Questions about using these two together:

- Does Nero Digital make ".MP4" or ".M4A" files?
- Do iTunes / iPod care about this?
- What does iPod do with the "HE" information?
- Are there any portable players that can play HE-AAC?

Thanks if you reply.

.MP4, but it's just a question of naming. The files are the same.


No

Nothing

Not that I know.

Menno

Menno,

Have you added the .M4A extension to the default audio file extensions that Nero can read so that Nero can read exisiting M4A files without the file extension renaming mess? I believe you or Ivan told me in a thread here on HA that you would add this feature (the ability for Nero to recognize and play/read without the need for renaming .m4a files). When will this feature appear in a Nero update?

Alternatively...

If many people will be using Nero Digital to encode HE-AAC files for playback on iPod (or particularly iPod Mini), how about if Nero options can be set to:

a. encode files with ".M4A" extension for iTunes
b. construct tags in the same way as iTunes?

Or, how about a "Nero Digital" plug-in for iTunes?

I'd rather use iTunes as my music manager and Nero just for ripping/encoding to 64kbps HE-AAC.

Thanks.

I am having problems with my iPod skipping over songs encoded with Nero (normal/high preset) - songs encoded with FAAC do not have this problem. Any ideas? I am using Nero 6.3.0.0.

Yes, this has been added. Should be in next update.

Menno

I haven't noticed that yet. But I'll test it.

Menno

Thanks for adding the .M4A file extension support Menno. I want to thank both you and Ivan for the fine work you've been doing with Nero 6 HE AAC and AAC MP4 audio support.

Any chance there will be a standalone MP4/M4A LC AAC and HE AAC audio app forthcoming from Nero (one with a simple GUI interface)? It would be nice to have a standalone Windows encoding app to use without having to fire up Nero 6.

I would buy one, as would likely many other people wanting to encode MP4/M4A files with Nero's excellent MP4 audio codec. It could be used to introduce people to MP4 audio encoding and also help sell copies of Nero 6 also (with links inside, etc.).

You can run Nero 6 as standalone encoder app. I think it's something like:

Nero.exe /Dialog:EncodeFiles

Someone posted it on this forum some time ago, it this doesn't work, search for that original post.

Menno

nero.exe /Dialog:EncodeFiles

Thanks. Had no idea Nero had a Windows GUI based encoder included!

This is just what I've been looking for. Thanks again Menno!

Are there more switches?
like something to actually encode any given file ?
as of now with that commandline only the GUI pops up...

you ahead ppl really should know these things, by heart

Probably, but I don't know them.

I only knew this one because someone posted it on HA somewhere.

Menno

It was me.

To find out the command lines to reach different windows inside Nero, read SmartStart.exe in a Hex editor.

IIRC, there was no command to start encoding a file right away.

In the mean time you can use the nero codec from dbPoweramp and have it auto generate .M4A files (see recent post by Spoon).

Cheers,
Fairy

I have this same problem, though with any profile aac files created by nero (I have used several of the VBR presets, but not CBR yet). Since I just got the ipod, I was planning on returning it to the store this weekend. Often it will *crash* (freeze for a second, then reset to the apple logo) about 14~18 seconds into a song. Either it freezes there, or sometimes it will skip over the tracks entirely. It seems to happen most often with the first track in an album, which if I skip, it plays fine with the rest. All my Beatles rips exhibit this problem.

Is this nero-related, or perhaps something wrong with my ipod? It seems somewhat regular, but so far I have not noticed it with mp3 tracks.

Could the skips be caused by the bitrate going above 320kbps? Apple's pages list that as a limitation of the iPod...

Yes, I was wondering about that. Is there a utility that can graph the bitrate / time for aac files? If this is an error in Nero's VBR presets (is >320kbps AAC in spec?) then perhaps a bitrate plot would provide an answer to my iPod problem.

AFAIK it goes up to 448kbps, and this is one the advantages AAC has over MP3.