As mentioned back in July, Iv’e been part of a panel at MacVoices discussing the iPhone. I missed linking to episode 3, but we’ve also just done parts 4 and 5. I found this to be perhaps the most interesting, as we’d all had a couple months with the device.

You can check our MacVoices #793 and #793 to hear it all. So as always, if you haven’t heard enough about the iPhone yet, here’s your chance for more.

I mentioned last month that we’d be at Macworld San Francisco 2008, and that we’d eventually have free Exhibit Hall passes to give out. Registration has just opened, and while we don’t have our passes to give out yet, you can get a free pass if you sign up by October 5th.

The small print says you must have attended in the past three years - I’m not sure what’s up there. But if you use Priority Code: 08-E-VF01 when signing up, I think you should be all set,

The expo hall will be open from January 15th through the 18th, and we’ll be at booth #2738. Sign up now, then plan to come by and say hello. We hope to see you there!

Last week we talked a great deal about iPhone ringtones on our company weblog Under The Microscope. The topic began with the idea of using Fission to edit audio files for ringtones, and we later released a small application called MakeiPhoneRingtone, to get the ringtones onto the iPhone.

MakeiPhoneRingtone does just that - it makes iPhone ringtones. Once you have an AAC file edited down, simply drop it on MakeiPhoneRingtone, and it will be passed off to iTunes and turned into a Ringtone. The file will show up in iTunes’ Ringtone section, and you’ll be able to sync it to your iPhone.

Today we’re happy to release MakeiPhoneRingtone version 1.2, as an official Rogue Amoeba Freebie. This update will work regardless of where your iTunes Library is located, a problem some users of older versions faced. You can now find the latest version on the Freebies page, so head on over and get started making ringtones for your iPhone.

Continuing in our seeming obsession with iPhone ringtones, we’ve got MakeiPhoneRingtone 1.1 available for download now. Version 1.1 uses the more stable “stik” method of turning AAC files into ringtones, as discovered by Cleverboy.

Click to download MakeiPhoneRingtone 1.1

As noted earlier this week, you can create ringtones with Fission, and you can turn non-AAC files into ringtones with the right Export settings in Fission. Once you have the file, just drag and drop onto MakeiPhoneRingtone, and you’ll be set. We hope you’ll check out Fission for ringtone and general audio editing, but of course MakeiPhoneRingtone works with AAC files from any source.

MakeiPhoneRingtone has been tested on many different setups, but we can always use more details to improve it. If you have any problems, issues or questions, email us directly so we can see what’s up.

So far we’ve talked about using Fission to create iPhone ringtones, and using MakeiPhoneRingtone to get those ringtones to the iPhone. Both these articles have received great responses, and we’re working on fixing a couple issues that have cropped up with MakeiPhoneRingtone, so stay tuned for an update.

We’ve also heard from people who want to edit non-AAC files in Fission and save them for use with MakeiPhoneRingtone and the iPhone. Though it’s not immediately obvious, Fission can turn any file it can open into an iPhone Ringtone-compatible file, through the use of QuickTime.

To start, open the file you want to convert in Fission and edit it as desired. When you’re ready, click “Save Audio”. In the Save dialog, choose the “Export With QuickTime” option and set it to MPEG-4, then click Settings.This will bring up a Settings panel which you’ll want to configure as below:

File Format: Set this to MP4

Audio Format: Set this to AAC-LC (Music)

Data Rate: Set this to 128 kbps.This can be set to any value. The higher it is, the better the ringtone will sound.

Channels: Set this to Stereo

Output Sample Rate: Set this to 44.100 kHz

Encoding Quality: Set this to Better.Like Data Rate, the value here doesn’t matter much. The higher it is, the better the ringtone will sound, but it will take longer to create.

When you’re done, click OK, then save.

This will produce a file with an .mp4 extension, which you need to rename. Change it from FileName. mp4 to FileName.m4a and approve the change. Once you’ve done that, you’ll be able to pass it off to iTunes with MakeiPhoneRingtone.

MakeiPhoneRingtone 1.1 and higher will accept .mp4 AAC files and handle them, so there’s no need to change the extension.

So there it is, getting Fission to save any file format it can open into a format MakeiPhoneRingtone and the iPhone can handle. You can now make iPhone ringtones from MP3, AIFF, and dozens of other audio formats.