AIFF - Audio Interchange File Format
Audio Interchange File Format (AIFF) is an audio file format
standard used for storing sound data for personal computers and other electronic
audio devices. The format was co-developed by Apple Computer in 1988 based on
Electronic Arts' Interchange File Format (IFF, widely used on Amiga systems) and
is most commonly used on Apple Macintosh computer systems. AIFF is also used by
Silicon Graphics Incorporated. The audio data in a standard AIFF file is uncompressed
big-endian pulse-code modulation (PCM). There is also a compressed variant of
AIFF known as AIFF-C or AIFC, with various defined compression codecs.
Standard AIFF is a leading format (along with SDII and WAV) used by
professional-level audio and video applications, and unlike the better-known lossy
MP3 format, it is non-compressed (which aids rapid streaming of multiple audio
files from disk to the application), and lossless. Like any non-compressed, lossless
format, it uses much more disk space than MP3¡ªabout 10MB for one minute
of stereo audio at a sample rate of 44.1 kHz and a sample size of 16 bits. In
addition to audio data, AIFF can include loop point data and the musical note
of a sample, for use by hardware samplers and musical applications.
The file extension for the standard AIFF format is .aiff or .aif. For the compressed
variants it is supposed to be .aifc, but .aiff or .aif are accepted as well by
audio applications supporting the format.
Convert to AIFF (Audio Interchange File Format)
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