I’ve already posted one tutorial on how to make a custom ringtone for the iPhone, but looking back at it, I find it’s a bit of a mess with all the edits and reviews. That’s why I decided to post an updated version that’s a bit cleaner if possibly more complicated. The steps are the same, but I’ve added notes, suggestions, and requirements for each step where needed.

Let me start off by saying, you don’t have to do this by hand if you don’t want to. Anyone who doesn’t feel comfortable doing things that require a bit of technical know-how can easily go to places like Audiko.net and have the entire process done for you. Let me point out though that you  have to upload your file to them or link it from a webserver. Personally, I don’t feel comfortable with this. This tutorial is for those people who are like me and want to do things on their own.

To start, let me tell you what you are going to need upfront before going into what the actual steps are.

• Audio source file – Doesn’t have to be music, can be anything you want as long as it’s an audio file. (Sorry, I don’t know an easy way how to pull from videos.)
• Audio editing software – If you don’t have one, try the free version of Wavepad by NCH Software.
• Audio converter – Some Audio editors (like WavePad) can do it, but I use the free Switch from NCH Software because it can do conversions in bulk. There are also multiple online file converters. A good list is over on MakeUseOf.

Now that you have your tools together, what do you actually do with them?

1. Edit your clip.
   • Most audio files start out with a blank second or so to make the transitions between songs less jarring. If you are taking just the beginning of a song, be sure to remove that empty space.
   • You want to make sure your ringtone is somewhere between 20-35 seconds long. If it’s too short you could miss it as I don’t think the iphone loops ringtones. If it’s too long the phone will not see it at all.
   • Another thing you want to do is make sure the audio balance is not too low. If it is, the clip will be rather quiet even if your phone volume is on max. If you make it too high you run into the problem of ‘clipping’ and it can sound rather unpleasant.
   • One suggestion is to make a copy of your source file to work with, that way you are not likely to destroy your original file. Remember, once saved editing can not be undone.
2. Save Clip as MPEG-4 Audio (.m4a).
   • There are many ways to do this, depending on your program. With WavePad you can simply go under File/Save File As… then name it a short title you will recognize it by and then in the drop down menu pick MPEG-4 Audio (.m4a).
   • Do NOT simply save it as MP3 or whatever format it is already in and then change the filename. That will NOT work.
   • If you are planning on making a lot of ringtones at once, you CAN save it in it’s original format and use a batch converter like Switch to change all of them at once.
   • One caution: be sure not to over-write your original audio file because there is no way to undo the editing.
3. Change extension to M4R.
   • Before you do this, make sure your OS is set to show file extensions. By default, Windows Vista has these hidden and protects them. To check if your file extensions are hidden, look at the file name. If it appears as filename.m4a you are fine. If it appears as simply filename then extensions are hidden. Renaming from filename to filename.m4r will result in filename.m4r.m4a which will not work.
     To change extensions in XP
     1. Open a folder or open explorer
     2. Click the Tools menu at the top
     3. Click Folder Options
     4. Click the View tab
     5. Uncheck Hide extensions for known file types
     6. Click OK

     To change extensions in Vista
     1. Open a folder or open explorer
     2. Click the Layout button (to the left of the Views button)
     3. Click Folder Options
     4. Click the View tab
     5. Uncheck Hide extensions for known file types
     6. Click OK

4. Drag your new Ringtone(s) into iTunes, making sure it appears in the Ringtones Library.
5. Connect your iPhone then click on it in iTunes. On that default page there are many tabs up at the top. Click on the “Ringtones” tab and make sure it is set to sync the ringtones.
6. Sync your iPhone.

Your ringtones should now appear in the Settings/Sounds/Ringtone menu on your iPhone. If they do not, the two most common errors are the file extension and length requirements.

• Problem: Ringtone imports to Music Library not Ringtones Library.
  Solution: Ringtone was not properly labeled as M4R. Check to make sure file was converted to M4A format properly. If it was, then make sure your OS is not hiding file extensions.
• Problem: Ringtone appearing in Ringtones Library but unable to sync to iPhone.
  Solution: Ringtone is too long. Testing found anything over 40 seconds was too long. I suggest no more than 35 seconds to be on the safe side.

I hope this has been helpful, probably more helpful than the older version of the tutorial. Readers have mentioned websites like MakeYourOwnRingtone.com which is perfect for people looking to get that right snippit made. The problem with these websites is that most will only make MP3 clips, some even WAV files. You will still need a program to convert them to M4A then rename to M4R before importing into iTunes.

For those who want to rip a clip from a video on the web, you can use websites like VidToMP3.com which will pull from any video posted on the internet including YouTube and MegaVideo. You can take the resulting MP3 and then follow all the directions posted above.

This wraps up this tutorial. Please comment as you wish with any problems, corrections, or suggestions.

When I finally managed to get my new iphone, the first thing Tanya & Laura say is “You have to get Pandora Radio“. At first I’m wondering why on earth would I want an internet radio station on my phone when I can use my entire iTunes Library at last.. but then Erroch piped in and said I needed to check it out so I caved. So will you when you hear about all of this.

One of the difficult parts for me was having to wrap my head around what Pandora actually is. It really is like flipping through radio stations. Each ’station’ will have themes, similarities, etc. How it obtains those ’seeds’ are up to you. For better explanation, I’m going to take you through the process of getting setup. It’s how my mind works, so bare with me.

When you first go to Pandora you can get started right away without even having to create your own account. Everything is available to you except saving your stations and whatnot. I highly suggest making an account, even if you don’t want to bother with creating your own stations. Other users on Pandora can make their own stations and you’re welcome to find them and use them. You can see my profile as an example.

So, how do you find channels to listen to? Pick a song out of your head. Hover over the “Share” button and click “Find a shared station“. Type in the name and do a search. Depending on the song there might be some stations up or not. You can type anything you want into the station search: song name, artist name, keywords, etc. Feel free to experiment and find all the stations you want.
While you are listening to a station you can vote on a song to say if you liked it or not. Why should you? Well, if you like it, Pandora then takes a look at the qualities of that song and tries to make sure that the rest of the songs it puts in the station match. It’s not 100% perfect, but it’s pretty good at it. If you tell it you don’t like the song, then it removes that song from the station and whatever qualities that made it different it will try to ignore. One thing to note: if you try voting on a ’shared’ station that someone else made, to make your vote count it will have to copy the station to your own listing then apply whatever changes you make. This means that if the original author makes any changes, you won’t see them because effectively you’re now listening to a different channel. This can be good if you find a channel you like but want to customize it to your taste. However, I simply prefer to make my own stations from the ground up.

To make your own station, it is pretty easy. Remember that song in your head that you really like? Well, this time, instead of going under the “Share” button go under the “About the Music” button and click on “Find a Song“. After you do the search for the song, go to that song’s page and you’ll see many things. From a blurb about the song, comments from other users, and a bunch of buttons under the album cover on the left. If it’s a song you really like, I suggest clicking the “Bookmark this Song” so you have easy access to it later. The next thing you can do is click “Create A Station“.
That will start a whole new station based around the qualities of that one song. If you want to do an artist rather than song that’s fine too. The only two things you can’t do is base one on a ’style’ (ie Pop, Classical, Rock) or on a particular album. At first it confused me why they wouldn’t allow style, but then I realized that ’style’ is very subjective. I might call something rock and you might call it alternative, etc. And how many times have you gotten an mp3 and found it’s genera completely mislabeled? No, it uses things like tempo, musical key, instruments, vocal types, etc to form the channel. But I digress.

Now you’ve just made your first channel. But, it’s very vague and not completely what you want. Time to customize it! Your first option is of course doing the thumbs up or thumbs down on a song, but you can do other things like add more songs and artists. So go to your profile page. It should open in a new window and leave your radio playing. If you look over on the far left of the window there will be a box labeled “Stations“. Click on the name of your station to open up it’s full listing. (Clicking the blue button with a white arrow will simply start playing that station, not edit it.)
On the station’s profile, you can do many things. The first is edit the station name and description. I find it better to label the station with what style I want it to portray and then add in a blurb about what artists and styles I’m looking for in the channel. If you do edit the name, you’ll need to refresh your radio window/tab for it to update. The next two sections are the important ones however: Artist Seeds and Song Seeds. The more seeds you have, the more qualities Pandora will have to apply to form the songlist for the station. You can easily add the choices right there on the page by clicking the “Add” button to the section you want to add to and filling in the artist or song title. Added something you now want to remove? That’s easy too. Just check the box next to the song or artist and click the “Remove” button.

Another good thing you can do on this page is correct any “Thumbs up” or “Thumbs Down” you’ve made to the songs on this station. I’ve already had it where I made some choices on a station I made that then completely changed the style of music I was getting off the station. The biggest thing to remember when applying a rating is this: Does this song BELONG on this station? Yes, you might LIKE it, but does it belong there? If you like it, you can hover your mouse over the song information in the player and between the thumbs up and down you’ll see a small arrow pointed up. There are several options, but one is the “Bookmark” where you can choose to bookmark the artist or the actual song. One other option I’ve fallen in love with is the “Move song to another station”. That will give it a thumbs down in the current station but give it a thumbs up in the selected one. Very handy indeed!

Once I had a station playing in the background I then went to town on the search page and bookmarked all the artists I liked, picked out specific songs I love, etc. Now I’m going through and putting channels together by going through my bookmarks. I’m still remember stuff I like. So happy it’s all dynamic. And the best thing is.. you get to find new artists and songs!

There are a lot more options and tons more information in the FAQ. I strongly suggest going through it sometime.

My only real wish is that I’d be able to listen to Pandora on my iphone in the background. But that’s not Pandora’s fault, that’s an Apple decision.

This morning I decided to do a bit of research. My friend linked me a nice program that did all the snipping and importing of the songs for you, but it was a paid program with only a small taste test of what you could do. This was not pleasing to me. I am a music and ringtone junky. I love to have my friends each have their own ringtone so I know who’s calling with out even looking.

Unable to find anywhere that explained a simple way to do your own ringtones without paying for it, I tried multiple ways to get the ringtone into itunes, all without success. Finally broke down and tried the paid software demo. My hunch paid off and I found out what I needed.

1) Pick out your Source – I’ve got a pretty extensive library, but I want to make sure that the song is loud enough to jar my attention when it’s ringing, as well as clear enough to make out.

2) Edit your clip – Most songs start out soft or have a blank second or so in the front. That is not good for a ringtone. Most of my ringtones are around 20 seconds long, but I think you can go longer (See Update 2 below). Since I’m a PC person, I just use the free Wavepad from NCH Software.

3) Save your clip in M4A format – Most audio editors should be able to do this, or you can use a file converter. Switch from NCH Software is perfect if you need to do bulk conversions. There are also multiple online file converters. A good list is over on MakeUseOf.

4) Change extension to M4R – I just open up the folder I saved my ringtones to and edit it straight in the OS. Don’t worry about any warnings you get about it being possibly unusable.

5) Drag the M4R into iTunes – M4R is a useable format for iTunes so all you have to do is drag it into iTunes and it will add it to the Ringtones library. I’ve read before that it’s a good idea to add only one ringtone at a time or you might get multiples of the same ringtone rather than all of your different ones.

6) Sync your iPhone – You can now choose the custom ringtone from your list. Your overall ringtone is in the Settings/Sounds menu. If you edit your contacts directly you can assign custom ringtones for each one.

Yes folks, it’s as simple as that. As far as I know this should work for both PC and MAC users. I don’t think there is a limit on how many or how large your ringtones can be, but I’m not exactly sure so be careful with your experiments. Remember that your phone rolls over to voicemail after a certain time period so it’s pointless to make anything longer than that. Typically shorter ones will loop, but I haven’t tried it out myself just yet.

Enjoy!

—

UPDATE: After adding my other ringtones, the iphone itself is limited to carrying only 10 ringtones at once. Sad Leth. If someone finds out differently without jailbreaking their phone, please comment and let me know.

UPDATE 2: I’ve figured out the problem with importing some ringtones. When I added them to my library, all of them would show up in iTunes, but not all would show up on the Ringtones tab under my iPhone. After a little experimentation, it’s because of length. The ones that didn’t show up were all 40+ seconds long. I trimmed them down to under 35 seconds and they all work now.

UPDATE 3: Someone over on my Livejournal just pointed out that by default Windows Vista HIDES and PROTECTS file extensions. You have to first unhide the extensions in order to change the file extensions.

To change extensions in vista

1. Open a folder or open explorer
2. Click the Layout button (to the left of the Views button) as shown in the picture below
3. Click Folder Options
4. Click the View tab
5. Uncheck Hide extensions for known file types
6. Click OK

Another reader mentioned the website MakeYourOwnRingtone.com which is perfect for people looking to get that right snippit made. You will still need to convert the file to .m4a then rename to .m4r before importing into itunes though.