Produce MP3 files from a CD with Windows Media Player?Dave, I've read your articles about how to transfer MP3 music files to a Sony PSP and other MP3 device, but what baffles me is that when I insert music CDs into my PC, it produces "WMA" files, not "MP3" files. How do I fix this, or is Windows Media Player incapable of producing MP3s? This is a very common question, so let me step through it in great detail. First off, though, rest assured that while it's definitely not recommended by Microsoft (for obvious reasons), the Windows Media Player can most definitely produce high-quality MP3 audio files from your favorite music CDs. The first step is to launch Windows Media Player. For this article, I'll show Media Player 10 (WMP10, as Windows folk say). Start it up, click on the "Rip" tab, and here's what you'll see:  Of importance here is the last text line in the main window area; it tells you where the MP3 files will be saved once the CD is "ripped" (a fancy word for 'copied onto the computer'). Insert a music CD, however, and nothing happens, even though the "Insert an audio CD" prompt suggests that somehow WMP should automatically detect and scan it. Maybe that works on your computer, but for me, I have to explicitly tell the Media Player to scan a specific hardware device to find the music CD. This is done by right-clicking on the word "Rip" then selecting the right menu item:  Please click on the image for a full-size version Yeah, it's a bit ugly, but select it and a second or two later the program queries an online CD information database to figure out album and track information, then all is good:  You can see that my test CD is the jazz album Philly Style by jazz music Jeff Lorber, and that WMP is showing every track by name, length of the track in minutes and seconds, artist, etc. Also note that every track is automatically checked. To copy all the music onto your computer, click on Rip Music along the top bar. But that's not quite right, actually, because you'll end up with more Windows Media Audio format music (files with ".WMA" which won't work with MP3 players including both the iPod and Sony PSP). What you need to do is change the default settings for ripping audio content within Windows Media Player, which is easily done. Right click on the "Rip" tab along the top again, and this time navigate to Tools --> Settings... and click on the Rip Music tab:  You can see where "Windows Media Audio" is highlighted as the default format in the middle of the window. Click that pop-up menu item and choose MP3 instead, then I suggest you drag the slider along to have either the best quality or just one 'click' down from there. No-one likes crummy quality music files... :-) When you're done, click "OK" and click on the Rip Music link at the top of the main Media Player window again. This time it'll copy the audio CD, but create MP3 files, rather than WMA files. Nice! Pop over to the folder -- probably "My Music" in your "My Documents" folder -- where the music is stored now, and you'll likely see both the old WMA files and the new MP3 files:  You can safely delete any Windows Media Audio files if you also have MP3 versions of the files, by the way. Now, finally, you have the MP3 files that your MP3 player / iPod / Sony PSP likes. Copy these MP3 files onto your player and you'll have just gone bigtime geek, ripping a music CD and copying the songs onto your favorite gadget. Nicely done! Not sure how to copy audio files onto your Sony PSP, by the way? Then please check out: • Download music and photos to a Sony PSP Hope this helps you with your music efforts!
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Never miss another useful Q&A article again! Subscribe to AskDaveTaylor with Google Reader. how can i change windows media 7.1 music into mp3 music so i can upload it onto my phone Posted by: adam at January 5, 2006 10:52 AMAdam, please see: http://www.askdavetaylor.com/convert_wma_from_windows_media_player_into_mp3_files.html Posted by: Dave Taylor at January 5, 2006 1:49 PMI can't get movies to my psp. i rip them from the dvd and save them to the mrroot/100anv01 if i go on the pc it shows that it is there but it doesn't show on psp. it takes away memory to. Posted by: Tony Sparks at January 11, 2006 8:54 AMTony, I find that it's pretty tricky to work with the PSP, it seems to be very fussy about what media formats it accepts. I've even downloaded two different videos produced by the same program and one works while the other is shown as "unknown data". The error messages are quite unclear (I think deliberately so) too. What to do about it? Keep experimenting with different formats, different output parameters, different filenames etc., and/or just get one of the PSP sync shareware apps for the Mac or PC and let that do the hard work. Posted by: Dave Taylor at January 11, 2006 9:02 AMI have been trying to download music on my little brothers psp for 3 hours now. I have read all of the other comments and followed them.But when i download it to his psp it never comes up in the music file. Posted by: regis at April 8, 2006 6:22 PMI have recieved a new computer with windows media 10 but i dont have the choice to rip the audio files to mp3 format...it confuses me because every where i go it says that WMP 10 comes with an mp3 encoder but i dont have it...Pleas help! Posted by: Dan at April 12, 2006 8:13 PMwhen my PSP folder comes up, it only says SAVEDATA, so I can't out it into MUSIC!!! i have no clue where to put my mp3 formatted songs.... Posted by: matt at April 13, 2006 3:20 PMI'm really confused. Your guide is amazing but I'm not quite with it today. I have a new 'supportplus mp3 player' and have followed your steps on the WMP and have ripped a CD. But I'm at a loss for what to do next. Any help please? as it seems i have the same problem as all others. the music seems to have taken up some memory but it cant be found on the psp, on my windows media the word rip does not appear Using media player 9 (can't get any later version because of company network restrictions)once I copy a CD I can't recopy it again no matter what I try. Ex:Copied a CD in wrong bitrate so deleted it tried to recopy in diffrent bitrate & it wouldn't. I tried deleting the folder from the recycle bin, recopying in same bitrate, clearing cookies, history & CD/DVD. Copy protection isn't on. Nothing works, any suggestions. Posted by: dal at September 3, 2006 5:57 AMI have a similar problem with Dan (posted April 12, 2006 8:13 PM). I downloaded WMP10 on this new laptop and tried ripping from my CD into mp3, but this error message keeps appearing: Recopy tip to nik, or to anybody visiting this page: Just select and check the checkbox on each item in the list which you want to recopy with different settings (bit rate etc.) :( very logical Posted by: mediaplayer at October 5, 2006 2:54 AMMr. Taylor- I am a college student just taking a CIS 115 course. We explore HTML + XHTML tags, and how to assemble a web page. The question I am pondering is one related to a specific tag situation. This is in no way a school related assignment-but I am looking to add a song to a webpage (I E) myspace-now I know to select the MP3 and get it into an HTML text by selecting my web browser. Either I can't find out what tag to use-to properly code the situation so the music will play-or I have no idea how to take the file from my computer-and put it on the myspace profile. all I am looking for is the basic code to insert the audio file from my computer into the myspace profile. Could you help me with this? My book does not give good refernces to how to insert tags such as video, or audio files. I am hoping I don't have to make a mock website-use smart HTP,host it-just to reference the site for my profile. Can you tell me of another way? Posted by: Mark R. at October 7, 2006 7:22 PMI riped my cd. and put in my memory stick but it dose not show any data. Posted by: tyler at December 26, 2006 9:50 AMis there a site where you can upload music from the internet to windows media player??? Posted by: gregg at February 26, 2007 7:38 PMhow do i change my mp3 songs into an html code that plays using windows media player?! Posted by: Andrew at March 4, 2007 12:09 PMHey,Dave. Thanks Posted by: Lee at March 5, 2007 12:08 PMhi dave, i have downloaded mp3 files to play on a car mp3 player but i'm having difficulty copying them from my computer to disc, wot do i need to do?? i have nero and windows cd creator, just a typical girl ..... Posted by: Jenny at March 10, 2007 9:39 AMHave media player 10, hate it! Thank you have the best solution to evry thing Posted by: giancarlo at March 16, 2007 9:23 PMI have a Sony MD recorder. I am trying to transfer the files from the mini-disc to my MAC. Can't find instructions on how to do it. Posted by: Connie at March 23, 2007 9:02 AMyou don`t understand,i have old computer at home i got some music on it,i want to put it this computer Posted by: kermit spurlock at April 14, 2007 3:41 PMHELP!!! Have been trying to burn Mp3 to CD-R using both WMP V.11 and Nero. After the burn finishes the cd pops out but when i go to view the files there is nothing there. Can anyone help? Posted by: Scott at April 17, 2007 12:27 AMHave media player and Windows XP. Want to do a simple convert from mp3 to audio cd and it doesn't seem to want to do it right. Burn, converting, burning, then says closing disk. I am using Roxio 7.0, burning music from wav. to mp3. Music will play on computer, but no where else. I've tried in the car, 3 different CD players. Solution? Posted by: Dee at April 30, 2007 3:58 PMHi Dave, HOW DO I CHANGE A MUSIC FILE THAT IS SAVED IN nml, nmx or m3u into an mp3 file, can you help me please... so that i can uploaded into a web page, because they only take mp3 files, please help Posted by: JULIO at May 23, 2007 11:05 PMi have a psp but wen i put it in and then i put usb connection and then it does not come up to create a file it comes up like what do u want to do play music from cd view slideshow and other things but i do not want to format my memory card how would i do this? Posted by: boo at June 1, 2007 10:26 PMhello there Mr. Dave... Is there a way to convert a song that is mp3 into a html code? How can I convert WAV format music files to mp3 or mp4 so they can fit on my Ipod? Posted by: Dan at June 29, 2007 10:00 AMDave I need some help! I have limewire and i got alot of songs i want to burn onto a cd & it says they are mp3 files. How do i change them from mp3 files to where they will burn on my cd? Plz Help A.S.A.P!!! -Lauren xoxo Posted by: Lauren at June 29, 2007 5:19 PMDave Taylor, well done. After hours of frustration with my new MP3 your blog sorted me in a few minutes. Thanks Posted by: John at July 15, 2007 1:01 PMHi Dave, Am using windows xp with windows media player. Am rather green at all this stuff but my problem is this. Have been downloading music from a certain site in mp3 form but want to record it at cd form. Pleeze elp. Cheers Steve. Posted by: Steve at July 25, 2007 12:30 AMCan u help me Plz, how to make mp3 folder from cd. my computer allow me to write mp3 from other mp3, it doesn't allow me to make mp3 folder from cd. Posted by: vuyisa at July 26, 2007 4:25 AMDAVE, HOW CAN I CHANGE FROM MP3 TO AUDIO USING WINDOWS MEDIA PLAYER Posted by: CUBBY at August 9, 2007 12:48 PMHi Dave, I've read some of your articles on how to burn music with windows media player, but I need your assistance on the problem I am having on my media player. The first problem is that when I am burning music maybe 15 music tracks, media player will only burn 6 tracks, and leave remaining 9 tracks unburned before closing the disc. Secondly when I click on media player, it displays memory is full. Kindly profer me with solutions to this problems. Thanks Posted by: Sean at August 10, 2007 1:02 PMI got the following error comment which stopped my copying music mp3 files to my CD. "Windows Media Player cannot copy the files because there is not enough free disk space to store the temporary files. Delete some unneeded files on your hard disk, and then try again." What Can be done to alleviate this problem. Please help me with your wide experience. Thanks Ram thank you very much! I am trying to put photos in my psp i done like you said, connected psp to the computer duble clicked on psp icon made 2 folders one called music the other called Photos i draged the music and droped it in the music folder done the same with photos drag and droped photos in folder called Photos. My music played fine but when i tried photos it said There are no images what did i do wrong Posted by: James Higgins at August 28, 2007 8:19 PMhow do i change and mp3 to where it will play in a car cd player Posted by: lisag at August 29, 2007 3:21 PMHow do I get a windows media player to play on Myspace? ty, gt Posted by: gary tourtillott at October 18, 2007 5:34 PMhey dave, i was wondering when i'm burning a cd using windows media player do i put it on highmat audio or audio cd? Posted by: jocey at October 18, 2007 6:30 PMThank-you so much!! I now know how to RIP music! I was trying to transfer CD music onto a background menu for my slideshow and had to convert it to a Windows Media usable version. Helped so much!! Thank-you!!!!! Posted by: Shannon Smith at November 6, 2007 6:17 PMHowdy, hi dave, Thank you so much for your information on converting wav files to MP3's using Windows Media. It is a simple thing, but for those of us who arn't geniuses at computer stuff a big thumbs up is given! Posted by: Jamie at December 2, 2007 10:54 PMcheers for da advice dave u a legand i have a ZEN mp3 player. I just downloaded over 300 songs to it from personal cd's. Most of the music is in hebrew. The music came imported all shuffled from how it was copied to the mp3 player. Even the englished music is shuffled. Why would this happen and..can it be corrected without redoing all of it? Posted by: sandi west at December 24, 2007 5:00 AMdave need help The file>cd and devices option does not show up on my windows media player. I am using windows vista which has wmp version 11.0.6. Even on clicking the rip tab it does not the songs. the songs are stored in a folder on the root of the audio cd. is that a problem ?pl help Posted by: snehal at January 8, 2008 9:09 AMDave, you are a genius. I can now play my music on my mp3 player. I thought the player would automatically save the tracks as mp3 files - little did I know. Many thanx for the ripping info. Posted by: Norma at April 16, 2008 9:17 AMYou are a genious! VERY good and detailed explanation, and with pictures!!!! i want to know how do i burn an MP3 disc but with different files within the disc? like lets it would mark...file 2 song 1 Posted by: david at May 1, 2008 10:31 AMHi Dave, hope you can help. I recently purchased a Philips mp3 for my wife to put her cds on. I ripped them to WMP then Sync'ed them fine. However on play back they appeared not as albums but in track order, ie all the track 1's played first etc. What have I done wrong, and how can I fix this?? I go through 4 or 5 CD's that get ruined before one of them finally burns part of the songs or some of the pictures I wanted to burn. I was wondering how I could fix that problem. Posted by: Raquel at June 3, 2008 11:36 AMI have a lot to say, but ...
I do have a comment, now that you mention it!
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