Converting MP4 or iTunes format to MP3 is something that is not all that easy to do. First off, the MP4 format is only compatible with ipod/apple devices and iTunes software. Nice, you pay money for a song that is useless on anything but iPod or apple products. Sounds a bit like the Microsoft Internet Explorer issue years back. There are a few ways to get around this but they all have their drawbacks and can be cumbersome. Some recommend CD drive emulation software or other expensive products to do the trick. Others say that burning a CD and then ripping it is the way to do it. The CD burning method is a good alternative but what if you just want to convert a few songs on the fly without all of the hassle? There is a way to convert MP4’s and you may already have what you need to do it. There will be some quality loss with this method but who cares, Your sticking it to the man.

You will need a few things to do the on the fly method. First the hardware, A decent sound card capable of “What You Hear” or “Wave Out“. Most on board sound chips will not be able to be used for this method. A decent sound card will start out at $40.00 and higher. What You Hear or Wave Out may also be called Stereo Mix or Mono Mix. The Audigy SE sound card is less than $40.00 and has the What You Hear feature built it.

Next you will need some recording software. Don’t worry, you won’t have to spend any money. You can get a copy of Audacity Free simply because it’s free or open source software. Download it here and then come back to this page to finish. There are several plug-ins available for sound effects and mixing if you are interested. Once you have Audacity installed your almost ready to copy a few songs. Keep in mind that we will have to listen to the song in real time to record. That is the one drawback of this method. You could start a play list and then split the tracks up once completed if you really wanted to batch record. If you have a microphone plugged in you will want to turn the mic input volume down! You can hear the birds chirping in my demo video because I left the microphone on.

Now assuming you have audacity installed and your sound card is operational, you are ready to try recording. This is where it gets tricky. If you are using Windows XP you will likely find that this is a simple task and requires little thought. If you are like me, an unlucky Windows Vista user, then you may cross over into the land of insanity to get “What You Hear” to work. But don’t worry, as long as your sound card supports it there are some options. Because of Digital Media Rights Windows Vista is normally configured to make it difficult to use this feature. Usually if you are using the latest drivers for your sound card the Wave Out or What You Hear may not work. Find the oldest drivers for your card and try that first. The older drivers seem to have this feature built right into the driver software. Up to date Vista sound card drivers usually don’t support the What You Hear feature or are extremely difficult to get it to work properly. If you have difficulty getting it to work, search Google and you will likely find a solution to your particular problem. If all else fails you can go to radio shack and get a splitter and cable to splice your line out with your speakers to your line in on your sound card.

Now that you have it set up, open audacity and set your preferences in the Edit Preferences Menu. See below.

Audacity You may have to set your recording device according to the method you are using to capture the sound. You will also want to set your speakers accordingly for proper playback as well. The best way from here is to open iTunes and start experimenting with Audacity while you have some music playing, stopping and playing back music to see if you have everything set in order for it to work properly. If it does not work, some adjustments in your Audacity preferences and volume properties in the Windows control panel may be needed.

Once you have mastered the art of recording you can trim the clips down before and after the music to clean it up a bit. See the video below for a demonstration of the Audacity recording method. Let me know if this worked for you!