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  #1  
Old 2006-04-20, 10:07 PM
calvin1663
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Thumbs up Mac guide to downloading and viewing...

Hey, here's a tutorial for new users on macs...


HOW TO DOWNLOAD:
First start by finding a torrent you like. Browse for bands, search them, etc. Find a thread with a specific band you like, and download the attached torrent link. Now download Bittorrent . Double click on the torrent file icon to start it. Once it shows up in the Bittorrent queue, click on it and then select the Start button. It will then show you the name of the torrent, the speed at which you're uploading (sending to other people) and downloading (what you're getting). It also has a progress bar which shows how much you've downloaded already. On the far left is an estimate of how long the download will take at the current speed. Once it's finished downloading, DON'T QUIT. Even though Bittorrent seeds (uploads to other people) while it's leeching (downloading for yourself), you almost never (unless you have an incredible connection and a huge file to download) upload at a 1:1 ratio (meaning for every byte you download, someone else downloads it as well). Having a 1:1 ratio or above means that you're giving back to the community what you take, or more. Once the files are downloaded, you can now listen/watch them. If they're audio files (Lossless), they've either got the extension .ape, .shn, or the most common, .flac. All 3 filetypes are compatible with xACT . Download xACT and select the files you want to decode. Then select the different options (WAV and AIFF are both compatible with iTunes) and decode. Depending on the length of the concert, the size of the files, and the speed of your machine, it can take anywhere from 30 seconds to 5 minutes to completely convert. Once you've done that, import to iTunes using drag and drop, or the import button under the file menu. If you don't want to go through that whole process, use Cog to play the files directly. If you're trying to watch a video, download VLC . VLC plays DVD discs, vobs and about every other file type as well. From there, select the file menu and choose what type of file you want to play. If you want to take a screenshot to show quality, hit Shift-Apple-3. A .png file will appear on the desktop entitled "Picture 1," there's your screenshot!

HOW TO FORWARD YOUR PORTS ON AN AIRPORT:
1. Open the Applications folder on your Macintosh HD
2. Scroll down and open up the Utilities folder
3. Open up the program called "Airport Admin Utility"
4. Select "Base Station"
5. Click the configure button
6. Click on the "Network" tab in the new window
7. Make sure the "Distribute IP addresses" box is checked
8. Select the "Share a single IP Address (Using DHCP and NAT) bubble
9. Select "Update"
10. Open System preferences
11. Select the "Network" option
12. Click on the AirPort tab (should have a green dot next to it)
13. Click configure
14. In the new window, select the TCP/IP tab
15. Select "Configure IPv4" and select the "Manually" option
16. Make sure the IP address reads 10.0.1.X, X representing a number between 1 and 254.
17. The router box should be 10.0.1.1, and the DNS server also 10.0.1.1
18. Click "Apply Now"
19. Go back to the Airport Admin Utility, and select the "Port Mapping" tab.
20. Click "add," and create new open ports with the public port reading 6881, IP reading 10.0.1.X (see above), and private port reading 6881.
21. Repeat step 20 for ports 6881-6889.
*all this taken from this site

HOW TO RIP AUDIO FILES (thanks AAR.oner):
1. Open xACT
2. Click the "util" tab & then select the "CD Extraction" radio button
3. Click the "Add" button, select all of the files on the disc, and click "add files" (the tracks will load into the file window)
4. Click "Execute" and let it do its thing
5. Once done, xACT will spit out an extraction log, which you'll want to save and include in your lossless file set (make sure all tracks ripped accurately by checking that each one reads "recorded succesfully" and had no errors)

HOW TO UPLOAD A TORRENT:
1. Insert CD into slot.
2. Use xACT to extract audio
5. Once you've got the raw AIFF/WAV files, name them to what you want (track 1, track 2, etc. doesn't distinguish a concert).
6. Convert them to FLAC Format using xACT (see above for where to get these apps).
7. Now, create an md5 for the whole package (.txt file, music files, etc. Use xACT to go from checksum>add files [select files]>select "traditional."
8. Include the md5 in the post/file you're uploading.
9. Open up Bittorrent and choose file>generate torrent, select the folder you want, and the Tracker URL (look at dime's homepage for this), it's everywhere on TTD
10. Let it generate the torrent file.
11. While it's generating, select "Upload torrent" from the menu at the top of the page.
12. Fill out all the pertinent information.
13. Select the torrent you want to upload. Let it upload, and post the torrent.
14. Click on the torrent in Bittorrent, and select "Start." It should say "Seeding Nonstop." Let it seed for however long you want (but at least long enough for someone else to get a copy, but longer=better).

NAMING TRACKS (thanks U2Lynne):
1. Open xACT and go to the util tab.
2. Drag all the files from disc one into the window. Leave the selection at batch rename.
3. Hit Execute. It will ask you for the prefix, for this show you would do something like "rush1994-05-04d01t" (I put d01 to denote disk 1, for the second disk, you would put d02, and the t for the track number because it will keep the numbers from in front of the names).
4. Hit OK. Then it will ask you about the period found, tell it to keep it as an extension. You will then end up with tracks named like this: rush1994-05-04d01t01.flac, rush1994-05-04d01t02.flac, rush1994-05-04d01t03.flac, etc. 5. Then, do the same thing for the second disk. xACT's batch rename is really simple!

DVD BURNING
This is a small tutorial for burning DVDs with Toast Titanium (there are other apps that'l do it, but this is by far the best)
1. Make sure you've got the VIDEO_TS folder on your desktop or somewhere on your home computer.
2. Insert your blank DVD.
3. Open up Toast, and select the "Video" tab at the top.
4. On the sidebar menu on the left, select "DVD from VIDEO_TS"
5. Drag the VIDEO_TS folder onto the toast window.
6. Unless it's for personal viewing, deselect all the compression/"Fit to DVD" schemes, just leave it as is.
7. Click the big red dot, and burn away!


If you've got any questions, PM me or reply back and I'll try to get to you as soon as possible. If it's something that isn't specific to you, I'll edit the above post to include it.

Happy downloading, calvin

Last edited by calvin1663; 2006-06-04 at 07:58 PM.
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  #2  
Old 2006-04-20, 11:00 PM
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bigtyke66 bigtyke66 is offline
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Re: Mac guide to downloading and viewing...

Good intro! The only thing I would add is that you can use Cog (http://cogosx.sourceforge.net/) to play flac and shn files without the annoying gap between tracks you get with iTunes, and there's no need to decode. It's a fairly rudimentary program, but I've never had a problem with it (it also seems to run on the new Intel chip machines). I've now pretty much given up burning CDs, except to use in my car. If I use Cog, I just drag and drop files to the interface and play straight from my HD to my system.
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  #3  
Old 2006-04-20, 11:11 PM
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gsmyth79 gsmyth79 is offline
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Re: Mac guide to downloading and viewing...

Personally I prefer MacAmp Lite X for playing FLACs etc. But Cog works too, just personal preference I guess.
http://www.macamplite.com/
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  #4  
Old 2006-04-20, 11:26 PM
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U2Lynne U2Lynne is offline
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Re: Mac guide to downloading and viewing...

I used to love MacAmp Lite also, but it did add gaps between tracks. I've been using cog now for a couple of months and I really like it now.

Something to note about MacAmp is that it isn't supported any longer so it won't 'grow' with our needs. A great application though.
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  #5  
Old 2006-04-21, 12:18 AM
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Re: Mac guide to downloading and viewing...

i used to use MacAmp as well...but now with the new Intel machine, Cog is the only one that i could get to run...
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  #6  
Old 2006-04-21, 07:27 AM
calvin1663
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Re: Mac guide to downloading and viewing...

thanks for the feedback guys, didn't even know about cog!

added it to the post
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  #7  
Old 2006-04-21, 08:23 AM
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AAR.oner AAR.oner is offline
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Re: Mac guide to downloading and viewing...

Quote:
Originally Posted by calvin1663
thanks for the feedback guys, didn't even know about cog!

added it to the post
and thanks for working up the info for any noobs on Mac...cheers!
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  #8  
Old 2006-04-21, 08:29 AM
calvin1663
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Re: Mac guide to downloading and viewing...

no prob, just trying to help out the mac community at large...theyre finally replacing my crummy PBG4 with an upgraded version (20 more GB of HD, better graphics card, DVD burner, 256 more megs of RAM) OH YEAH...

arrives today at noon, expect some seeding around then


cheers, calvin
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  #9  
Old 2006-04-25, 09:33 PM
calvin1663
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Re: Mac guide to downloading and viewing...

edited as of 04/25/06 to include how to upload a torrent
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  #10  
Old 2006-04-26, 06:08 AM
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AAR.oner AAR.oner is offline
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Re: Mac guide to downloading and viewing...

hey calvin, read the update, looks good except on thing...we did some testing last year and found that iTunes extraction is not accurate [even w/ error correction enabled]...xACT however can extract error free, so we recommend only using it

--open xACT
--click the "util" tab & then select the "CD Extraction" radio button
--click the "Add" button, select all of the files on the disc, and click "add files" [the tracks will load into the file window]
--click "Execute" and let it do its thing
--once done, xACT will spit out an extraction log, which you'll want to *save and include in your lossless file set* [make sure all tracks ripped accurately by checking that each one reads "recorded succesfully" and had no errors]
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  #11  
Old 2006-04-26, 09:58 AM
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U2Lynne U2Lynne is offline
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Re: Mac guide to downloading and viewing...

Also, once you use xACT to extract, you will end up with a bunch of files and want to batch rename them. Here's a post I wrote for someone else to be able to do it:

Quote:
Also, I'm a mac user and very familiar with xACT. I've found a quick way to do away with filenames altogether (I know you won't want to do that with this seed, but for future reference...). Open xACT and go to the util tab. Drag all the files from disc one into the window. Leave the selection at batch rename. Hit Execute. It will ask you for the prefix. For this show you would do something like "rush1994-05-04d01t" (I put d01 to denote disk 1, for the second disk, you would put d02, and the t for the track number because it will keep the numbers from in front of the names). Hit OK. Then it will ask you about the period found, tell it to keep it as an extension. You will then end up with tracks named like this: rush1994-05-04d01t01.flac, rush1994-05-04d01t02.flac, rush1994-05-04d01t03.flac, etc. Then, do the same thing for the second disk. xACT's batch rename is really simple!
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  #12  
Old 2006-05-06, 10:32 AM
calvin1663
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Re: Mac guide to downloading and viewing...

edited as of 05/06/06 to include the above posts, clean it up a bit, and bump it as well (talk about killing multiple birds with one stone!)


cheers, calvin
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  #13  
Old 2006-05-11, 01:58 AM
jazzbo jazzbo is offline
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Re: Mac guide to downloading and viewing...

In addition to the discussion about Cog and other players for Macs, the Xiph group is working on QT plugins for their formats:

http://www.xiph.org/quicktime/

The effect of this is that it would allow support for playing the files in iTunes.

Here comes the bad news, while it has flac support, it currently only supports ogg flac* and not "native" flac which is what everyone is familiar with. I was playing around with it tonight and couldn't even get it to play anything correctly so some work has to be done (To create flac files in ogg containers, you pass the flac encoder the --ogg switch)

Does anyone know if iTunes supports gapless playback -- I haven't used it much yet.

*Note that ogg is a container not a format, so these files are still lossless. What most people call "ogg" files, are actually vorbis files in an ogg container.
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Old 2006-05-11, 08:51 AM
calvin1663
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Re: Mac guide to downloading and viewing...

hmm looks interesting, but by looking thru the release notes/your comments, I don't think its quite ready for mass distribution...for funky file formats (FFF, lol) I've been using Flip4Mac (flip4mac), it's played stuff VLC couldn't handle...


cheers, calvin
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  #15  
Old 2006-05-11, 11:26 AM
jazzbo jazzbo is offline
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Re: Mac guide to downloading and viewing...

Quote:
Originally Posted by calvin1663
hmm looks interesting, but by looking thru the release notes/your comments, I don't think its quite ready for mass distribution...for funky file formats (FFF, lol) I've been using Flip4Mac (flip4mac), it's played stuff VLC couldn't handle...
Well, I wouldn't consider native flac too funky if they got that working.

I've been wanting to try flip4mac but there is still no public beta of the Intel version, and I've heard the current version doesn't work under rosetta.
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