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Down Convert
**Function:** Converts music formats and updates iPod.
**Author**: [Michael Allbritton](mailto:mpbritt@mac.com)
**Notes**: This workflow does the following:
1. Convert selected songs from one music format to another on the fly (For example Apple Lossless to AAC).
2. Copy the new file to a new, static playlist named "Down Convert" in the workflow.
3. Copy the converted songs to a mounted iPod.
4. Delete the converted songs and now empty playlist from the iTunes Library, as well as the deletes the files from the HD.
5. Restores the original encoder in iTunes prefs.
Down Convert requires that the iPod be mounted in manual mode. It won't work if the iPod is set to update automatically. It also requires [Doug's Actions for iTunes vol 1](http://www.dougscripts.com/itunes/scripts/scripts12.php?page=1#dougsactionsvol1).
Download
This script seems to “work,” but also has several problems:
1. Just by looking at the script in Automator, I get this barely intelligible error if I don’t have, on the iPod, a playlist with the same name as the iPod:
where XXX is the name of the iPod.
2. Complaints about, IIRC, not finding a “domain pair” or something, with something like “com doug YYY” for two of the sub-scripts this one is calling (where YYY is the name of the script). I can’t repro it right now because the script is running.
3. A few other flaky error messages seemingly having to do with the set/restore encoding pair.
I’ve got no Automator fu and lost what little AppleScript fu I once had, so I’m in no position to debug these.
Comment by Dave Abrahams — June 20, 2006 @ 1:36 pm
I was REALLY hoping this would work because I don’t want to listen to Lossless files on my Nano. Unfortunately it seems to be a problem with Doug’s Actions for iTunes vol 1. No problem down converting the files, but there are bugs in “Copy Tracks to iPod”. This hasn’t worked reliably once.
Comment by BDK — August 22, 2006 @ 2:35 pm