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iPod iTunes, youtube and M4A files

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Dave2011

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jun 29, 2011
2
0
Hallo folks,

I have a question for you all, people say that M4A (AAC) is the best way to download youtube videos in order to get their audio tracks Iuse clipconverter.cc. People say it's because M4A uses less space and has better quality but if that is the case people are foretting one thing, the youtube file stared life off as an mp3 file that was probably dragged into movie maker and given a still image and when uploaded onto youtube, youtube would probably convert it to an AVI file. With that being said, once you convert this youtube file to an m4a with clip converter etc how could it possibly make this file better when it was an mp3 to start with but really disguised as a youtube AVI file? in other words, how can it make a **** file good if that is what its original sate is? surely it would make sense to simply download the youtube file in mp3 via clipconverter etc since that is what the original file was anyway and that way you avoid trying to tamper with sound quality even though the file size will be slightly larger but hey I could live with that.

What do you all think

Regards

Dave
 
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AdrianK

macrumors 68020
Feb 19, 2011
2,230
2
I know what you're saying, and I agree that YouTube audio sounds like crap due to several layers of lossy encoding.

A couple of things you say aren't quite coherent though:

the youtube file stared life off as an mp3
Click to expand...
It could be MP3, AAC, or any lossless codec that a video editor would accept (in order to be attached to a video steam). From that, the video editor could spit out a video with an mp3, aac or wma audio track.

Hence:
surely it would make sense to simply download the youtube file in mp3 via clipconverter etc since that is what the original file was anyway
Click to expand...
Is pretty much null/void. If the the audio track that the video editor spits out is wma (a la Movie Maker) or m4a, the resultant file that you're downloading is still mp3. Loss has still occurred, it's not the same file at all.

In fact, there's no evidence to suggest that the mp3 is demuxed (assuming an mp3 sound source from the video spit out by the video editor). It's most likely re-encoded as mp3, even if the video uploaded to YouTube had an mp3 audio track.

Long story short, don't use youtube to acquire music, it's just silly.
 
D

Dave2011

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jun 29, 2011
2
0
Hi, thanks for the info. Say though for instance that you just wanted to keep the same quality of audio from the youtube video even though it's not great, do you think then it would just be ok to use clip converter.cc and download it as mp3? beause if you downloaded it in m4a to get better quality then that is not going to make a differece if you get me?

Regards
 
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AdrianK

macrumors 68020
Feb 19, 2011
2,230
2
I honestly don't believe it will make a difference. Both the separate mp3 and acc track within the video are encoded from the same source. Since AAC supposedly gives a better quality:size ratio (both the mp3 and aac tracks are the same bitrate I believe), the aac should sound better. I highly doubt that there will be any noticeable difference at all though, due to the fact that the source has undergone several generations of loss.

tl;dr - Doesn't make a difference. MP3 is easier to get hold of due to the fact that you don't have to demux the audio stream from the video.
 
TMRaven

TMRaven

macrumors 68020
Nov 5, 2009
2,099
1
Don'g be cheap by half-assing it. Go get the CDs and rip the songs off them, or download via an online store, and you'll get better quality. That's just how I think anyways. I would rather have something full quality or not have it at all, instead of having a file that's subpar quality. It ruins the experience, and could make or break your opinion of an artist.
 
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