For those who are interested in using iTunes, here's a little tutorial I did for HEMI4ME via PM, thought I'd post it for the rest of the forum. This tutorial will work for both Mac and PC versions of iTunes.
HEMI4ME? said:
I read your post, and have a question, I am a MAC newbie, and have 150 songs in my Library burned from CDs that I own. I simply put the discs in, chose the songs and added them to the library. What do I need to get these songs to MP3 format and then to a CD that will hold say these songs?
If you can help, i'd appreciate it!
Paul
Hey Paul,
No problem. I'm always happy to help people learn the wonders that are Macintosh. Using iTunes is a great way to burn MP3 CD's with little effort. Obviously you've already figured out the Importing of CD's to your iTunes Library, so we'll go straight to getting them ready to burn and then burning.
Step 1: Make sure you're working with MP3's. iTunes defaults to importing CD tracks in AAC format, which will not play in the 300 radio. You can check if your tracks are already MP3's by selecting a song and opening File > Get Info then looking at the format area.
To change this for the next time you import from CD's:
Go into Preferences
and make sure of two things: that your Import setting is MP3 not AAC
and that your Burning selection is MP3 not Audio CD
Step 2: Convert your tracks to MP3's. If the tracks are AAC, Apple Lossless Encoder you'll need to convert them. To do this simply highlight your tracks (in your case probably all of them) and go to the Advanced menu, then select Convert to MP3.
BE SURE NOT TO CLICK ANYWHERE AFTER THIS PROCESS AS IT WILL UN-HIGHLIGHT THE TRACKS YOU'VE SELECTED. When that process is done you can simply delete all of the highlighted songs since you'll no longer need the AAC or ALE versions.
Step 3: Make a playlist. In the lower right-hand corner you'll see a + sign. This creates a new playlist.
Do so and copy your tracks into it. You can re-order the tracks to make them play how you want on the CD.
Step 4: Burn the disc. Once you have your tracks in the order you like, insert a blank CD-R. In the upper right hand corner of iTunes you'll see the Burn icon. Click it and follow the instructions.
Once you're done you should have an MP3 CD you can play in the 300!
This process gives you a CD that is ordered only by the playlist order. You can easily put songs from the same artist, or of the same genre next to each other by using the info columns to auto-order the songs. Simply click the column title you want to use to order the songs.
However, the 300 MP3 stereo offers the ability to read directory structures (folders on a data CD). So, what can be done to REALLY organize things is use folders for artists or albums or an album folder in an artist folder, etc..
On a Mac there are two options for burning a disc like this: use Mac's built in burning function through the Finder or buy software like Roxio's Toast which will facilitate burning with greater reliability and flexibility.
To use Mac's built in burning capabilities simply insert a blank CD-R into the computer, drag and drop whatever folders you like onto the CD-R icon on the desktop, then drag the CD-R icon to the trash (which has turned into a little round yellow and black icon) follow the prompts to finish the burn then you're done.
A little note about finding MP3's when using iTunes: in Preferences there's a setting under the Advanced tab called "Keep iTunes Music folder organized" which I believe is checked by default. If it is not checked I advice checking it as this is a super easy way to organize all your music. It does require that you have the Artist, Album, and Song Title fields entered in to work properly. If this is done right then you should just be able to go into the iTunes Music folder and find folder's for all the artists you have songs from, then inside each one a folder with the album name, then inside that the songs from that album. This makes burning CD's with folders in them very easy.
Hope that helps!
