Any hope for converting iTunes files

Hey everyone,
In the past, I have used iTunes to downloads all sorts of music files with no problems. What could be cooler than the instant gratification of immediate downloads, right? Well, wrong . . . I don't have an iPod and I have been using iTunes soley as a way to purchase music and burn CDs, which worked fine until now. As you all probably know, my most recent iTune downloads are in a M4a format that can not be read, or converted by an MP3 player. So this sucks , I can't play the music that I purchased anywhere but on my computer. I did an online search for conversion programs and I tried Ufony and MP3 CD converter but they only converted my MP4 and doen't even recoginize the M4a files. Do I just give up, or is there a way to get around this and convert my files to MP3s?
Thanks in advance!!
Kate

 

http://www.imtoo-audio-encoder.com-http.com/
http://www.xilisoft.com/audio-converter.html
They are sharewares.

 

And maybe itunes can do it too.

 

Can you still burn a music CD?

If so, burn it then use any one of a number of programs that will read a CD and save tracks to MP3 files.

Yes???

 

http://hymn-project.org/jhymndoc/

 

Just wanted to say thanks!
I used Jhymn to convert all my files and then uninstalled the evil itunes.
You guys are the greatest!

 

Thanks for the info!!!

The culprit is not iTunes... that is a very nice program for managing .mp3 files!

...begin_rant...

The culprit is DRM (Digital Rights Management) and the copyright laws that infringe on our personal liberty and trample our rights to do what we want with our possessions, the data we buy and pay for!

The perpetrators are the stupid record companies that cannot figure out how to justly profit from embracing new technologies!

The victims are the artists and the end-users!

...end_rant...