How do I force m4a tracks to be trnascoded?

[ausbox]

winamp just transfers m4a audio to my Samsung T10 without transcoding it. How do I force it to be transcoded?

[DJ Egg]

Winamp -> Prefs (Ctrl+P) -> Portables -> (Samsung T10) -> Transcoding tab -> Advanced Settings:

Checkmark: Force transcoding of compatible tracks if bitrate is over x kbps

Set "x" to whatever the lowest bitrate you've got is, e.g. 56


Back in the Transcoding tab, select the desired Encoder, and set it to "Highly preferred"

Note: You might also have to checkmark "Enable transcoding..." and set the other Encoders to "Do not use"...

[ausbox]

Yep saw that setting. Thanks for that.

However ALL I want transcoded is M4A tracks nothing else. I have m4a tracks at many different bitrates.

So if I set it to 128kbps then it will transocde even my mp3 files which I do not want.

Hopefully there is something coming soon.

[DJ Egg]

Hmm, right...

Yeah, I don't personally own any p4s type players, so I'm not sure if there's any way to tell it what filetypes are compatible or not.

I know for generic usb devices/drives managed by pmp_usb there's a "Supported Formats" field in the Advanced tab, but I don't think that exists for pmp_p4s managed devices...

[ausbox]

Where is the supported formats field???

[DJ Egg]

As I said, it's only there for generic usb devices/drives (eg. flash drives, usb thumbdrives, external usb hard drives, generic mp3 players) managed by pmp_usb.dll, and not for specific/manufacturer mp3 players managed by pmp_p4s, pmp_njb or pmp_ipod.

Creative, PlaysForSure and iPod players all have their supported formats set internally, so there should be no need for us to let the user specify what they are (not that we can't, but just that it's not been implemented). Whereas generic usb drives can theoretically support any/all file formats.

Alas, I don't have a solution for you right now, other than to transfer the m4a files manually/separately (eg. by right-clicking them in the playlist/ml and selecting: Send To -> Samsung player), and then uncheck the aforementioned "Force transcoding of compatible tracks" setting when doing a full auto transfer/sync (assuming you can exclude the m4a files from also being transferred during auto sync/transfer).

[ausbox]

Would love a simple....check the box to say what format you want on your player and to convert everything else.

A real shame.

[Rocker]

its samsung's fault if they set their player to tell the host that it supports m4a when it doesn't.

perhaps updating the firmware will fix the problem?

[DJ Egg]

Maybe it only supports LC-AAC in M4A container, but not HE-AAC (aacPlus), or something like that...? Lord knows, heh.

[ausbox]

Whatever it does or doesn't support, I hope one day Winamp gives me an option as to what formats I want on my MP3.

[ausbox]

Mediamonkey does exactly what I am after. Check what formats you want on the player and what bit rate and convert everything else.

[ausbox]

Forgot to mention the Samsung T10 does support m4a just not the tags, which makes it useless.

[ausbox]

Any update on this? I have gone back to Winamp due to the much more intuitive interface, but I need the auto conversion feature of MediaMonkey!

Help...I will pay for it.

[ausbox]

Any update at all???

[DJ Egg]

No, nothing yet.

What kind of player supports M4A but not tags?
I find that rather strange... to put it mildly.

[Kamesennin]

I have a similar problem with my Creative ZEN. The manual said the this media player supports "non protected AAC" files, which means in reallity MP4 AAC-LC. But with the encoder options by Winamp 5.541 Pro, when I transcode a file into MP4/AAC-LC the result is a incompatible file.
I compared different M4A files with GSpot 4.70a some of the my ZEN was unable and some able to play them.
I found that the unable to play files (all of them encoded by winamp last version) don´t have the "M4A: Apple iTunes AAC-LC (.M4A)Audio" tag in the Container section. All the winamp encoded files are similar to this in the result window of GSpot, Container section:

--Container--
mp42: MP4 v2 (ISO 14496-14)
-isom: MP4 Base Media v1 (ISO 14496-12:2003)

And the Winamp Format info into the File info window:
--Format Info--
Track Type Info
1 Audio MPEG-4 AAC LC (...The info of duration, frequency, bitrate)
2 od Object Descriptors
3 scene BIFS

On the other hand, the files able to play in ZEN (encoded long time ago by Realplayer) have the next tags:

--Container--
M4A: Apple iTunes AAC-LC (.M4A)Audio
-mp42: MP4 v2 (ISO 14496-14)
-isom: MP4 Base Media v1 (ISO 14496-12:2003)

And the Winamp Format info into the File info window:
--Format Info--
Track Type Info
1 Audio MPEG-4 AAC LC (...The info of duration, frequency, bitrate)

I don´t know exactly what this means. Probably, the encoder/transcoder in Winamp lacks this "Apple iTunes tag" or the container for these files is different, in addition of the additionall "tracks" made by Winamp. I am almost sure that this is the reason for the incompatibility of M4A files encoded by Winamp in my Creative ZEN and possibly in the iPod's and the T10's too. There is no difference in the playback throughout Winamp

I doesn't like neither iPods nor iTunes software, but is possible that MP4/AAC-LC files have better quality compared with the same bitrate of MP3 files, I think that this compatibility could be considered in future versions of Winamp.