Compressing Music to WMA

Nytehawk

I am trying to get my head around compressing my favourite CD tracks to use in my car (which has WMA)so that instead of the usual 18 ish tracks I can get a lot more on. I usually rip/burn using Windows Media Player and thought that it automatically compressed the music when you loaded tracks for burning. Can anyone help here. Thanks

BillScarab

Yes it does, WMA is a compressed format developed by Microsoft. When you rip a CD it converts each song to a WMA file. Once you have the WMA tracks you want you just burn them to CD.

For reference I get about 16 albums on a CD for use in the car using MP3 format, WMA files are usually smaller so you could get even more.

I also use Freerip for ripping CDs as I prefer it to using Media Player. Then burn them using Nero.

Nytehawk

BillScarab wrote: »

Yes it does, WMA is a compressed format developed by Microsoft. When you rip a CD it converts each song to a WMA file. Once you have the WMA tracks you want you just burn them to CD.

For reference I get about 16 albums on a CD for use in the car using MP3 format, WMA files are usually smaller so you could get even more.

I also use Freerip for ripping CDs as I prefer it to using Media Player. Then burn them using Nero.

Thanks for that info. That sounds fairly straighforward but my media player has automatically split all my tracks (about 40ish in all) into three Cds, how can that be compressed to one disc

BillScarab

What size are the tracks? Do you have a copy of Nero, or any other CD/DVD burning software?

Nytehawk

BillScarab wrote: »

What size are the tracks? Do you have a copy of Nero, or any other CD/DVD burning software?

Just typical chart stuff nothing oversized. A few queen tracks, Snow Patrol and a mix of genneral favourites.
Yes I have Nero but haven't ever used TBH

bluewater

When media players like WMP refer to "burning" they mean converting the compressed (ripped) files back to audio format for playing on an ordinary cd player. So you don't use the media player to get wmp or mp3 files onto a cd. I just use windows explorer. Put the blank cd in your RW drive, open windows explorer (right click on START and select explore), find the folder that contains your music files (probably My Music) and then drag and drop (or you could use Send) to the cd drive.

When you do this a window will pop up saying you have files ready to be written to the cd. Click on this window and a screen will open showing you the files you have copied that are ready for burning. Use this window to check that what you have copied will fit onto the cd. Do this by selecting all the files (File - Select All) and then (with the cursor on any part of the highlighted selected area right click and select Properties. You can then go back and copy some more files ( or remove some if there is more than 700Mg)

When your happy you choose the option to write these files to the cd and away it goes.

When it's finished the folder that contained the files to be written will be emptied.

bluewater

Sorry - it should say Edit - Select All above - not File

Donnie

That's not quite right, bluewater.
After you have finished 'ripping' your CDs, you put a blank CD into the drive and then select the little downwards pointing arrow under 'Burn' on WMP11 and select Data CD, as opposed to Audio CD. That's it. Just burn the CD with WMP.

bluewater

Thanks Donnie - I wasn't aware of that. I just assumed that Nytehawk was selecting the burn option in WMP that makes an audio cd.

bluewater

If Nytehawk does as you say in WMP it's a much better way than the my suggestion, except that it can be easier to make a compilation cd by choosing the files from your music folder than by navigating around WMP - but i've probably got a lot to learn about that too!

Nytehawk

bluewater wrote: »

Thanks Donnie - I wasn't aware of that. I just assumed that Nytehawk was selecting the burn option in WMP that makes an audio cd.

All good info, you are right that is exactly how I was doing it. I assumed that after choosing my compilation I could burn them onto an audio cd and within media player the files would be automatically compressed to use in my car which has the facility of playing WMA files. I am happy to be corrected here because I think reading the posts that compression will only take place with a Data CD rather than my Audio CDs