AAC / gapless playing / iPod

[calestyo]

Hi.

Perhaps someone might help me with these questions, thanks in advance.

I'd like to use AAC as main codec for all my music on the ipod, but there are some problems with gapless playback.
It seems that newer iPods support this but only for:
- MP3's encoded by LAME or iTunes
- AAC (in an MP4 container) encoded by iTunes

Although both FAAC and Nero's AAC codec support gapless playback, it seems that the iPod does not evaluate their way of storing the gapless meta-data.

1) Is there a way to convert AAC's created by FAAC and/or Nero's AAC so that the ipod will play them gapless?

2) What is the meaning of this gapless flag one can set in ipod? Does this specify wheter to use gapless meta-data (if available) at all? Or is it just a hint that the ipod should try to remove gaps on files where not gapless meta-data is available?

3) As hinted in 1) I'd like to use FAAC (because it's OpenSource and avaialble for Linux) or at least Nero's AAC to encode my files.
Both support VBR. Does anyone know what iTunes AAC coded does? There is an option for variable bitrate but I've read on some forums that iTunes would use ABR.

4) Is there a way to use the iTunes AAC codec with dmc?

Best wishes,
Chris.

btw: Will dmc support FAAC in the future?

@Spoon: Are you thinking about a Linux/UNIX port of dbPoweramp?

[LtData]

Re: AAC / gapless playing / iPod

1) You could try encoding to a ALAC file and then having iTunes re-encode to a normal m4a file.
2) I have no idea on this.
3) Glancing at Wikipedia, it does look like iTunes uses ABR when you select VBR. Do note, though, that ABR and VBR are very similar to each other.
4) No, there was an old method in r11.5 but it was replaced by the Nero codec.

[calestyo]

Re: AAC / gapless playing / iPod

1) You could try encoding to a ALAC file and then having iTunes re-encode to a normal m4a file.

Don't understand what this would help? It would still use iTune's AAC codec (and I still would have to boot Windows ),...
Perhaps Spoon has any ideas?

4) No, there was an old method in r11.5 but it was replaced by the Nero codec.

What were the reasons for this?

[LtData]

Re: AAC / gapless playing / iPod

Whoops, I missed the part about you not being in Windows.

I think the reason for replacing the old iTunes method was that it was cumbersome and any updates to iTunes could break the encoder, as it launched iTunes and then closed it and started encoding.

Also, a Linux/Unix port is not likely to happen, as Spoon is the only Illustrate employee, so all dBpoweramp Products, including Sveta, are written by him and only by him.

[calestyo]

Re: AAC / gapless playing / iPod

Also, a Linux/Unix port is not likely to happen, as Spoon is the only Illustrate employee, so all dBpoweramp Products, including Sveta, are written by him and only by him.

I know, but depending on the programming language, and how clean (i.e. portable) he writes his code this shouldn't be impossible.
Of course one problem would be the shell integration and the GUI (for gods sake no one has had the stupid idea yet to port this to Linux).
Perhaps it would be interesting to use GTK for the GUI as this is also available to Windows.

[LtData]

Re: AAC / gapless playing / iPod

Which would require users to download and install GTK, we would have to make sure they are using the latest version... it would not be a decision to come to lightly.