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Removal of DRM from M4P iTunes files


punchycool

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punchycool

This is killing me. A week spent trying to remove the DRM from a hundred m4p files that I bought from Apple. I'm on a linux box. I assumed there would be something here. I can't find a single thing that works? What gives? Any advice other than buying a Win or Mac OS since there seems to be many paid apps that could do this there :(? Hold the lecture on the legalities of this matter.

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thefirstofthe300

As far as I know, most of the Windows apps get around the DRM by doing a screen and audio capture of the playing content. In reality, they aren't stripping DRM, they are just rerecording the file.

 

I have not run across a Linux app that is capable of stripping DRM from iTunes MP4s. You could hack together a solution similar to what those windows apps are doing. It would be a bit of work but it should be doable.

 

Welcome to the wonderful world of DRM! *sarcasm*

 

Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

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punchycool

In the open source world (linux) nothing exists...man, times are bad. I don't have skills to reverse engineer the win app. I've tried handbrake in linux, but it only outputs mkv which will not play the file even if I rename the file.

I've also tried downloading them from itunes from my account, but no go - just gives me an m4p back that won't play nice on linux.

I've also tried burning to CD and ripping via itunes, but no go either - just gives me m4p files that don't work on linux.

My ~100 m4p files are pre-'09 era so probably screwed, eh?

Thanks.

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thefirstofthe300

I do believe that you are screwed unless you have a Windows machine you can install the DRM-removal software on.

 

DRM is a b****.  Most people do not even try to crack iTunes DRM as it is just a PITA or it takes forever and instead go to something like BT or Usenet.

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You can burn the mp4a to a cd/iso virtual image. Then rip that virtual image in any format you want sans the drm.

 

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

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punchycool

@speechless - hmm. Didn't even come to mind nor show up in at least 40 pages I surfed this week. I'll try it;).

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punchycool

You can burn the mp4a to a cd/iso virtual image. Then rip that virtual image in any format you want sans the drm.

 

Here is what I tried, but didn't work. I must be missing something. Maybe I need to extract the audio out of it with something like ffmpeg?

  1. In ubuntu gui, locate the m4p file.
  2. From context menu, compress the file, selecting an ISO as format.
  3. Burn that ISO to disk (from context menu choose write to disk).
  4. Write the ISO disk - this is what I tried (below). my optical drive I used is on sr0.
  5. Rename the file to example.mp3.
  6. The file will not play. It launches the Videos app and says, "The stream is encrypted and decryption is not supported."
sudo cat /dev/sr0 > /home/foo/example.iso
Edited by punchycool
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I meant, burn the music to cd, use a virtual image writer. This will create a "redbook audio cd" in iso form. Now mount the iso, and rip it to flac/mp3/ogg/etc. This is the same as wasting a CD to burn on each time, but without the waste.

 

Sent from my Nexus 7 using Tapatalk

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Koleckai Silvestri

I am surprised you're having a problem. iTunes Audio hasn't had DRM since 2010 at least. Apple only has DRM on their video these days.

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punchycool

I am surprised you're having a problem. iTunes Audio hasn't had DRM since 2010 at least. Apple only has DRM on their video these days.

Well, I've been buying itunes music for ten years now...well nine at least. I've got 400 some songs in m4p format because of this. itunes fixed their problem in '09, but I have 137 files - I assume from pre-'09 - that simply will not open up using typical means on Windoze. ANd I'd like to avoid giving those creeps another $137 + tax to re-purchase them;).

Edited by punchycool
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punchycool

I meant, burn the music to cd, use a virtual image writer. This will create a "redbook audio cd" in iso form. Now mount the iso, and rip it to flac/mp3/ogg/etc. This is the same as wasting a CD to burn on each time, but without the waste.

 

This is what I tried speechless, but no go. Any other suggestions or did I goof on your direction? Sure appreciate your time.

  1. Burn the m4p music file to an ISO on disk. I use the built into ubuntu CD/DVD Creator and choose to burn the song.m4p file to an image file on hard disk. This creates a file, /home/me/brasero.iso.
  2. I mounted the newly created ISO after creating a dir to hold it.         sudo mount -o loop /home/me/brasero.iso /media/iso
  3. I tried using these apps to convert the m4p file sitting in that new ISO mount point (WinFF and VLC Player gui apps), but they failed to produce anything that would play the song. I chose outputs from WAV, FLAC, MP3, OGG. The basic premise is to point the source to /media/iso/song.m4p (the lone file sitting on that newly mounted virtual disk), select the output source, and hit convert. All options fail. None of the ouput files play the song, at all. It either errors trying to load it or if it does play, there is nothing to be heard.
  4. I also tried just playing the /media/iso/song.m4p file directly in these players. All attempts failed.
  5. I even tried passing the bitrate and sample rates directly through the ffmpeg command like this, but it exits with a failed to convert. No logs I could locate.
/usr/bin/ffmpeg -y -i "/media/iso/song.m4p" -vn -ar 44100 -b:a 160k  "/home/me/Music/song.mp3"
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HeWhoWas

You're burning the file itself to a 'CD', then copying it off. Basically the process you're doing is the same as copying the file to a USB drive and then copying it back off, it won't remove DRM.

 

What people are suggesting is you use a Windows (or Mac) computer to create audio CD's using iTunes. You can find instructions for this here: https://support.apple.com/kb/PH19494?locale=en_US&viewlocale=en_US

 

If you don't have a Windows PC available, you can install a virtual machine using Virtual Box, install Windows and use that to create your ISO's.

 

Once you have your ISO's, they are just audio CD's, and linux would be able to rip them as per normal.

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Koleckai Silvestri

Well, I've been buying itunes music for ten years now...well nine at least. I've got 400 some songs in m4p format because of this. itunes fixed their problem in '09, but I have 137 files - I assume from pre-'09 - that simply will not open up using typical means on Windoze. ANd I'd like to avoid giving those creeps another $137 + tax to re-purchase them;).

I just downloaded previous purchases again and didn't have to repurchase them. Removed the DRM for me. Good luck.

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punchycool

im pretty sure I tried those options from iTunes on Windows. It worked for most of the 400 songs in m4p format, but I'm left with 137 that would not work. iTunes simply returned an m4p for those. Thx for the url though. I will try it again and report back. Such a great knowledgable community here. Glad to have found this emby product:).

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punchycool

No go. Went through all instructions on apples pages. Because these are older DRM-present m4p files they are ineligible to use the conversion tool in iTunes. Apple pages state the files must be newer DRM free iTunes Plus files in order to convert them. Heck, if mine were DRM free I would not need to convert them. What a mess. I'll try the official Apple forum for one last hope.

 

Thx all.

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punchycool

I had to subscribe to "iTunes Match" ($25/year). I was then able to follow these instructions to output an M4A file that plays nice elsewhere. Worth the money, but what a pain. So, in summary, here is what you need to do with old DRM m4p files. While I've subscribed, I may as well upgrade all of my music to 256kbps format :-). That's a good deal since I have lots of old crappy ripped files from many moons ago as low as 60kbps. Note to self: Find a way to cancel the subscription to avoid year two. It lets you get 100K songs matched and stored in iCloud. Of course if it's not in the iTunes library, you're hosed. I intend to find all of my music files less than 256 bit rate and then ftp'ing them to my windoze laptop. There, I will feed them into iTunes and do the labor to convert per below. You might ask, "Did you try just following step 3.1 without paying??" Answer: Yes, it does not work. See this page I found explaining why and how it helped me solve this.  https://discussions.apple.com/thread/7459594

  1. In iTunes, subscribe to iTunes Match - go through and purchase it as needed. Be sure you've authorized the PC in Store>Authorize so the box will be allowed to play purchased content.
  2. In iTunes, go to Store>iTunes Match and tell it to scan your library.
  3. Follow these instructions to get iTunes Plus versions of my content. It outputs a nice m4a file. You can find them under $\music\iTunes\iTunes Media\Music.
    1. https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201616
  4. I then, ftp the converted, happy m4a files from the laptop to my server when emby lives, rescan my emby library, and drink beer. Wohoo!
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  • 7 months later...

I'm not familiar with Linux. But I do know a smart iTunes M4P converter that could solve your problem on Mac and Windows quickly. It's called TunesKit Apple Music Converter, which you can find it via google or it's official website: http://www.tuneskit.com/audiobook-converter-win.html. This converter is able to get rid of the DRM from the old purchased iTunes M4P songs, as well as the newly downloaded streams from Apple Music.

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  • 2 months later...

You can try out audio book support in the latest beta release of Emby Server. Simply create a library using the Books content type. Once scanned in you can play and resume just like you would expect with audio books. Please try it out and give us your feedback, we're listening. Thanks !

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