Play iTunes M4P on Creative Zen

Zen is the first Creative player that supports unprotected AAC format, so you can enjoy up to 8,0001 of your favorite CD tracks that you've ripped through iTunes software. Zen also supports iTunes Plus tracks from the iTunes store, in addition to MP3 and WMA music tracks. It is also compatible with music subscription services such as Napster To Go and Rhapsody.

However, as the music purchased from iTunes Store is encrypted with DRM, you cannot directly play it on your Creative Zen. iTunes allows you to burn the protected AAC(M4P) files to CD-R or CD-RW disc to make a standard audio CD:

1. Insert a CD-R or CD-RW disc into your CD-ROM drive.
2. Burn your playlist to make an audio CD.
3. After the audio CD is successfully burned, insert the disc into your CD-ROM drive again. Then you can use iTunes or Windows Media Player to import the music tracks on the burned disc as MP3 or WMA files.

Or you can get some software to help you. I use TuneClone M4P Converter to do this. Though not free, it is very well worth a try. It generates a virtual CD drive to help to remove DRM from iTunes and convert the M4P music to MP3 or unprotected WMA format, which is compatible with your Creative Zen.



Here is the tutorial as to how to use TuneClone to convert iTunes M4P to MP3.

How to convert iTunes to MP3

By Will Spencer via http://www.articlesnatch.com

You might have experienced being unable to play songs you bought from the iTunes Store without using your iPods. At times that can be really frustrating seeing that you bought the music and you feel like you have the right to listen to it using other players. The solution is to convert iTunes to MP3 format, which may not be as easy at it looks.

The trouble with the steps to convert iTunes to MP3 is due to the fact that the music you downloaded from the iTunes Store will be encrypted. This simply means that the music is protected from song duplication and piracy. These songs are classified as DRM protected, which simply means they could only be played a specific computer or type of media player.

It is also interesting to note that Apple continues to have a tight control over the encryption used in iTunes. It is safeguarded to the point that no other online music store can sell music with the same encryption. To the consumer, this simply means you can only get their music from them and play it on their player or software. However, if you are able to convert iTunes to MP3, which is a format that is open to all, then you can listen to the music you bought from them on a player of your own choosing.

The first method to convert iTunes to MP3 is safe and risk free, which is burning your music to a disk, while the second one, which entails using a music file conversion program, might become a bit messy.

If you opt to use a file converting program, you run the risk of corrupting your files. This may be the fastest and the easiest way to convert iTunes to MP3 but you run the risk of corrupting files. Your other option is to burn your songs to a disk then rip the songs from the disk to into MP3. You may use a burning software if that you like or that you're familiar with.

Popular CD burning software like Roxio or Nero can help you to convert iTunes to MP3. Grab a blank CD and put it in then burn the songs from iTunes into a regular CD format. Once all the songs have been burned into a CD, you now have your songs in open format. The next step to convert iTunes to MP3 using this method is to rip the music from off the CD into MP3.

You might think that this procedure is either laborious or time consuming since it will take some time to burn your songs into a CD. Another thing you should think about is the fact that you can fit 18 songs at the most to one CD. This will mean that if you want to convert more songs, you will have to do the same steps over and over.

If ever you don't want to use a third-party burning software then you can just use the CD burning feature in iTunes. This is an alternative method to convert iTunes to MP3 without using another software. Before you start burning your music, you should set iTunes to burn using your CD burner. Select your CD burner on the preferences menu.

Those who don't have a CD burner on their computer will have to use a virtual burner software like TuneClone or NoteBurner. All you have to do to convert iTunes to MP3 is to create a new playlist in iTunes, which includes all the songs you want to convert. After making your playlist then burn your music to a disk in iTunes. If you used a virtual burner, obviously you don't have to rip the music since it's already on your hard drive.

These are your options if you want to convert your iTunes music into open music formats like MP3. Some of your options are a bit risky while other options are safe but sometimes are time consuming.

M4P converter - convert M4P to MP3 WAV WMA

Are you annoyed by iTunes DRM? Do you want to remove it because you want to play the iTunes music on non-Apple MP3 players like PSP, Zune, Creative Zen, BlackBerry, PS3, iriver, Walkman, mobile phone MP3 player, etc, use it as background music in a home video, or anything else that DRM limits it to do? Many people know you can remove the DRM from iTunes music by simply burning the song to a CD, and ripping it back over, losing very little quality (if settings are correct):

1. Insert a CD-R or CD-RW disc into your CD-ROM drive.
2. Burn your playlist to make an audio CD. You cannot select the "MP3 CD" option since it requires the DRM protected iTunes music files be converted to unprotected MP3, WMA or WAV files.
3. After the audio CD is successfully burned, insert the disc into your CD-ROM drive again. Then you can use iTunes to import the music tracks on the burned disc as MP3, WMA or WAV files.

And the method I am going to introduce does the same exact thing but you will not need a CD-RW disc, a CD ROM drive, or even need to burn anything! It's that simple. Let's show you how to perform this.

We are going to be using a program called TuneClone M4P Converter. TuneClone M4P Converter is basically a program that acts as a virtual CD drive that allows you "burn" MP3 from iTunes and "rip" it. TuneClone "lies" to your computer saying that you have a CD-RW drive that it will burn to (like Alchohol 120%). You can use this to move your library of M4P DRM protected music to the MP3 format that you can use on any player out there worth its salt. This is a useful tool for anyone looking to break their relationship with the iPod. The best part is that it maintains all of the music file's metadata. Below is the step by step tutorial that shows how it works:

1. Create a new playlist in iTunes.


2. Add the protected songs to your playlist. Since iTunes burns the protected music with TuneClone virtual CD drive, there is no limit as to music length so long as you have enough hard drive space.


3. Launch TuneClone M4P Converter. Click the "Settings" tab. In the pop-up window, you can specify output folder, output file name format, output format (WMA, MP3, WAV), etc for the output files. Note: You can check whether TuneClone virtual CD drive is successfully installed and where it is installed in the bottom left corner of the interface.



4. In iTunes, click the "Burn Disc" button.


5. In the pop-up window of "Burn Settings", select "TuneClon Virtual_CD-RW" from the "CD Burner" drop-down list, click the radio button next to "Audio CD" and tick "Include CD Text" option. Click "Burn" to start burning.



6. Upon the completion of burning the disc and encoding the music, you can open the TuneClone manager screen to show all the converted music files. To locate the output folder, simply click the "Folder" tab on the interface.