what is the appropriate format to convert audio mp4 to?

[Harry Putnam]

Setup: windows 7 64 bit on an i7 Q820 1.73 ghz, 1.73 ghz
8 gb of ram, all on a Sager NP8760 laptop

I have problems with winamp when I allow it to be the default for mp4
files.

Winamp then wants to open the mp4 video files I have, and it always
leads to major problems where winamp stalls and requires a reboot to
break its hold on the os.

(Yes, I know winamp is dying but not ready to go looking for something
as good yet)

I confine winamp to sound files other than mp4, then Video Lan, my
video player wants to open the mp4 (all sound) files too.

That's ok, and it plays them fine but VLC is not geared up as sound
application with all the jots and tittles winamp has.

So, and finally cutting to the chase... I'd like to convert all my
sound only mp4 files to some other format that I can dedicate winamp
to. Trouble is, there was a time when mp4 was only a sound format and
during that time I converted lots of *.wav and other files to mp4 to
conserve space... back when space was not so cheap.

So, I'd like to know what format will not be a lossy conversion. And
would make good sense to use.

I suspect the mp4 formats available when I did most of the converting
was a lossy format already so it may not even be much of factor by
now. Probably no sense going back to *.wav after already losing
whatever quality old mp4 compression required.

What would be a sensible format to convert all sound only mp4 to?

[Nil[_2_]]

On 02 Feb 2014, Harry Putnam > wrote in
rec.audio.pro:

> So, I'd like to know what format will not be a lossy conversion.
> And would make good sense to use.
>
> I suspect the mp4 formats available when I did most of the
> converting was a lossy format already so it may not even be much
> of factor by now. Probably no sense going back to *.wav after
> already losing whatever quality old mp4 compression required.
>
> What would be a sensible format to convert all sound only mp4 to?

MP4 is a compressed format, so you've already damaged the files beyond
repair. If you must convert them to a lossless format, your choices can
include uncompressed WAV of AIFF, compressed FLAC, compressed Apple
Lossless (ALAC), compressed lossless Windows Media Audio, and Monkey's
Audio. They won't regain any of the discarded audio information, but at
least they won't lose any more during another cycle of lossy
compression.

[Ralph Barone[_2_]]

Nil > wrote:
> On 02 Feb 2014, Harry Putnam > wrote in
> rec.audio.pro:
>
>> So, I'd like to know what format will not be a lossy conversion.
>> And would make good sense to use.
>>
>> I suspect the mp4 formats available when I did most of the
>> converting was a lossy format already so it may not even be much
>> of factor by now. Probably no sense going back to *.wav after
>> already losing whatever quality old mp4 compression required.
>>
>> What would be a sensible format to convert all sound only mp4 to?
>
> MP4 is a compressed format, so you've already damaged the files beyond
> repair. If you must convert them to a lossless format, your choices can
> include uncompressed WAV of AIFF, compressed FLAC, compressed Apple
> Lossless (ALAC), compressed lossless Windows Media Audio, and Monkey's
> Audio. They won't regain any of the discarded audio information, but at
> least they won't lose any more during another cycle of lossy
> compression.

Why don't you just change the extension of the audio files to .MA4 and
associate that extension with WinAmp. Don't actually change the files.

[Nil[_2_]]

On 02 Feb 2014, Ralph Barone > wrote in
rec.audio.pro:

> Why don't you just change the extension of the audio files to .MA4
> and associate that extension with WinAmp. Don't actually change
> the files.

I'm sure you intended this to addressed to the OP, not me. But you
have a good solution, I think. Here's a bit from the article about
the MPEG-4 format (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MPEG-4_Part_14):

> .MP4 versus .M4A
>
> M4A stands for MPEG 4 Audio and is a filename extension used to
> represent audio files.
>
> The existence of two different filename extensions, .MP4 and .M4A,
> for naming audio-only MP4 files has been a source of confusion
> among users and multimedia playback software. Some file managers,
> such as Windows Explorer, look up the media type and associated
> applications of a file based on its filename extension. But since
> MPEG-4 Part 14 is a container format, MPEG-4 files may contain any
> number of audio, video, and even subtitle streams, making it
> impossible to determine the type of streams in an MPEG-4 file
> based on its filename extension alone. In response, Apple Inc.
> started using and popularizing the .m4a filename extension, which
> is used for MP4 containers with audio data in the lossy Advanced
> Audio Coding (AAC) or its own lossless Apple Lossless (ALAC)
> formats. Software capable of audio/video playback should recognize
> files with either .m4a or .mp4 filename extensions, as would be
> expected, since there are no file format differences between the
> two. Most software capable of creating MPEG-4 audio will allow the
> user to choose the filename extension of the created MPEG-4 files.

This makes it sound like he could change the extension of his audio-
only MP4 files to M4A and Winamp should be happy.

[Harry Putnam]

Ralph Barone > writes:

> Nil > wrote:
>> On 02 Feb 2014, Harry Putnam > wrote in
>> rec.audio.pro:
>>
>>> So, I'd like to know what format will not be a lossy conversion.
>>> And would make good sense to use.
>>>
>>> I suspect the mp4 formats available when I did most of the
>>> converting was a lossy format already so it may not even be much
>>> of factor by now. Probably no sense going back to *.wav after
>>> already losing whatever quality old mp4 compression required.
>>>
>>> What would be a sensible format to convert all sound only mp4 to?
>>
>> MP4 is a compressed format, so you've already damaged the files beyond
>> repair. If you must convert them to a lossless format, your choices can
>> include uncompressed WAV of AIFF, compressed FLAC, compressed Apple
>> Lossless (ALAC), compressed lossless Windows Media Audio, and Monkey's
>> Audio. They won't regain any of the discarded audio information, but at
>> least they won't lose any more during another cycle of lossy
>> compression.
>
> Why don't you just change the extension of the audio files to .MA4 and
> associate that extension with WinAmp. Don't actually change the files.

That is a great idea...and so straight forward, thanks. I just had
stumbled across the fact that those extensions could be done like that
but still hadn't quite dawned that it would resolve my problem.

One thing more on this. The newish mp4 that youtube is using.

People often seem to submit what is really just an audio, in video
format by adding some silly gunk that appears in video along with it.
I don't mean the live performances and such... but stuff where the
musician may be long dead and they put a couple of pictures of him/her
and its now a video.

I guess, to handle them as audio only would require an actual reformat
that extracts the audio ... eh?

[Marc Wielage[_2_]]

On Sun, 2 Feb 2014 17:50:44 -0800, Nil wrote
(in article >):

> MP4 is a compressed format, so you've already damaged the files beyond
> repair.
>------------------------------<snip>------------------------------<

That's the right answer. Once the files are stepped on with lossy
compression, nothing can get that information back again.

Just keep them in the original format and don't compress or change them any
further. Or, better yet, pay money to get an original uncompressed source
from CD, if the performance is commercially available.

--MFW