Downloading iTunes purchases for use with Mosies

[judi]

Hi all, I haven’t seen any conversation about this issue…

I haven’t been able to download my purchases from iTunes in a format that Moises recognizes. Yes, I’m being sure to download from iTunes and not Apple Music (streaming service). The files always download as .movpkg files, which Moises does not recognize. I’ve adjusted the playback settings (audio quality > download) to High Quality AAC, with Lossless audio checked. I’ve set the import settings under Files to use the mp3 encoder (I also tried AAC) even though the UI explicitly states these settings do not apply to iTunes downloads. I’ve removed the download, removed the song from my library, quit Apple Music, re-started, re-downloaded. I still get .movpkg files. I’ve tried converting and importing the files. That fails due to DRM. I’ve written to Moises, and they quoted an article I’ve read several times.

Does anyone have any insight into this problem? Thanks in advance!

[mattswain]

I’ll start by saying that I use Moises and I’ve specifically bought tracks from the iTunes Store recently and had no problems using them in Moises. I’m saying this upfront before someone jumps in with an uninformed opinion that it’s not possible.

My bet is it’s the lossless option that is the problem. I think lossless has DRM. Unless you’re a hifi nerd there’s no reason to use lossless. Standard iTunes files is enough for most people. Try removing the download and unticking lossless

I can’t really comment about what options I use because I use Moises on my iPad and/or my iPhone so don’t have a bunch of settings to choose from but it works

[AJSki2fly]

Have a read of this https://fileinfo.com/extension/movpkg

Even if your downloading with iTunes I suspect it will be due to settings ‘ To do so, open the apps’ Preferences menu and deselect any options that save media as high-resolution or high-definition files.’

However if the music has DRM (Digital Rights Management) on then you will not be able to play it in another application. AAC will definitely be DRM

I hope that helps

[mattswain]

AAC files from iTunes do not have DRM (anymore - they used to but Steve Jobs took that away which means they’ve not been protected for a long time)

The movpkg files Judi describes do. Apparently they are in ALAC format which is protected

[AJSki2fly]

Thanks Matt, I was not aware of that and I used to work at Apple as Genius until 2020, I retired due to ill health. I checked and apparently DRM was removed in 2009, this passed me by, apart from I presume the movpkg files which are protected streaming content files as already discussed.

I know I have old AAC files in my iTunes library which I rarely use nowadays that are DRM protected.

[mattswain]

You are correct that the AAC extension is somewhat ambiguous because the files can be protected or unprotected. I’ve also got files in my library from pre-2009 that Moises can’t process. It’s actually quite mind blowing to think that I’ve got digital music files that are approaching 20 years old

Apple changed the industry when Steve Jobs removed the DRM. I think it’s a concession to music industry that DRM has been added to the lossless files. I believe the industry wanted lossless files to cost more but DRM ended up being the compromise. I think for most consumers this is fine because without expensive audio equipment lossless is of limited value

[AJSki2fly]

I really do not like lossless, for several reasons, the level of compression and manipulation done when mastering these is a bit of an unknown.

It is pretty well accepted that music producers will often create several versions from the original master recording for different market sectors. Often low res digital, especially for pop/rock market will have the low end frequencies boosted, reason being often it is listened to on headphones/earbuds, so this tries to overcome this. CD level files are usually good but compression can sneak into these as well, and dynamic range suffers greatly, there are a number of well known sound quality issues, known as the ‘The Wall of Sound’. I think some Oasis albums suffered from this on vinyl and CD, and a load of other big artists.

Re-mastered or re-issued CDs and Vinyl is another can of worms in terms of SQ, often these are from digital copies of the ‘Original Master’, whatever that means, probably a 2-track master copy taken at some point from the original multi-track master. So what ends up on CD and/or vinyl is completely at the mercy of the engineer and whether he/she tinkers with it or leaves alone, and if re-issued for digital streaming the same can be true. For example I have at least 5 versions of Led Zeppelin I from different periods in time, Vinyl, CD, digital files and all sound different, a couple are good, and one sounds very odd(compressed, dull and lifeless).

Unfortunately the music industry IMHO has dumbed down on SQ(sound quality) to support streaming to the masses. Probably 2 generations now know no difference and just accept it as it is. Basically in the early days file storage, and bandwidth was at a premium so making that package smaller meant it worked and was cheaper to implement.

Today even Spotify premium is questionable, it may or may not be at CD SQ levels(320kbps is not), it is well known that they will and do use lower res if their bandwidth and servers are at full chat. This is a good article on these issues High-Resolution Audio vs. CDs vs. MP3s as Sony see it

Having said that it can be very difficult to hear the difference between a very good 320Kbps digital version of a piece of music and the same at CD SQ(uncompressed).

Digital SQ is a huge and contentious topic, certainly at the end user end of the market.

[jkahn]

I usually download the song from YouTube as mp3.

[Mustela]

I don’t know about Moises, but when my ipod died a number of years ago, interoperability of my itunes library became suddenly a lot more important.

I managed to have all my itunes stuff converted to mp3. I opened itunes (windows version, which I know is very different from what is on mac these days) to check for the settings you’re describing and none of it appears there.

I even found out how to strip DRM from those pre '09 itunes files (burn the songs to cd and then rip them back into mp3, which I’m sure does great things to sound quality).

[judi]

Thanks @mattswain Matt and @AJSki2fly Adrian. I thought I’d twiddled all the switches, but I missed one. Turns out “Download Dolby Atmos” on the General tab needs to be unchecked. Which I guess seems natural in retrospect (think movpkg - movies and Apple TV), but I didn’t make the connection with a strictly audio file!

Weirdly, Moises still doesn’t upload the file from my iTunes library. I have to use files and navigate to the download file. Who knows, maybe I directed my iTunes downloads to a non-standard directory years ago. Anyway, I’m good to go now!

Thanks too for the fascinating conversation! The days are long-since gone that we can know most everything about topics we’re interested in. Thank goodness for this community!