Hello. I know this subject in general has been talked about a lot of times before but I've noticed there is still something wrong with gapless playback of LAME encoded MP3s in iTunes and on the iPod.
99% of the time, my MP3s encoded with LAME are perfectly gapless when read through iTunes or my iPod, but there is still some songs with a very small gap between seamless tracks; it's very faint but audible to me.

I thought iTunes was supposed to be completely gapless by now, do you have any explanations or solutions to fix that?

You need to check your gap detection settings when encoding the mp3's.

I use EAC and Lame 3.97 for all of my electronic and DJ sets and there is no problem at all with the gapless feature when playing it on my iPod Classic 80 GB.
JXL

Have you confirmed that the LAME tags on *all* of your MP3s are intact? Not all programs that use LAME for encoding necessarily preserve the LAME tag, which iTunes - or any other application (fb2k, Winamp) - needs for true gapless playback.

I use EAC in secure mode to encode my MP3s so there shouldn't be any problem with it, I suppose the LAME tag is preserved.

This problem is kind of known, though default settings should provide acceptable results.

Try using pcutmp3 on an MP3/CUE image. Normally, gapless MP3s are encoded with no overlap, but the pcutmp3 technique forces an overlap, so the audio should "line up" better.

Also try using a different gapless player such as foobar2000 and see if the problems persist. iTunes is known to be gapless, but I'm always a bit skeptical about it.

It's perfectly gapless with foobar. I only have the problem with iTunes.

...Actually, I just realized I also have the same problem with foobar, sometimes.

It seems like at the end of the day, it's totally impossible to find a perfect solution to gapless, there will always be something that doesn't work sometimes...

So why don't you read it then? This issue comes up at least once every two months, because people seem to prefer spamming the forum with long answered questions over using the search function. See this thread for a start.

iTunes' gapless implementation is fine. It's not an gapless metadata issue either. The LAME encoder just doesn't work correctly at file boundaries some times. The artifacts are contained within the mp3 audio tracks. If you have an iPod anyway, use AAC. You get working gapless, more overall quality per byte, and much less killer samples.

Lossless always works. And have you tried using pcutmp3? That will probably result in an improvement.

Sorry, that's not what I wanted to say: I meant that the issue was supposed to have been solved for quite some time (everyone is saying iTunes finally supports gapless playback with LAME encoded MP3s). I also used the search function and didn't get anything but I suppose I should have searched more. Sorry again.


I tried encoding tracks that had a small gap in AAC format, using the encoder implemented in iTunes, and I still have the same small gap.

FWIW, the issue with gapless lossy when properly implemented has to do with discontinuities in amplitude at the split point, not inaccuracy in timing when joining tracks.

I've yet to see any examples of tracks created with Lame/Nero/Apple that do not play back gaplessly as a result of improper timing.

Plunk, perhaps you can record and upload a <30 second clip of the output of iTunes showing this problem?

I'm gonna try, I'm not sure if I can do it.

OK, now my MP3s that had a gap play perfectly fine in iTunes, they are completely gapless, I don't know why. There is still a small gap on the iPod, though.

I've recorded the output of iTunes with Audacity during a transition between two tracks encoded in AAC (with the iTunes encoder), where the gap (more like a click, actually) is audible around the 11th second. The songs are the next-to-last and last tracks of the album Madonna by the band Trail of Dead.
I have the same click sound when playing LAME encoded MP3s of these tracks in foobar.

Sorry but I can't find how to attach a file to this post, so I put it here >> http://www.fileshost.com/download.php?id=CF1A731B1

OK. New to all this, so be gentle.

I'm having an issue where I'll import WAV files into iTunes, and gapless playback will work fine. Until I change ANYTHING about the info in a file (like adding a band name, or any notes, or even (ironically) checking "Gapless album"). If I do any of these things it adds a .013 second gap at the end of the song. Is this related to the encoding issues mentioned above?

Oh, and same with mp3, m4a, etc.

I had a problem with this on my 30 gig video IPod. I made the mistake of upgrading the firmware and immediately got gaps just when playing songs on the IPOD. ITunes played them back fine. I had to fully restore my IPOD to the original firmware before Dark Side of the Moon would play back the way it should. This was just with MP3. Didn't effect the M4a's encoded with Itunes.