Ringtone creation

I wanted to produce some MP3 ringtones for my new Treo, so I played around with the easiest and cheapest way to do it this weekend and here’s what I found:

• Download Audacity — it is available for free for both Windows and Mac (I used it on my Mac)
• Download the LAME MP3 encoder that Audacity needs to save sound files as MP3s
• Open the MP3 file that you want to turn into a MP3 ringtone.  If you have your files in AAC or you have files that you purchased with iTunes, the easy thing to do is to burn them to a CD and pull the WAV files into Audactiy
• Once the file is open in Audacity, zoom in several times until you can view the sound file by the second.
• Insert a marker with your mouse where you want the ringtone to start.
• Drag from the marker to where you want the ringtone to end (i.e., drag to the right from the marker)
• Export your selection as a MP3 — be sure to title it how you want to see it on your phone
• In the case of the Treo, insert your SD card into a card reader and drag and drop the MP3 file into the “Audio” folder.  Note that you probably need Ringo on the Treo to play MP3 ringtones and Ringo creates the Audio folder for you upon installation
• Select your newly created MP3 as a ringtone from Ringo and off you go

These instructions apply (naturally) only to music that you own.