Converting mp3 to the iPod ready AudioBook format
From Mike Beane's Blog
Mp3 to AAC
I've been tinkering with Super and am really liking it. I was able to convert videos from YouTube from FLV to ipod ready mpeg4 in seconds. I found that converting audiobooks was slightly more involved as the default AAC setting really wasn't the ipod was looking for. Before the directions, perhaps it is better to say what Super is and unfortunately for this post, I'm highlighting only one of the many things this program does!. From the Super "Important Information" install page:
SUPER © (Simplified Universal Player Encoder & Renderer) is nothing more than a trivial graphic user interface to the famous line command encoders:
* ffmpeg, mencoder, mplayer, x264, ffmpeg2theora, the libavcodec library and the theora/vorbis RealProducer plugIn.
SUPER © supports a wide variety of input/source file format to play or encode (to & from) without any additional third party software:
* Video: 3gp, asf, avi, dat, fli, flc, flv, mpg, mkv, mov, mp4, ogg, qt, ram, rm(vb), str, swf, ts, viv, vob, wmv ..
* Audio: ac3, amr, mp2, mp3, mpc, mp4, ogg, ra, wma
* AviSynth Script Files: avs
Converting mp3 to AudioBook with Super & iTunes
Super
- Start Super
- Select the Output Container: Apple Ipod
- Check the DISABLE VIDEO checkbox
- Leave the audio at the defaults
- Audio Freq: 22050
- Channels: 2
- Bitrate: 48 kbps
- DVD stream: default
- Right click within the program
- Select ADD MULTIMEDIA FILES
- Browse and select the files
- Select ENCODE (Active Job-List Files)
- Wait
- Browse to super\output\
- Rename .mp4 to .m4b (make a bat file)
iTunes
- iTunes: File->Add Folder
- Set Library to ALL
- Search your Library for Super (to isolate the files)
- Select the files
- Right Click and select GET INFO
- Set the File info
- Artist
- Album
- Year
- Volume
- Artwork
- Set Library to AudioBook and verify the book is there
- File->Create Playlist (name it the book)
- Drag the AudioBook to the playlist
- Synch the iPod
- Enjoy
You should now have an audiobook file on your iPod that is indexed (you can leave and come back to the exact spot) and has the slower/faster ability in playback. In regards to playlist order, if your files were name with the sequence number at the start of the filename, it all should be in order. If not, you will need to arrange them in the order needed.