Transfer iTunes to Zune

January 14, 2009

How to Import DVD Movies into Windows Movie Maker

Filed under: Uncategorized

Windows Movie Maker is a totally free program that comes with Windows XP Home Edition, Windows XP Media Center Edition, Windows XP Professional, and Windows Vista (also called Windows DVD Maker). Below are the media formats accepted by Windows Movie Maker:

Video files: .asf, .avi, .wmv
Movie files: MPEG1, .mpeg, .mpg, .mlv, .mp2
Audio files: .wav, .snd, .au, .aif, .aifc, .aiff
Windows media files: .asf, .wm, .wma, .wmv
MP3 format audio: .mp3

To import a DVD clip into Windows Movie Maker, you need to extract the clip from the DVD movie, and then add it to the Windows Movie Maker project. I’d recommend using Clone2Go DVD Ripper to perform the DVD ripping process.

1. Add DVD movies

On the main interface, click "File -> Open DVD…" to import the DVD disc. Or you can click the "Open DVD" button to add the DVD.

import DVD movies into Windows Movie Maker

If the DVD movie is saved as a folder on your computer, you need to click the "Add Video" button to locate that folder, which is composed of two separate folders: VIDEO_TS and AUDIO_TS. From the VIDEO_TS folder, select the .vob file to import and then click "OK".

2. Trim the video

You can drag the "Start to trim" and "Stop to trim" buttons to get the certain segment of the DVD movie.

rip DVD, import DVD into Windows Movie Maker

You can also specify the "Start Time" and "Stop time" at the bottom right panel of the interface (under "Profile").

put DVD into Windows Movie Maker

3. Specify the output format

Windows Movie Maker needs external codec to decode mp4, xvid and mpeg2 video. To skip this trouble, please select "Customized AVI Movie(*.avi)" profile and adjust "video codec" to "msmpeg4v2", "video size" to "Original" to get AVI video accepted by Windows Movie Maker.

import DVD clips into Windows Movie Maker

rip DVD, edit DVD for Windows Movie Maker

4. Start to encode

Now you can click the "Start Encode" button to start ripping the DVD clip to Windows Moive Maker AVI format.

Tip: The output video files are easily available by clicking the "Folder" button on the main menu after the ripping/converting process is done.

5. Import the DVD clip to Windows Movie Maker

After you get the output video clip ripped from the DVD movie, now you can begin to import it into your Windows Movie Maker.

Click on "File". Then click on "Import". A window will appear. In the window, navigate to the video clip you extracted from the DVD movie just now. Then double click on the file. You’ll see the icon for the file in your Windows Movie Maker "Collections".

import the ripped DVD movie into Windows Movie Maker

Tip: Many users may wonder how they can convert Windows Movie Maker file (*.MSWMM) to other video format. Actually, A *.MSWMM file is not a video file. It is a project file of Movie Maker (more like a record file). You have to open this file in Windows Movie Maker and save the movie to your computer: Go to Movie Tasks bar -> Finish Movie -> Save to my computer. After that you will have a WMV file which can be converted to another video format or burned to DVD.

January 9, 2009

How to convert iTunes Plus to MP3?

Filed under: Uncategorized

The other day Apple announced that it was making about 80% of the iTunes store DRM free, with the remaining 20% to follow shortly. DRM-free iTunes means that in theory you should be able move your music to other computers and devices easily…

But… iTunes Plus DRM-free music comes in .m4a format which is based on the MPEG-4 part 14 standard. Problem is, far more devices don’t recognize what to do with .m4a than do (and its video sibling, .m4v). MP3 is a far more popular format.

So, can you convert .m4a files into.mp3 files? Yes you can, and you can do it all from within iTunes (iTunes 8) ! Here’s how:

1. Click on Edit -> Preferences…. From the General tab click on Import Settings… button.

2. Change the Import Using drop down box to MP3 Encoder.

3. From the Settings drop down box select Custom… and choose a Stereo Bit Rate of 256Kbps.

4. Click OK, OK and OK.

5. Now find a file that you want to convert, right-click on it and select Create MP3 Version and an MP3 copy will be created.

Note that you’ll have now both versions of the song in your library, so you’ll have to do a little housekeeping.

Note that if you want to upgrade your previously purchased iTunes tracks to DRM free, you need to pay 30 cents per song. You can’t pick and choose which tracks to upgrade. Start by going to the iTunes Store home page, and clicking on “Upgrade My Library” under the “Quick Links” heading. Once there, you’ll see a list of all the songs and albums that are available for upgrading, with a price next to each. But the important number to look at is the price next to the buy button, since that’s how much it’ll cost to upgrade your library.

So if have an extensive music collection with many songs (i.e. 500 songs) purchased from iTunes and wanted to get them freed from DRM protection, you will have to pay USD150 for the upgrade. And in order to listen to them with your MP3 player or mobile phone music player, you still need a further step - convert the AAC music to MP3 one by one (as the steps show above). It not only messes your iTunes library up but also costs you a great deal of time and money. Therefore, if you really want to play the previously purchased music tracks from iTunes Store with MP3 players or mobile phone music players, you just need to get TuneClone Audio Converter to help to remove the iTunes DRM protection and convert the iTunes music to the popular MP3 format. Also, if you get iTunes Plus DRM-free music files and want to play them with the MP3 players or mobile phone music players incompatible with Apple AAC format, you can still use TuneClone to turn them into MP3 format, saving the time to create MP3 version for the songs one by one.

January 6, 2009

Transfer iTunes Library to Zune

Filed under: iTunes to Zune
If you have moved from Apple iPod to Microsoft Zune, you probably have some songs that you purchased from the iTunes Music Store that you would like to move to the new device. You will run into a hurdle if you try to transfer the files directly as Apple’s copy protection prevents the song from playing on another device. There is a workaround to this however…
  1. Create a new playlist in iTunes.
  2. Add the protected songs to your playlist until you have 72 minutes of music.
  3. Click the "Burn Disc" button.
  4. Click the radio button next to "Audio CD" and tick "Include CD Text" option.
  5. Upon completion of burning the disc, rip the songs to MP3 using Windows Media Player.
  6. Open the Zune software and sync the newly created MP3’s to your Zune device.

Alternatively, you can use TuneClone Audio Converter. It automatically generates a virtual CD-ROM drive during the installation. The virtual CD drive tricks your PC into believing that you are burning a CD. Therefore, the DRM protection is removed without wasting a CD and the speed is very fast. Below are the steps:
  1. Create a new playlist in iTunes.
  2. Add the protected songs to your playlist. Since iTunes burns the protected music with TuneClone virtual CD drive, there is no limit as to music length so long as you have enough hard drive space.
  3. Launch TuneClone. Click the "Settings" tab. In the pop-up window, you can specify output folder, output file name format, output format (Here we can choose MP3 or WMA since Zune accepts MP3 and WMA music), etc. for the output files. Note: You can check whether TuneClone virtual CD drive is successfully installed and where it is installed in the bottom left corner of the interface.
    transfer iTunes to Zune
  4. In iTunes, click the "Burn Disc" button.
  5. In the pop-up window of "Burn Settings", select "TuneClon Virtual_CD-RW" from the "CD Burner" drop-down list, click the radio button next to "Audio CD" and tick "Include CD Text" option. Click "Burn" to start burning.
    transfer iTunes to Zune
  6. Upon the completion of burning the disc and encoding the music, you can open the TuneClone manager screen to show all the converted music files. To locate the output folder, simply click the "Folder" tab on the interface.
  7. Open the Zune software and sync the music in the output folder to your Zune device.
    Done.

January 4, 2009

How to rip DVD and convert video to BlackBerry Storm

Filed under: Uncategorized

You may have at hand many fantastic DVD movies and video files, which you definitely love very much. Also, you have a smart BlackBerry Storm and you really want to watch these DVD movies and video files on your BlackBerry and take them on the road.

However, BlackBerry Strom only supports:

Video format support: MPEG4 H.263, MPEG4 Part 2 Simple Profile, H.264, WMV
Audio format support: MP3, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, WMA, WMA ProPlus

Clone2Go DVD to BlackBerry Converter comes to the rescue! This DVD to BlackBerry Converter has the following three features:

1. Rip DVD movies to BlackBerry (DVD ripper)
2. Convert videos files to BlackBerry (video converter)
3. Download YouTube videos to BlackBerry (YouTube downloader)

So, you just need Clone2Go DVD to BlackBerry Converter to help you rip DVD movies, convert video files and download YouTube videos to the video format accepted by BlackBerry Storm and then transfer the output video files to your BlackBerry Storm. Now let’s take a look at how it performs:

Step 1. Import DVD movies, video files and YouTube videos

Insert the DVD disc into the disc drive, click the “Open DVD” button to import it if you are going to watch the DVD movie on your BlackBerry Storm. Or if the DVD movie is saved as a folder on your computer, you need to click the “Add Video” button to locate that folder, which is composed of two separate folders: VIDEO_TS and AUDIO_TS. From the VIDEO_TS folder, select the .vob file to import and then click “OK”.

You can also import videos stored on your PC by clicking the “Add Video” button and then click “OK”. The supporting formats are shown as follows:

Audio Files (*.mp2;*.mp3;*.wav)
Windows Media Files (*.avi;*.wmv;*.asf;*.dvr-ms;*.ms-dvr)
MOV/MP4 Files (*.mov;*.mp4;*.3gp;*.m4v;*.qt)
Real Media Files (*.rm;*.rmvb)
Flash Video Files (*.flv)
MKV Video Files (*.mkv)
AviSyth Scripts (*.avs)
Other Video Files (*.mpq;*.dv;*.vob;*.m1v;*.m2v;*.dat;*.amv)

If you want to watch YouTube videos on your BlackBerry Storm, click the “YouTube” button on the main interface. In the pop-up window, copy and paste the URLs of the YouTube videos one by one.

There will be a list of the added YouTube videos, which will be downloaded automatically one by one. The downloading status is clearly shown on the list. After the status of all of them indicates “Completed”, you can tick whichever videos you want to watch on your BlackBerry Storm.

After the DVD’s, videos or YouTube videos are imported, you can preview it on the main interface. If you only want a clip of the DVD/video, you can drag the “Start to trim” and “Stop to trim” buttons to get the certain segment.

Step 2. Choose a proper profile and start encoding

From the drop-down list of “Profile”, you can select the most appropriate profile:

Now you can click the “Start Encode” button to starting ripping DVD movies, converting video files and converting YouTube videos for your BlackBerry Storm.

Step 3. Transfer output videos to BlackBerry Storm

After you get the output video files, you can now begin to transfer them to your BlackBerry Storm.

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