Macs All-in-One For Dummies by Joe Hutsko

Author:Joe Hutsko
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Published: 2012-02-06T16:00:00+00:00

Figure 4-8: CrossOver Mac lets you run a handful of Windows programs without running Windows.

Book IV

Your Mac as a Multimedia Entertainment Center

Chapter 1: Listening, Watching, Reading, and Learning with iTunes

In This Chapter

Understanding audio file formats

Moving media you already own to iTunes

Managing your iTunes Library

Creating playlists

Playing audio and video

Browsing and buying from the iTunes Store

Sharing media

Burning audio files to disc

When iTunes first came on the scene in 2001, followed by the iTunes Store in 2003, it was all about music. Today, the iTunes Store is a one-stop media megastore — or mega media store. You can still buy music, choosing from over 18 million songs, but you also find music videos, movies, television shows, audio and video podcasts, audio books, electronic books, iOS apps, and lectures from some of the best universities in the world. All the more reason to have a sizeable hard drive!

The iTunes application that came with your Mac is a combination audio and video organizer, player, audio file converter, and disc-burning application. You can even listen to the radio with iTunes as long as you’re connected to the Internet.

Digital files have all but replaced CDs, DVDs, and flash drives. Ubiquitous Wi-Fi, broadband cellular networks, and Apple’s new iCloud service make accessing and sharing remote files between your Mac and other iOS devices, like an iPod touch or iPhone, quick and easy. If you find that you still want your music on a CD, you can use the iTunes disc-burning feature to copy your favorite audio files to a CD that you can play whenever you don’t have the option of listening to music with iTunes on your Mac.

We begin this chapter with an explanation of different file formats and copying media you already own into iTunes on your Mac. We also explain how to convert files in iTunes. We go through how iTunes is set up and how to listen to music or watch a movie on iTunes. We show you how to set up playlists on your own or let iTunes do it for you with Genius. At the end of the chapter, we then take a tour of the iTunes Store so you can find out how to add other media to your Mac.

Understanding Audio File Compression Formats

Audio files offer tremendous advantages in storage and audio quality compared to previous forms of audio storage. However, dozens of different audio file compression types — the underlying conversion technology used to save audio as digital files — are out there. Therefore, to hear different audio files, you might need to use different applications. This would be like having to buy two separate radios where one radio receives only AM stations and the second radio receives only FM stations.

Different types of audio file compression formats exist because each file format offers certain advantages. The standard approaches to audio file compression are three schemes used for saving audio as digital files: lossless (no compression), lossless compression, and lossy compression.

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