Advice on merging files?

[LuciferEternal]

I kinda asked this in another post, but this is more to the point:

Does anyone have any advice or suggestions on merging m4a/m4b files? How about on merging mp3 files?

Here's my background on it:

I've been using "MP3 Splitter & Joiner" to merge the Mp3's but it can't handle m4a's. When I merge the mp3's they work just fine in iTunes, no matter the length.

I've read reports of people having issues when their audiobooks are longer than 15 hours iTunes and their iPods freaking out. I finally started merging m4a's with "YAMB" and the first 5 or 6 I merged worked just fine, including 1 over 15 hours (18 hours actually).

Here's where my issue comes in though. I then had a problem with a book at 25 hours... it merged it, but showed the time to be 777 hours. No good. Tried with a different book (14 hours) and it also showed way too long.

Essentially, I'm curious if anyone here (since you are all technical audio geniuses) have any experience with this and any suggestions on how to merge my two remaining m4a audiobooks (the 25 hours one and the 14 hours one) with either a different program, or with YAMB. Or if you have any info on the length limitations in iTunes?




This part is from my other post and I want this one mostly about the merging, but I feel it's notable to mention...
I've converted mp3 files of large lengths (28 hours) to m4b (and m4a) with dbpowerAMP and got the same length issue in iTunes (361 hours for that file), so it might be iTunes and not the way I'm merging them.

[LtData]

Re: Advice on merging files?

One user mentioned a fix for the "time" issue in iTunes is to use the profile "Force LC AAC" and that will fix it.

[msandersen]

Re: Advice on merging files?

I don't know the answer, but you might try playing the joined file in another player that supports M4a files to determine if the file or iTunes is at fault.
Note: M4a and M4b are identical except for the extension, which marks it as an audiobook. For instance, WinAmp plays m4a files, but doesn't recognise the m4b extension. You simply have to temporarily change the extension and it works in it.
I think you can set MP3 files to be resumable in iTunes, under the Options tab in Get Info. It won't make it show up in the Audiobook section, though.

[msandersen]

Re: Advice on merging files?

One user mentioned a fix for the "time" issue in iTunes is to use the profile "Force LC AAC" and that will fix it.

Well, if the issue turned out to be the Nero M4a/b Encoder, and I don't think he mentioned using it, he might also try the iTunesEncode howTo stickied at the top of this forum to have iTunes encode it. Or just import it directly if from MP3. Just to test if it works. Who knows how long 28hrs takes to encode though... well, he would!
28 hrs is one huge audiofile, no wonder if developers might'nt have tested it. I can imaging some sort of counter overflow problem, a bit like the Y2K bug (28 hrs is 100800 seconds).
If the file is fine and it is iTunes, report it as a bug from Help -> iTunes Feedback. It might help other audiobook-o-philes.

I wonder if the iTunes store carries many 20+ hr audiobooks, like the Collected Works of Harry Potter or something. I know they have Dune, it is 21hrs, but don't know if they split it. I wouldn't think so.