Retaining ratings when converting FLAC to Apple Lossless

[jd7744]

I'm converting FLAC files tagged by JRiver Media Center. Ratings in JRMC are shown in ID tag as 1 thru 5 representing number of stars. When converting to M4A iTunes doesn't recognize the rating. iTunes ratings look to be stated in multiples of 10 so 80 (presumable 80%) is the equivalent of 4 stars in a 5 star system like JRMC. I tried using a rule in the conversion process. The rule is IF rating=4 Set rating=80. Thought I had it but didn't work.
I can't be the first to try to retain song ratings so are there and ideas/fixes out there?
Thanks

[Spoon]

Re: Retaining ratings when converting FLAC to Apple Lossless

Internally we fix the range to 10 so you cannot write 10 to 80 with dBpoweramp.

[jd7744]

Re: Retaining ratings when converting FLAC to Apple Lossless

If I tag a converted m4a file as 4 stars the ID tag will read 80. I use RJMC, Monkey Media and iTunes all for different purposes. Both iTunes and MM use the same system...20,40,60,80, etc while JRMC uses 1 thru 5. iTunes doesn't recognize MM's rating even thought they appear the same in the ID tag editor. I can manually change the JRMC generated rating ID tag from say 4 to 80 and and MM will recognize the change. I cannot do this in batch though (using convert audio) using the rule IF rating=3 SET rating=60. Am I stating the rule correctly or is it just that the rule won't recognize anything over 5?

Any idea how or where iTunes writes their rating? Changing the rating in iTunes does not change the rating as shown in the ID tag editor.
Thanks for your help

[Spoon]

Re: Retaining ratings when converting FLAC to Apple Lossless

iTunes would keep in its own database rather than in the file.

[sundog_ak]

Re: Retaining ratings when converting FLAC to Apple Lossless

I ran into the same issue converting FLAC to MP3 to read in iTunes (decided not to go M4A way). The problem isn't an MC or dB issue but one where Apple decided for some unknown reason not to read standard rating tags from the file. All the ratings are stored within the actual iTunes database. So it also works (badly) the reverse. If you rate something in iTunes it doesn't save to file and thus isn't read in any other non-Apple player.

There is software for MC that syncs iTunes and MC ratings. I have only tested it with FLAC to MP3 and so not sure how it works with M4A files but you can trial it:

http://www.misterpete.co.uk/mcis.html

More info here:

http://yabb.jriver.com/interact/index.php?topic=51734.0

I gave up on transferring the ratings since it was too much of a pain to keep it all coordinated. Apple could fix all this quite simply, but they haven't after all this time so doubt it will for whatever reason.

[jd7744]

Re: Retaining ratings when converting FLAC to Apple Lossless

Thats an excellent find. Thank you. I'll work it through and post back how well it works. Instructions indicate different file types can be synced which presumably hits my flac in MC vs. m4a in iTunes issue. JD

[jd7744]

Re: Retaining ratings when converting FLAC to Apple Lossless

Anyone know if I can use db as an external encoder for apple lossless within JRiver MC and what the parameters might be?