How to Convert Flac or m4a to mp3 Batch?

[wrender]

Does anyone know an easy way to convert a whole bunch of flac or m4a files to mp3?

[quarkslot]

Re: How to Convert Flac or m4a to mp3 Batch?

I use soundKonverter:

http://kde-apps.org/content/show.php?content=29024

Set it to a directory and it will convert all files in sub-directories, however I'm not sure if it can convert m4a files but I know it works with flac

Should be in the repository.

[wrender]

Re: How to Convert Flac or m4a to mp3 Batch?

Sweetness... will try tonight! Thnx!

[wrender]

Re: How to Convert Flac or m4a to mp3 Batch?

Works amazing! Though I was wondering if there is a way to enable VBR or ABR encoding of MP3s?

[quarkslot]

Re: How to Convert Flac or m4a to mp3 Batch?

Yes, it's possible, you just need to play around with the settings:

- In the 'Conversion Options' screen there are 2 tabs 'Simple' and 'Detailed'
- Select 'Detailed'
- Set 'Output format' to 'mp3' and 'Use Plugin' to 'lame'
- Set 'Preset' to 'User defined'

- If you set 'Mode' to 'Quality' you will see that 'Bitrate mode' is automatically fixed to 'Variable'
- Use the slider to set the quality (smaller number=higher quality)

- If you set 'Mode' to 'Bitrate' you can set 'Bitrate mode' to 'Average' or 'Constant'
- Use the slider to set the bitrate

There is probably more to it than that but this meets my needs so I haven't bothered experimenting.

If this doesn't work for you an alternative is WinFF which is a GUI for ffmpeg. Again you should find it in the repositories and although it's primarily designed for video I (think) it works just as well converting audio. There may be options for VBR.

[wrender]

Re: How to Convert Flac or m4a to mp3 Batch?

I'll have to double check when I get home but I remember only seeing ffmpeg as the only pluggin option in the pull down in the detailed tab for mp3. Do I have to do something to have lame as an option or maybe I missed something?

[wrender]

Re: How to Convert Flac or m4a to mp3 Batch?

So I checked and there is no lame pluggin option from the pull down. Is there something I have to do to get the lame pluggin?

[quarkslot]

Re: How to Convert Flac or m4a to mp3 Batch?

So I checked and there is no lame pluggin option from the pull down. Is there something I have to do to get the lame pluggin?

Not that I'm aware of, my understanding is that if lame is installed on your system soundKonverter will make use of it.

I'd start by checking lame is installed, if not install it and try again.

[wrender]

Re: How to Convert Flac or m4a to mp3 Batch?

Awesome sauce! You are right, once I installed lame it was available in the pluggin list! I just need to figure out how that quality slider number relates to the encoding and im set!

[wrender]

Re: How to Convert Flac or m4a to mp3 Batch?

I was reading up on lame vbr settings and quality of v0 equals floor 220, target of 245 and ceiling of260. I noticed in the soundKonvertor there is an additional arguments setting and was wondering if it is possible to manually set the target, floor and ceiling values?

ie. floor 192, target 256 and ceiling to 320

[quarkslot]

Re: How to Convert Flac or m4a to mp3 Batch?

I don't think so, soundKonverter is just a front-end and as such is constrained by the defaults offered by lame. There is a discussion someone had with the developer of soundKonverter here (but I don' think it will help you):

http://kde-apps.org/content/show.php...29024&kbid=634

The best quality (I believe) that lame can deliver is CBR 320 in which case use the preset setting of 'insane'.

It may be that ffmpeg provides more control over the quality settings though I suspect it also uses lame, but you may want to look into that as an alternative.

[wrender]

Re: How to Convert Flac or m4a to mp3 Batch?

I did a V0 VBR conversion and looked at the bit rate in VLC as a song played. It seems to fluctuate between 230 and 310. Perhaps there is something I do not fully understand how the settings work. Sounded good and saved 3 megs off the song compared to a 320 CBR version.

[heinkel_111]

Re: How to Convert Flac or m4a to mp3 Batch?

when you convert with soundKonverter, do you get the id3-tags (or wahteever it is called) also on the new file?