Transfering mp3 files to iTunes

[linus]

I know that I am in the wrong forum, but cannote find the forum for 1.3 beta. I have a maddening problem. Once I have converted my cassette tape to mp3 and downloaded it onto an external hard drive as a folder I cannnote drag and drop the folder and transfere all the titles in the folder to Itunes e.g. if there is a tape with 10 tracks and I name each one, then export multiple into mp3, when I take the mp3 folder and try to drag and drop it into Itunes I only get the first track imported into Itunes although all the tracks show on the mp3 folder on the hard drive. Previously with Audacity 1.2 I have succesfully imoprted 180 folders,2000 tracks, into iTunes with very few problems. Unfortunantly I cannote reload 1.2 no matter how hard I try,for my particular usage it was a far simpler procces,especially converting the tracks to mp3 and importing the folder into iTunes. Can anyone tell me what I am doing wrong ? or how to solve this problem. All advice gratefully recieved.

Linus

[kozikowski]

One common way to confuse Windows is to have "funny" characters in the filenames. Did you try to put dates in your filenames? Operating systems hate the "/" character. That would create a conflict between the folders you can see and the ones Windows or iTunes sees. Start there. Any other funny characters like "?" or the quote marks themselves?

Try one transfer with only unquestioned legal characters in the filenames: Upper and lower case letters, numbers, underscore and dash. If that fails, too, then we need to dig further. You can run into problems with meta-data, too, but that's less likely.

It's disturbing that you can't install Audacity 1.2, not that you'd want to. If you have any computer past Windows XP, Audacity 1.2 is not fully supported and can cause problems.

Koz

[kozikowski]

Why are you creating MP3 files in Audacity? iTunes native uses AAC, not MP3 and it's a simple matter to make iTunes do the conversion for you. No lame needed.

Koz

[waxcylinder]

See this sticky thread for my workflow to take Audacity Projects to AAC files in iTunes: http://forum.audacityteam.org/viewtopic ... 28&t=18759

WC

[linus]

Wow, thanks people, I never expected such an amazing response to a daft question like mine. I have got to "fess" up as an old "silver surfer" you are way out of my league.Gale Andrews put me wise to the / ? etc. but as for the rest of it I am still in the dark. For instance,you say that I can convert from Audacity to the iTunes AAC in itunes but when I go into edit>preferances I don't come up with export option,nor can I find Metadata.So Koz once again thanks for your help only wish I had the smarts to do as you suggest.
As for the workflow sheet, I can manage to get to No.2 but from No.3 onwards I'm stumped,the intial problem was that I could not succesfully drag and drop the edited mp3 file into Itunes in it's entirety, out of ten tracks I only transfered one or two, the rest stay in the original folder, but I cannote get them into the Itunes library.Thank you w/c for such a detailed break down, and it would seem that I am not alone in needing your expertise as I see lots of posts on this thread,I just wanted to be able to carry on digitising all my old jazz tapes that I have accrued over the last fifty years, and had been doing quite successfull until I had problems with Audacity 1.2 is there any simpler methode,say at a lower level than "Audacity for Dummies", that would enable me attain my goal ?
Once again thanks a lot fella's for you help, time and expertise, Linus

[waxcylinder]

For instance,you say that I can convert from Audacity to the iTunes AAC in itunes but when I go into edit>preferances I don't come up with export option,nor can I find Metadata.

Basically you just need to import the exported WAV files that you make with Audacity into your iTunes library. I hate drag'n'drop it's a nasty dangerous way of doing things IMHO. Instead I used Add Folder to library or Add File to library. Then in the settings that are used to control your CD ripping format in iTunes - this is on the General tab of iTunes' Edit>Preferences, you will see abutton labelled "Import Settings" about 2/3 of the way down. Click on this and set bit to AAC at your preferred bitrate (I use AAC 256). Then to converth the WAV files to AAC just right click on them and select "Create AAC Version". Note that this will leave you with a WAV version and an AAC version of the same file as it makes a copy and not a direct conversion (safer that way ) - so you will need to delete the WAV file(s) from your library.

I have got to "fess" up as an old "silver surfer" you are way out of my league.

Nah... I'm a greybeard too - and I only startted in digital audio a couple of years or so ago - so you can learn and conquer all this stuff too.

WC

[waxcylinder]

You might finf the improved workflow sheet that I developed for the 1.3/2.0 manual easier to follow - see: http://manual.audacityteam.org/man/Samp ... _to_iTunes

WC