br5 to mp3 music converter?

[JimVonBaden]

I am sure this has been posted, but does anyone have a converter to convert br5 to mp3 music? I have a ton of soms the previous owner of my car have loaded, and I exported them, but they are useless to me in br5 format. I want to go through them all and delete the ones I don't like, and organize the rest into genres.

Any help?

Thanks,

[mmmm_beer]

Do a search for "skanman bmwconv". There is a post (#29) that contains a utility that will convert your br5 files back into wma files. It is actually a pretty simple program, it renames the extension and performs a basic bitmask operation to undo what maded it unplayable. The zip file posted includes the .c source code so you should be able to compile it on any unix like operating system (i.e. macOS, Linux) or using something like Cygwin, SUA or other unix environments on windows. It also included a windows Cygwin executable, but it will only run if you install Cygwin to get the .dll file it complains about.

[JimVonBaden]

Originally Posted by mmmm_beer

Do a search for "skanman bmwconv". There is a post (#29) that contains a utility that will convert your br5 files back into wma files. It is actually a pretty simple program, it renames the extension and performs a basic bitmask operation to undo what maded it unplayable. The zip file posted includes the .c source code so you should be able to compile it on any unix like operating system (i.e. macOS, Linux) or using something like Cygwin, SUA or other unix environments on windows. It also included a windows Cygwin executable, but it will only run if you install Cygwin to get the .dll file it complains about.

Thanks, I saw that, but I am only semi-competent on Windows. Unix is well past my skill level.

[mmmm_beer]

Try this one, I took the source that was posted and changed one of the calls to be Windows compatible and the .exe in this zip file should run on Windows now without the need for Cygwin. It is still a command line program so it would require you to open the command prompt and issue the command like this:
bmwconv mysong.br5

where mysong.br5 is the name of a backed up song you wish to convert back into wma files.

You might even be able to drag and drop your files onto the .exe and it should do the conversion. Not 100% sure but I can't see why it wouldn't work.

[JimVonBaden]

Originally Posted by mmmm_beer

Try this one, I took the source that was posted and changed one of the calls to be Windows compatible and the .exe in this zip file should run on Windows now without the need for Cygwin. It is still a command line program so it would require you to open the command prompt and issue the command like this:
bmwconv mysong.br5

where mysong.br5 is the name of a backed up song you wish to convert back into wma files.

You might even be able to drag and drop your files onto the .exe and it should do the conversion. Not 100% sure but I can't see why it wouldn't work.

OK, took me a few minutes to figure it out, but basically if you drag and drop one file at a time, it automatically converts it to a WMA file that plays just fine! Would be nice if you could dump whole sets of songs in, but it is what it is, and way better than nothing!

Awesome, I owe you a beer or six.

Now to convert 5000 songs!

[JimVonBaden]

OK, these are great. I converted over 2000 music files to wma. Do I have to convert it back to reinstall the songs I want back in the car?

[mmmm_beer]

I don't think you need to convert it back to reinstall the songs, just add the .wmv files to your usb drive or idrive. You could also play them on any Windows computer and some other OS's with a little help.

No need to drop the songs one a time, it would have been way easier (assuming you know how to script in Windows) to script it.

For example something like this should work, this will recursively look for br5 files in the %Folder%. Copy and past the code below into a file named bmwcnv.bat, change the C:\Users\WinUser\Downloads to the location of your br5 files, also update the %BMWCONV% setting to point to the location of the bmwconv.exe, then just double click the bmwcnv.bat file:

@Echo Off
set "Folder=C:\Users\WinUser\Downloads"
set "BMWCONV=C:\Users\WinUser\bmwconv.exe"
echo "Starting in folder %Folder%"
cd %Folder%
For /r %%a In (*.br5) Do (
echo "Converting %%a"
call %BMWCONV% %%a
)

[JimVonBaden]

My apologies, I managed to install them as WMA files and they work fine.

Thanks again for all your help!

[JetsetterJason]

Originally Posted by mmmm_beer

Try this one, I took the source that was posted and changed one of the calls to be Windows compatible and the .exe in this zip file should run on Windows now without the need for Cygwin. It is still a command line program so it would require you to open the command prompt and issue the command like this:
bmwconv mysong.br5

where mysong.br5 is the name of a backed up song you wish to convert back into wma files.

You might even be able to drag and drop your files onto the .exe and it should do the conversion. Not 100% sure but I can't see why it wouldn't work.

Yooo, I have been looking high and low for this one 1999 reggae mix cd I got at a random NYC street festival, ever since someone broke into my car and stole it in 2016! Then my car was garaged with DMV registration penalty in 2018, then covid-19 and here we are today November 2021. I get my car back on the road and discover the CD i been looking for all these years was the only cd I ever saved to the car's hard drive. You helped me get it back! Can I paypal you $20 or sumthin? geez thanks!

[WinksLol]

What converters have you tried before? Just to make it clear what to advise. Not all of them work promptly with maintaining quality. I've tried different ones, but I'm completely satisfied with https://convertr.org/wav-to-mp3. I was able to convert all kinds of files, including videos. At least this option is free. Maybe you have a corrupted file, didn't you check it? I had a similar situation where the file refused to play in any application on my phone. My first reaction was to transfer it to my computer and try there. But that didn't work.