August 19, 2004
Category: 
I realize not many people are using their iPod for reading audiobooks, but the touted features of bookmarking and “speed reading” with audiobooks on the iPod definitely sounded worth at least trying them out.
I hopped on over to the local library and grabbed a few books-on-CD, then iTuned them over. Well, the newly downloaded books did not show up under the audiobooks category. To cure this (at least on Windows), I had to rename all of the audiobook files from the “.m4a” extension to “.m4b”, delete the old files from the iPod, then upload the newly renamed files. Sucks that it takes doing that to get it to work, but it does work nonetheless. Now I can bookmark my place in any of the audiobook files, then go listen to music and come back to the place where I left off in the book. C’mon, that’s friggin’ cool.
The speedy reader is really nice, too. It doesn’t increase the pitch of the narrator at all, just speeds it up somehow without being overly fast. Someone’s probably timed the differences in Normal vs. Fast. (UPDATE: It seems it’s 25% faster, so for the math deficient that means you can read an hour’s worth of book in 45 minutes.)
UPDATE: Found more information on this here, but I didn’t notice an issue with needing to use a space at the end or caps.
UPDATE 2: Another thing I wanted to be sure to mention here. I’ve noticed several times already that if you have a rather large audibook file (larger than 1 CD worth, that is), you may run into problems with the bookmark feature when leaving the book and playing music. At least with two audiobooks so far, which I had combined into one huge file totaling maybe 10-16 hours, I would pause the book to listen to music. When I came back to the audiobook, my bookmark was there and I was able to continue playing from that point, but about ten seconds or so into the book, it would stop and dump me to the main iPod menu. When I went back to the audiobook, my bookmark was gone and I had to start over. Once I did start over and fast-forward to my old spot (which I luckily caught a glimpse of before starting), it would continue fine. This only happened when I left the book to listen to music; if I simply paused or turned the iPod off while listening to the audiobook, I could go back without a problem. Again, this only seems to occur with very large files.
UPDATE 3: Here’s a handy shell command I use on my .m4a files to convert many to .m4b files:
ls *m4a | cut -d . -f1 | awk '{print "mv ""$0".m4a" ./""$0".m4b""}' | bash
Works like a champ.
Horaayy..there are 39 comment(s) for me so far ;)
Sometimes my audiobook section is blank, then they come back! Any ideas?
What do you mean by “selection”? You mean you see the book on your iPod, but it has no audio?
Was not aware one could read an AudioBook. I’ll have to try that since I’ve been listening to them all along
For books, can one jump forward in larage bits–15 or 30 minutes at a time? I can only ff at about 20 seconds at a time.
At least with the 4G iPod, you can fast forward songs and books fater by just moving faster around the dial. It’ll accelerate pretty fast.
Also, I highly recommend splitting large MP3’s using something like MP3 Splitter. Doing this stops the problem of bookmarks getting lost and sometimes having the book “restart” on you.
I too have a problem with putting audiobooks in the correct category. How do i convert files from .m4a to .m4b? Thanks
trevor — Just rename the extension from .m4a to .m4b. But to make sure the iPod gets the new file, make sure you remove it from your iPod first, then re-add it again.
Hi!
I’ve got some problem. I converted my audiobook mp3 to m4b but I still can’t read it in the audiobook library on my ipod… any suggestion? Ps I’ve got mac.
I learned how to ff audiobooks. I download books one per month from audiobooks.com. Anyway a way to navigate through a long book is to hit the middle button a few times until a series of about 6 vertical lines appear. Then use the volume mechanism to go anywhere you like from beginning to end in the book. Works great.
Do not rename .mp3 files! This will not work! The mp3 needs to be converted to m4a (in iTunes, go to Advanced->Convert selection to AAC). Once the file is a .m4a file, just rename the extension to .m4b and put on your iPod. Voila!
I found more detailed info on this procedure here.
recommendation
Thanks to a commenter over at Yglesias’, I’ve been enjoying Oink’s Pink Palace the last couple of days which, surprisingly,…
Your best bet for getting audiobooks to work smoothly with your ipod is to wait two years, then buy the latest ipod then.
Keep in mind that is an optimistic forecast. Apple actually might not even have its shit together by then – DRM is obviously much higher on their priority list than general usability or open standards.
To Gudlyf:
Okay, I’m done converting audiobook files into m4a format, but how do you convert it into m4b? Where can I change the extention? And those files converted into m4a files are not even real one, I mean they’re just on the list, real files are still mp3 files eh. I’m lost on this one, help.
To Gudlyf:
Never mind. I somehow managed to do it on my own…. ;p Sorry I’m a dork
Try this forum for several different guides on converting CD’s, cassettes, and any audio that plays on your computer to bookmarking m4b file. Note MarkAble, $13 shareware that does the entire job, including a spiffy CD wizard.
Also, keep files below,say 7 hours or 300 MB. iPod just can’t handle large files. iPodlounge Books and spoken word:
http://forums.ipodlounge.com/forumdisplay.php?s=&forumid=46
The conversion threads have had about 60,000 visitors and the audio book recommendation thread close to 40,000. Shows a few people are listening to audio on iPods.
[URL=http://forums.ipodlounge.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=79396] Guide: MarkAble Shareware. EZ merges/converts CD/MP3/WAV to bookmarking files, adds to iTunes, & deletes temp files[/URL]
[URL=http://www.ipodlounge.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=33491]Guide 4. Audio CDs to bookmarking iPod files-All iTunes solution[/URL] (Mac adaptable)
[URL=http://www.ipodlounge.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=273806#post273806]Guide 1. Audio mp3 files to bookmarking iPod files [/URL] (mac adaptable)
[URL=http://www.ipodlounge.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=273807#post273807]Guide 2. Audio CassetteTapes, vinyl LPs & CDs to bookmarking iPod files )[/URL]
[url=http://forums.ipodlounge.com/showthread.php?s=&postid=582930#post582930]Guides to Sound Recording ware: Audacity Free, $12 Total Recorder, 30 Euro PolderbitS[/url] [URL=http://www.ipodlounge.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=312147#post312147]
Guide 3. Copy Audio CDs into fewer iPod files using freeware & additional steps&time[/URL]
[URL=http://ipodlounge.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=37562]Guide 5. Burn audible books to CD iTunes (mac adaptable) or AM (Best!PC only)[/URL]
[URL=http://ipodlounge.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=61895]Guide 6. Convert mono m4b files to Stereo to avoid 4G & Mini Lockup AND keep iTrip out of 4G+ Shuffle[/URL]
[URL=http://www.ipodlounge.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=108484#post108484]Link 7. Roberts Audible Book sorta literary Recommendations [/URL]
I’ve seen this technique of creating iPod audiobook format from MP3 proposed all over the internet, but the bottom line is IT SIMPLY DOESN’T WORK. Sure, you can convert the files to M4B and reload them to the iPod, but “Shuffle Songs” STILL plays the audiobook tracks. This is NOT what is wanted. I’ve yet to find a true answer.
I don’t understand how I can read the audiobook while it’s playing. Can anyone help me with this, I feel lazy only listening to it, I would liketo read as well
My audiobook files show up in the audiobook folder AND the music folder????
How can I get them out of the Music folder and only into the audiobook folder??
thanks
before i found out about the whole audiobook thing on the ipod (m4b etc.) i just copied the audiobooks i had as mp3’s on the pod and made their genre ‘books & spoken’. i then created a smart playlist named ‘almost-all’ that contained all file whose genre was not ‘books & spoken’ (or jazz or classcial) .. every other smart playlists derives from that mother-of-all-playlists ‘almost-all’. if i want to shuffle over almost-all songs i just shuffle over my almost-all playlist …
I’ve found a solution for the problem where you lose your place after a few seconds of going back to a large file’s bookmark. When I open the large audiobook file after listening to music I pause the track right away, then press play again. The book continues where I left off and doesn’t kick me back to the menu like it usually would if i didn’t press pause. works for me anyways, give it a try if you’re having the same problem and let me know if it work for you.
hi Gudlyf,
Thanks to your site, I am now able to create audiobooks from my mp3s. My slow songs are now hip-hop fast ones. One more question. How do I connect a few songs (in mp3 format) to form a single audiobook in m4b format?
For joining MP3 files, I use MP3 Joiner. Works like a champ.
For those of us with Mac OS 10.4, try the Automator to rename and convert your files. I will do a great job. I took an audiobook that was seperated into folders per cd…. Then I had the automator rename them all numbered in order and change the ext. Because we all know that Track 1 in each of those folders are played befre track 2 in the same folder….
How do I use the shell command?
I’m sorry, I still can’t figure out how to change the file type. I remember doing it before, long ago, but I can’t seem to have any effect on the files now…
Here’s what I did. I located the file from “my computer”, pressed f2, then went to the far right and typed in .m4b. Then I updated my Itunes, then moved all the songs onto my IPod. For somereason, it still isn’t working properly.
I’m using Windows XP, if that helps at all.
What program can I use to merge a number of audio files to create one large file?
Thanks so much for this post… I have not yet tried this and I hope it is the best way to move my ripped CD books from Songs to Audiobooks. I am assuming that it will also remove them from the Shuffle feature. I’ve only had my iPod a week, but this is very promising. I have a good 50/50 split between books and music and I was bummed that I couldn’t get my books into the Audiobooks section of my iPod.
Thanks Again,
p.s. – Any ideas on how we can clean up the CDDB that is used by iTunes? Some of that stuff is really screwed up. — Dare to dream…
This article is very easy to understand:http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1895,1846814,00.asp
To rename lots of files use the rename command. On my box it comes from the util-linux rpm.
rename .m4a .m4b *.m4aYou’re a little math deficient yourself. If it’s 25% faster, than you could read an hour’s worth of material in 48 minutes. You can’t just subtract 25% from the original time. If you read it 100% faster, you would be reading it twice as fast – but according to your math, it would take you zero minutes to read anything at that speed.
I can load my audiobook files onto my ipod nano by clicking and dragging them into “music” in itunes. they are correctly read and played as audiobooks. i cannot, however, access them afterwards from itunes nor delete them. any advice?
To merge different mp3 files into a big one I use a little free program called mp3 merger. http://mp3merge.netfirms.com/
I was looking for a solution to the problem the author explained above. With big files, after about 5 mins into the audiobook the ipod pops you back to the main menu, then you loose your bookmark. Any ideas on how to solve this?
Lookup (for Mac users) Audiobook Builder on http://www.versiontracker.com – it does all this dirty work of importing and making nice, neat .m4b files to your liking. It is shareware and costs a few bucks but it is worth it in my opinion.
My audiobook files show up in the audiobook folder AND the music folder. How can I get them out of the Music folder and only into the audiobook folder?
thanks
Hi!
On http://www.freeipodsoftware.com you can download a free MP3 to iPod Audio Book Converter for Windows. You can also combine multible MP3s to a single *.m4b File with it.
I have found a website which shows you a much easier way to convert your audiobooks using a free program
http://www.freewebs.com/ipod-audiobook
For all you people complaining that you don’t want your audiobook files to shuffle, why don’t you just select that option in the info page for the file? You can select every audio file you have at once and change them to not play during shuffle all at once! Voila! Problem solved.
Apple should be told this is waaaaaaay too much work to get audiobooks into the audiobook folder, though. A tiny update to the iPod software would fix this.
There is a better way to convert audiobooks using a free program. This free program allows you to convert these files to audiobook files and when you impoert them into iTunes they will come up in the audiobook library.
Check out http://www.iPod-Audiobook.co.nr