The Zune software lets you add to your collection audio and video in a variety of formats and codecs. Just download media from the Web or rip songs from a CD, and the Zune software automatically adds the downloaded (and ripped) items to your collection and syncs them to your device.   

The Zune software will convert many video formats during sync so they can play on your Zune device. This automatic transcoding can take a while.

The audio or video format is the container that stores audio or video information. It holds the actual audio or video content.

You've probably heard of the most common audio and video formats: Windows Media Audio (WMA), Windows Media Video, MP3, and MP4. You can find out the format of your media by looking at the file extension—the characters to the right of the dot in the file name. For example, an MP3 file's extension is .mp3.

You can play, burn, or sync audio and video files on the Zune software that are in these formats:

Some media on your computer may not show up in your Zune collection even if they are in one of these formats. For example, if you buy protected .m4v and .wma files from somewhere other than Zune Marketplace, they won't work on Zune and won't be included in your Zune collection. Zune plays only protected content from Zune Marketplace.

Songs or other audio content in formats that Zune doesn't use can be converted into one of these formats and then added to your Zune collection. To learn more about converting audio files into one of the formats Zune uses, see Manage File Conversion.

Codec is short for "compression and decompression." A codec is software that compresses the sound and image streams, and the Zune software decompresses media using the same codec.

For example, when you rip a song from a CD to your computer, the Zune software uses the WMA codec to compress the song into a compact WMA format. When you play that WMA file (or any WMA file), Zune uses the same WMA codec to decompress the file so that Zune can play the music.

Some codecs can be used to store audio and video in a number of different file formats. For example, the H.264 video codec (also known as MPEG-4 Part 10 or AVC) can store data in a number of MPEG-4 and QuickTime movie formats, including .m3v, .mp4, .m4a, .m4b, and .mov.

Zune will play media compressed with the codecs installed on Windows or the Zune software, including

• WMA Standard
• WMA Pro
• WMA Lossless (available for Zune 30 with version 2.1 firmware)
• Advanced Audio Coding (AAC)
• MPEG-1 Audio Layer 3
• MP4pt2 (not available for Zune 30)
• H.264 (not available for Zune 30)
• MPEG-2 (available for Windows Vista Home Premium and Ultimate only and is converted for play on the Zune device during sync)
• WMV8 (supported on Zune 30 only)
• WMV9
• WMV Photostory (available for Zune 30 only)

Note
Your Zune device doesn't use as many codecs as the Zune software does. However, any media that can be stored in your collection will be converted to a playable format when it's synced to your Zune device.

You can adjust the compression quality used during ripping. Choose a quality setting that balances between quality and file size. If you are not sure what settings to use, try ripping with different formats and bit rates, and then play the files.

You also can choose a format for files created during ripping. The default format is Windows Media Audio, which balances file size and sound quality. It is not possible to use the Zune software to change either the format (for example, from WMA to MP3) or the bit rate of previously ripped files. Rip the music again using the new format or bit rate settings.

To learn how to adjust audio quality, see Adjust the Quality of Ripped Audio.