Creating a ringtone using only iTunes

Remember the days when getting a ringtone up on the iPhone was about as hard as, say, fixing the economy? There were all kinds of programs you had to mess around with, and sometimes it worked and sometimes it didn't, and most of the time, it just wasn't worth the trouble. Cut ahead a year from those days of yore to right now, and look at this -- all you need to get a ringtone of almost any song you want is iTunes itself.

If you want to do anything more fancy, you'll need GarageBand (and you've got it anyway, so follow Steven's guide if you'd rather do that), but as CNET shows, iTunes will let you choose the start and stop times of a song, and converting to AAC from mp3 will let you cut it down to just those times. Pull it out of iTunes, rename the extension, drag it back into iTunes (making sure to delete the version that's already in there), and voila, custom ringtone.

Note, however, that it doesn't work for music with DRM on it, but it does work for music you rip from a CD. One favor to ask, though: don't really put Young Jeezy on your ringtone -- those 'tones are obnoxious. How about a little Miles Davis instead?

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Source: http://cnettv.cnet.com/9742-1_53-50003920.html

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Analysis / Opinion Software How-tos Tips and tricks Odds and ends Freeware iTunes iPhone

Remember the days when getting a ringtone up on the iPhone was about as hard as, say, fixing the economy? There were all kinds of programs...

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Oh! delete the original. That's what I was missing. Thanks. Also, not sure if it was needed, but I changed my acc files extension from m4a to m4r.
Thanks much.

November 29 2008 at 12:50 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

marcintosh

I used to do this with my RAZR, but was never able to get it to work with the iPhone. I did exactly what the guy in the video said and now I have 5 ringtones listed correctly in iTunes, but the WON'T sync to my phone. They show up a sync-able in my iPhone options screen, they just don't move over. Any ideas?

October 14 2008 at 9:06 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

callisto9

To change your settings so that you see the Advanced/Create AAC version, click on Edit, Preferences, General tab, and then click on the "Import Settings" next to "When you insert a CD" in the middle of that screen. Change "Import Using" to AAC Encoder. You will now see "Create AAC version" in the Advanced menu. Good luck.

October 07 2008 at 10:26 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

farfisa

Nice tip--I've been doing it that way already, but thought maybe there was a way to skip the Finder steps. You know, 'cause it says "using only iTunes" and all. ;)

October 07 2008 at 12:40 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

rob

Hmm... nothing new here. I've been doing this exact process for a long time now.

Another note however, before exporting the portion of the song as aac, you can also adjust things like base and volume levels (get Info box, different tab). That way, when you put the ringtone on your iPhone you can squeeze out a little extra volume and lower the base to remove some of the distortion on the external speaker. Works well.

October 07 2008 at 10:54 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Andy

it can be longer than 15 seconds too. I think the limit is 30 seconds? so i went with 29 and it worked fine.

October 07 2008 at 8:53 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

I dont do ringtones with lyrics in them anymore, just the instrumental, I hate peoples phones screaming in public.... I got over that phaze five years ago with my old school i930. Bring it back to the basic's people. But anyway, I usually find you still have to do a little audio editing in audacity to turn the down bass and turn up the treble. Then amplify so you can actually hear it. It just sounds so much better.

October 07 2008 at 8:43 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Jeff Dembinski

To get 'around' the DRM issue - you could take an extra step and create a music CD with the song in question; make sure your IMPORT settings import files as MP3; after the CD is created, re-import the song you just wrote to CD - no more DRM.

October 07 2008 at 1:40 AM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Jash Sayani

Used to use GarageBand......

October 06 2008 at 11:17 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply

Jan

You don't even need GarageBand with this method; just iTunes and, well, that's it! Enjoy:

http://brandonblattner.com/2008/07/14/put-custom-ringtones-on-your-iphone-3gfor-free/

October 06 2008 at 10:51 PM Report abuse Permalink rate up rate down Reply