m4a Codec Beta (AAC and Apple Lossless)

[Spoon]

Re: m4a Codec Beta (AAC and Apple Lossless)

However, opening these files in Foobar2000 it does not accurately find *any* tags at all on these files (it does, however, play the files back perfectly).

The nero encoder by default writes a blank nero ID Tag (perhaps containing the nero tool version). Nero ID Tags are very different to iTunes tags (which the world seem to be using). Foobar can read nero tags and itune tags, but not both at the same time. So when it finds the nero tag it just reads that ignoreing the itunes tag...at least that is my understanding.

[Deano]

Re: m4a Codec Beta (AAC and Apple Lossless)

That doesn't explain why it worked in 11.5 and does not work now. I'm using the exact same Nero encoder and Foobar2000, the only thing that has changed is dBpowerAMP's codec.

[Spoon]

Re: m4a Codec Beta (AAC and Apple Lossless)

I tried one file with the foobar (v9.4.1) and it read the idtags.

[Spoon]

Re: m4a Codec Beta (AAC and Apple Lossless)

Update 12th February

m4a
fix to nero encoding 6 channel or extensible (Error writing audio data to StdIn Pipe [clEncoder::EncodeBlock])
aac decoder
fix, delete source works when converting from m4a now

New aac encoder.

[Ron F.]

Re: m4a Codec Beta (AAC and Apple Lossless)

Update 12th February

m4a
fix to nero encoding 6 channel or extensible (Error writing audio data to StdIn Pipe [clEncoder::EncodeBlock])
aac decoder
fix, delete source works when converting from m4a now

New aac encoder.

Excellent. The bug is gone, it works great, and I am off and running again.

Thank you.

[gc76]

Re: m4a Codec Beta (AAC and Apple Lossless)

I am getting "Error decoding AAC, file is AAC? [clfaad::Create]"

This is an aac file that plays in winamp.

[Spoon]

Re: m4a Codec Beta (AAC and Apple Lossless)

Does the file have an idv2 tag at the front?

[gc76]

Re: m4a Codec Beta (AAC and Apple Lossless)

It was ripped using streamripper/winamp. How do I determine if it has that tag format at the front?

[Deano]

Re: m4a Codec Beta (AAC and Apple Lossless)

I tried one file with the foobar (v9.4.1) and it read the idtags.

I am using Foobar v0.9.4.2. These are being converted from FLAC files, so maybe that is the culprit if not the version differences we seem to have. I shall try and rip from a CD and see what happens.

[Deano]

Re: m4a Codec Beta (AAC and Apple Lossless)

Right, I have tried encoding directly from a CD (Killswitch Engage - As Daylight Dies) and have received the same result, in the tags not being read properly in Foobar2000.

I manually used Foobar2000 to remove all tags and reinserted them using Foobar2000's tag editor. These then showed up in Foobar2000 (naturally) and also in the Popup from dBpowerAMP.

If you like Spoon I can send you a file I am having initial problems reading the tags from if this would benefit investigations?

[Spoon]

Re: m4a Codec Beta (AAC and Apple Lossless)

Sure a small file please.

[Deano]

Re: m4a Codec Beta (AAC and Apple Lossless)

A small file is not a problem. 1.75mb isn't too big for your inbox right? Anyway, sent it to the address contained on:

http://www.dbpoweramp.com/email.htm

[Spoon]

Re: m4a Codec Beta (AAC and Apple Lossless)

Update 14th February

Nero AAC encoder fixed so RTP hint track is not created always. Download as first post.

New m4a Utility Codecs released (see first message).

[Deano]

Re: m4a Codec Beta (AAC and Apple Lossless)

Hey again Spoon, sorry if I seem to be putting a downer on your party but I have more issues.

a.) Your new Nero encoder release did not solve any of my previous tagging problems (although I was not really expecting it to, with the fix being for the streaming hint stuff). I have even tried with both the RTP Hint checkbox on and off and it does not make a difference. Hopefully the file I emailed to you might help diagnose the issues.

b) Now the Nero encoder, after finishing a conversion from FLAC successfully, is coming up with a "Windows has encountered an error" box and asking me to close the converter (even though it appears to have finished). If it is any help I can send a dump from one of these, although I doubt it'll do much good.

c) When I try and run the "Optimize m4a Utility" you posted (simply because I wanted to help partcipate in the testing, not because I really need it) from the Convert To dialog box and select the "m4a Optimize" codec, I hit the Covert button and then dBpowerAMP sits there doing nothing. MusicCoverter.exe is in Task Manager using 5696k of memory, but the window appears to do nothing. I have to "End Task" on this eventually (and I left it open for several minutes to make sure). This also happens if I go to "Convert To" and press the "List/Rename" button when in the "Optimize m4a" codec, so I have a theory this is to do with the naming code when using this particular utility.

I am using R12 Reference for the above operation (if that makes any difference I would be surprised).

[lump1]

Re: m4a Codec Beta (AAC and Apple Lossless)

Will this ever be able to do 2-pass encoding?

I asked because I tried messing around in the encoder.txt to add a 2-pass option and it always delivered an error. I figure that this is because it does the encoding directly from memory instead of writing a temporary wav file to disk. I'm able to use the CLI plugin to do 2-pass encodes, using this command line:

-br 161300 -2pass -2passperiod 0 -if [infile] -of [outfile]

Of course, the CLI plugin takes longer because it has to first write a WAV file to disk and only then does it start encoding. I would love to do 2-pass directly from this codec and I wonder if there is a way in the future to pipe in the data correctly.

PS: Thank you for the great work on this plugin. I hope you do something similar with a future LAME and an OGGENC plugin, because there are many specially optimized execuatbles floating in the wild, and I'd love to see them seamlessly intergrated into dMC in the way you did with Ahead's AAC. Even better would be: a menu to which you could add and choose between different EXE files. I must have 5 different versions of lame.exe on my disk, each of which is useful for different things (two are Alphas, one is SSE3 optimized, one is stable, etc.).