I have not yet given it a try, but a new application for Mac OS X looks like it may be even better than Join Together 5, which I recommended back in July. Audiobook Builder appears to go quite a bit beyond what Join Together is able to do, including the ability merge individual CD tracks into chapters before merging the chapters into a chapter marked whole-book track, add artwork to each chapter, etc.
My initial suspicion, based solely on looking at the screenshots, is that it may be a little complicated if your needs are simple. For myself, I usually only want to merge entire CDs into chapters, which iTunes does if you use the Advanced > Join Tracks command, and then join those into a whole book, with chapter marks and full audiobook format and metadata, which Join Together does quite ably, and very simply.
In any event, I’ll be giving Audiobook Builder a try in the near future, and I’ll post a full review then, but in the meantime, I wanted to point to it, and see what other people think.
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
I checked Audiobook Builder out and it’s among the best tools I have ever used. It’s beautiful, sleek and works perfectly without any Quicktime windows popping up and freezing it so you cannot do anything else while converting.
I converted quite a couple of my Audiobooks this way. I like especially the way how tracks from different CDs can be joined into one chapter. Of course it’s shareware but for 10 bucks, it’s a steal.
I love it. I think every audiobook fan should give it a try. The demo is limited to 20 minutes of audio material though but it took me only two spins and 10 minutes to get my PayPal account ready.
I really found your blog entries on audiobooks useful, thanks! I have one remaining question…in Windows, is it possible to join together multiple audiobook tracks into one track AND put a chapter mark between each track (i.e., preserve the multiple-CD structure in the file that’s created). Thanks! Mark
Learned the hard way that ripping CDs for iphone listening isn’t as easy as it should be. So, I bought and have been using Audiobook Builder for several days now. This is beautiful software! It is simple, intuitive, stable and does its ONE job with amazing elegance. And at $10 it’s a no-brainer.