Many new S60 phones support true tones in MP3 or AAC formats. For example, Nokia 3250, 6630, 6680, 6681, 6681 and all N-Series phones. Can we create true tones from our own music collection? The answer is yes. What do we need? We need software to create true tones. Basically you can use any sound editing software that has the following features:

  • Importing audio files from MP3 or other formats.
  • Editing audio files. Actually we need only a feature to select and copy part of the audio.
  • Converting audio files to MP3 or AAC.

There are some sound editing applications out there, for example:

  • WavePad. WavePad is a commercial software. There is a free version with limited features, which should be sufficient for us to create true tones. One limitation of the free version is no support to AAC format. It should be fine; we can use MP3 as our true tones.
  • AudaCity. AudaCity is an open source project. It supports MP3 (after downloading additional codec). Unfortunately, it does not support AAC yet.

I will show you how to create true tones using WavePad. The steps should be similar for AudaCity.

  • Open your music file in WavePad.
  • Select part of the music file you want to make true tones (see pictures below). In many cases, you don’t want to make the whole song as true tone. Firstly because the whole song is too long for true tones (usually 20 - 30 seconds is sufficient for true tones). Secondly, you may want only use the refrain part of your song.
  • Select Edit | Copy.
  • Select File | New to create a new music file. You can simply select 44,100 kHz and stereo. Don’t worry; you are able to change the format later when you save the music file.
  • Select Edit | Paste.
  • Select File | Save as. Save the file as MP3. As I mentioned above, the free version of WavePad does not support AAC.
  • Now you have MP3 file that you can use as true tones. Transfer the file to your phone using PC Suite or memory card.
  • Enjoy your new true tone.

Creating true tones for S60 phones using Wavepad