[Indigo Bob]

Hello....
 
I just purchased a Macbook Air and unfortunately my Flac files aren't playing with the available iTunes.   
 
I was wondering if anyone knew a good mp3 kbps or mp4 converter for the macbook air.
 
OR...
 
To avoid converting the files I was wondering if anyone knew of a good alternative to iTunes that is easily compatible with the macbook air.
 
I have am receiving a Fiio x3ii in the mail shortly and I don't think iTunes recognizes that DAP.  I would rather keep the files as Flac and play them on an alternative audio player so as to make the transfer to the Fiio x3ii seamless as well as not to have needless duplicates of tracks on my laptop.
 
Please let me know what you think or if you have a macbook and what the best solution for you was or if there is something I am not thinking of.
 
Thank you.

 

[NA Blur]

Try running iTunes in 32-bit mode. Right click the iTunes app, Get Info, set the option "Open in 32-bit mode."
 
That should get you on your way.

 

[Hydranix]

Apple deliberately excludes support for FLAC out-of-box in order to promote their own ALAC format.
 
Neither one is any better than the other as far as audio quality as they are both lossless codecs.
I don't really know what you mean by converting to kpbs? kpbs is an acronym for "Kilobits per second" which is a unit of measurement of bandwidth. Also mp4 isn't an audio encoding format like mp3 is, despite the similar names, MP is short for MPEG (Moving Picture Experts Group) which is who was tasked with developing a set of standards for Audio, Video, Transmission, Subtitles, computer animated graphics. MP4 is a container for containing audio, video, subtitles, and metadata of several different encoding formats.
 
M4A is the audio-only version of an MP4 container, and is usually encoded as AAC and sometimes ALAC.
 
 
 
If you absolutely must use iTunes, you have two options.
 
A) Convert audio files to ALAC format. (will not lose quality like converting to mp3 will) 
To  do this in the cleanest and safest way possible, you will need FFmpeg.
The current OS X version of FFmpeg can be found here: http://evermeet.cx/ffmpeg/ffmpeg-3.1.1.7/z
 
This shell script I wrote should automatically convert all flac files found in the music directory to alac. To be safe, you will need to delete the flac files yourself after the conversion.
 
 
#!/bin/bash
[[ "$(which ffmpeg)" ]] || { [[ -f "./ffmpeg" ]] || { echo "Unable to find ffmpeg... "; exit; }; }
find ~/Music -type f -iname "*.flac" -print|while read filename
do
  ffmpeg -i "${filename}" -acodec alac "${filename%%.*}".m4a
done
 
 
B) Purchase third party (extension?) for itunes to support FLAC
Examples could be http://www.channld.com/puremusic/​ or http://sonicstudio.com/amarra/products.php
 
 
 
If you could care less about iTunes, you have another option
 
C) Use anther media player capable of playing almost any format without any incentive to exclude any format.
 
VLC is a popular choice and works on OS X.
 
After VLC your choices run out fast. I don't know of any other trusted, mature and unbiased media player with a gui for OS X.
 
mPlayer is a personal favorite, but I don't think there exists a single Apple user that isn't offended by using a terminal for day-to-day things.

 

[Indigo Bob]

  Try running iTunes in 32-bit mode. Right click the iTunes app, Get Info, set the option "Open in 32-bit mode."
 
That should get you on your way.

I did what you said and got to "iTunes info" after selecting "get info" but there was no option to "open in 32-bit mode".
 
I read that "However, as MacOSX 10.9 does not support this solution anymore".
 
Unlucky.
 
But thank you for the feedback anyways.

 

[rockwell]

i use xld to convert flac files to alac files on my mac: http://tmkk.undo.jp/xld/index_e.html

 

[paaj]

XLD is great, also for ripping CD's in the future.

 

[Indigo Bob]

I appreciate the feedback.
 
I tried downloading it onto my mac, but it said it couldn't open because it was from an unidentified developer.  
 
But that's ok.  I have a trusty converter to convert flac to MP3 320.  I prefer to condense them to mp3 instead of going with ALAC for storage space.
 
But i will keep my Flac's for my fiio x3ii and store them onto an SD card.
 
If you have any other suggestions i would like to hear.

 

[haywood]

I appreciate the feedback.

I tried downloading it onto my mac, but it said it couldn't open because it was from an unidentified developer.

You can bypass the gatekeeper for an application by right-clicking the application icon but caveat emptor. I'm not sure about the url given but XLD is legit and I use it.

But that's ok.  I have a trusty converter to convert flac to MP3 320.  I prefer to condense them to mp3 instead of going with ALAC for storage space.

But i will keep my Flac's for my fiio x3ii and store them onto an SD card.

If you have any other suggestions i would like to hear.

The idea is to convert to alac *instead of* flac for use on both your mba and fiio which would save you the storage space taken up by the duplicate mp3s.

If you're just hard up for storage on your air in general you can move your music library to a big (128-256gb) sd card, there are even models that mount flush-ish though they tend to be more expensive.

If you're looking for a free alternative player instead of iTunes then Vox might be worth checking out.

 

[Indigo Bob]

If you're just hard up for storage on your air in general you can move your music library to a big (128-256gb) sd card, there are even models that mount flush-ish though they tend to be more expensive.

 
That's what I was thinking.  I began with the idea of using ALAC, but noticed it began taking up more space in storage than I wished.  I have only 128gb storage.  I'm kind of planning for the future since school is going to test my storage this year.  If storage wasn't a priority i would definitely go the route of ALAC.
 
So I was going to buy one of those SD cards that sit flush like you mentioned:
 
https://www.amazon.com/Transcend-JetDrive-Storage-Expansion-TS128GJDL130/dp/B00K73NT0S/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1470032334&sr=8-1&keywords=sd+cards+for+macbook+air
 
Plus it has the added benefits of backing up my files, having them be ultraportable and transferable, AND allows me to have a separate "archival storage" for my music since i almost exclusively buy online.
 
I liked going with the mp3 320's because I could also store them on my iPhone despite the fact that i do 90% of my listening on my fiiO x3ii.  
 
I haven't tried other media players because i really like iTunes and especially how it is easily compatible with my iPhone despite the fact that i don't actually buy from iTunes.

 

[dbxrecord]

You could try opening a Flac file with a Mozilla browser in Mac , should be interesting to see if that works, as Mozilla provide a simple music file player supporting
Flac and many other formats.

 

[Roseval]

Lot's of alternatives for iTunes today: http://www.thewelltemperedcomputer.com/SW/OSX/Players.htm

On this forum check : https://www.head-fi.org/threads/mac-os-x-music-players-alternatives-to-itunes.539740/

 

[audiomonkey777]

Lot's of alternatives for iTunes today: http://www.thewelltemperedcomputer.com/SW/OSX/Players.htm

On this forum check : https://www.head-fi.org/threads/mac-os-x-music-players-alternatives-to-itunes.539740/

I use Audirvana Plus on my iMac and it works well. No issues.

 

[whohasaquestion]

Apple deliberately excludes support for FLAC out-of-box in order to promote their own ALAC format.

Neither one is any better than the other as far as audio quality as they are both lossless codecs.
I don't really know what you mean by converting to kpbs? kpbs is an acronym for "Kilobits per second" which is a unit of measurement of bandwidth. Also mp4 isn't an audio encoding format like mp3 is, despite the similar names, MP is short for MPEG (Moving Picture Experts Group) which is who was tasked with developing a set of standards for Audio, Video, Transmission, Subtitles, computer animated graphics. MP4 is a container for containing audio, video, subtitles, and metadata of several different encoding formats.

M4A is the audio-only version of an MP4 container, and is usually encoded as AAC and sometimes ALAC.



If you absolutely must use iTunes, you have two options.

A) Convert audio files to ALAC format. (will not lose quality like converting to mp3 will)
To do this in the cleanest and safest way possible, you will need FFmpeg.
The current OS X version of FFmpeg can be found here: http://evermeet.cx/ffmpeg/ffmpeg-3.1.1.7/z

This shell script I wrote should automatically convert all flac files found in the music directory to alac. To be safe, you will need to delete the flac files yourself after the conversion.


#!/bin/bash
[[ "$(which ffmpeg)" ]] || { [[ -f "./ffmpeg" ]] || { echo "Unable to find ffmpeg... "; exit; }; }
find ~/Music -type f -iname "*.flac" -print|while read filename
do
ffmpeg -i "${filename}" -acodec alac "${filename%%.*}".m4a
done


B) Purchase third party (extension?) for itunes to support FLAC
Examples could be http://www.channld.com/puremusic/ or http://sonicstudio.com/amarra/products.php



If you could care less about iTunes, you have another option

C) Use anther media player capable of playing almost any format without any incentive to exclude any format.

VLC is a popular choice and works on OS X.

After VLC your choices run out fast. I don't know of any other trusted, mature and unbiased media player with a gui for OS X.

mPlayer is a personal favorite, but I don't think there exists a single Apple user that isn't offended by using a terminal for day-to-day things.

To this point about VLC. I tried playing the same file via VLC and iTunes but they don't sound exactly the same. I think it has something to do with the gain of each application. I max out the volume on VLC and iTunes, and two steps lower from max off the master volume. VLC consistently plays louder. Weird.