O.T. itunes to flash drive

[Mr.Thomas Aaron Hero]

I am trying to put some of my albums on itunes onto a flash drive that I can use in my car stereo, my music is in MPEG4 format, I also have some in MP3, I can drag the MP3 albums into the flash drive but not the AAC albums, I have tried several methods and none work. I asked for advice on the ""itunes lounge" and got nothing but disrespect, insults and was even told that I am completely "ignorant"! I have searched all over and everything I find says I have to convert all my music to MP3 in order to send it to a flash drive. Do any of you know if there is another way?
I dont want to deal with the "lounge" again!
Thanks if anyone can help!

[WWWJD]

Change your iTunes import settings to mp3 (in preferences). Once you've done that, highlight the files of interested. Go up to the "Advanced" drop down, and select "create mp3 version". It'll spit out your mp3 files. I'm running Mac, so if you're on a Windows box these features might be in a different spot. (done it before, just can't remember at the moment where they're at for sure).

That's one way. I'm not sure why iTunes won't let you drag and drop to a flash drive; I can drag and drop my files, purchased or not, anywhere I want without issue, straight out of the iTunes library.

[Mr.Thomas Aaron Hero]

Change your iTunes import settings to mp3 (in preferences). Once you've done that, highlight the files of interested. Go up to the "Advanced" drop down, and select "create mp3 version". It'll spit out your mp3 files. I'm running Mac, so if you're on a Windows box these features might be in a different spot. (done it before, just can't remember at the moment where they're at for sure).

That's one way. I'm not sure why iTunes won't let you drag and drop to a flash drive; I can drag and drop my files, purchased or not, anywhere I want without issue, straight out of the iTunes library.

I have used the itunes mp3 converter, it works fine but I dont want to have the AAC and MP3 versions of my music in itunes. I havent really compared the sound quality of the two but I assume the AAC version is better, I would like to keep the sound quality as high as possible.
I can easily drag the MP3 versions onto a flash drive but not the AAC. The mean guys over at "itunes lounge" say I should be able to drag the ACC formatted music just as easily as the MP3, I cant get it to work!

[WWWJD]

Well, I've honestly always been hard pressed to hear any kind of audible difference between mp4 (aac) and mp3. Once you put the mp3s on flash drive though, you can just delete them out of the library. You won't replace the original aac files when you do the conversion; you'll wind up with duplicates, so all you gotta do is go back once your done and wipe them out.

Is there something wonky about your flash drive? Dual partitions or something fishy like that? I've never had your problem. I guess you could format the flash drive on the iTunes machine and see if that makes a difference. Not sure what there is to go wrong there.

[Mr.Thomas Aaron Hero]

Is there something wonky about your flash drive? Dual partitions or something fishy like that? I've never had your problem. I guess you could format the flash drive on the iTunes machine and see if that makes a difference. Not sure what there is to go wrong there.[/QUOTE]


So you are able to drag files out of itunes that are AAC format? I dont think it's my flash, I have tried three or them and even tried a couple of SD cards, each time I get the same results. I have googled the issue and everything I have found states you have to convert the file into MP3 in order to do this. I dont mind using MP3s in my car, I just dont want to have to convert music to MP3 every time I want to add music to a flash drive.
Like I said, I have never taken the time to check the difference in quality between MP3 and AAC, you say they sound the same? Is there any other issues between the two?
Thanks for taking time to help a guy out!

[absolootbs]

maybe i'm missing something, but why involve itunes in a task like this at all? itunes is the devil, that tries as hard as it can to control your digital music life. case in point: the problem you're having here. just use my computer/windows explorer (or whatever the mac version of that is, if you're using a mac) and drag/drop the audio files to the thumb drive just like you'd drag and drop any other files to any other folder or drive on your computer. placing a restriction on what type of file can be placed on random generic universal storage media is ridiculous.

[Æ]

I use iTunes by default. Anyway for me to copy any songs from my library to a flash drive, I went into the iTunes Music folder then into the individual artists/bands folders and selected the specific songs I wanted, which I dragged into the flash drive. It wasn't terribly difficult, though maybe not absolutely convenient because you actually have to locate on your hard drive where each and every song is that you want to copy/send.

I've never had any problems using iTunes. I bet that if I were to actually read the instructions I'd even be good at it. My only complaint is that it puts a one or two second gap between songs, which didn't occur on the original CD, but I already have a stand alone CD burner that burns exact duplicates.

I am trying to put some of my albums on itunes onto a flash drive that I can use in my car stereo, my music is in MPEG4 format, I also have some in MP3, I can drag the MP3 albums into the flash drive but not the AAC albums, I have tried several methods and none work. I asked for advice on the ""itunes lounge" and got nothing but disrespect, insults and was even told that I am completely "ignorant"! I have searched all over and everything I find says I have to convert all my music to MP3 in order to send it to a flash drive. Do any of you know if there is another way?
I dont want to deal with the "lounge" again!
Thanks if anyone can help!

[WWWJD]

Did you follow up on code monkey's response from the other forum? I'm curious if this might be the case:

"iTunes, by design, won't do file level operations on files it doesn't have ownership of. If these AAC files are in directories outside of your designated iTunes media folder then it's likely the D&D method doesn't work. If this is the explanation, then if you're just doing a "Create MP3 version" of the files, *those* files are going to go into wherever your iTunes media folder is by necessity."

[Mr.Thomas Aaron Hero]

I went into itunes just now and checked and here is where the files are stored, I never moved them. C:\Documents and Settings\Aaron\My Documents\My Music\iTunes\iTunes Media. I have even tried dragging the aac files directly from there with no luck

[WWWJD]

I think you officially have a gremlin. Nobody else is having your problem. Here's what I've got set up on my office machine. My library is actually stored on an external hard drive (F here so that I can take it home and update it regularly.



Not knowing anything else to suggest, I would uninstall iTunes, clean the registry (this one works pretty good: Eusing), and do a fresh installation of iTunes. There's no reason why you shouldn't be able to do what you want to do, regardless of file type. I just got done dragging aac files directly out of my iTunes player to one of our network drives, a USB drive, and a FTP dump that I share with my brother.

EDIT: Some interesting hits come up on Google when you search "Windows settings to prevent drag and drop". One suggests that since IE and Windows Explorer share several settings, that this problem you're having may be related to a security zones setting. If your security is set to high, it may not be a problem native to iTunes at all; may be an XP problem.

[Mr.Thomas Aaron Hero]

Well its fixed and I still havent a clue why it wouldnt work. My UPS guy came by yesterday to deliver some flash drives I ordered, I kinda laughed when he handed them to me, I explained why I thought it was funny and he asked to take a look. He tried to drag the files just as I had and had the same problem, he messed around with it for a couple an minutes and fixed it. I asked what he did and all he said was "dont worry about it" and then he left. I really wanted to know what was wrong! I will push him to explain next time he brings me goodies. I always love seeing UPS pull up in front of my house, it used to mean I was getting new toys, now it means I can get my computer fixed!
Anyway thanks for helping out!