08.09.20076

MP3 is an audio-specific format.

read more ...

081.09.2007

MPEG-4 Part 14 was based on Apple's Quicktime container format used to store digital audio and digital video streams./p>

read more ...

MPEG-4 Part 14, formally ISO/IEC 14496-14:2003, is a multimedia container format standard specified as a part of MPEG-4. It is most commonly used to store digital audio and digital video streams, especially those defined by MPEG, but can also be used to store other data such as subtitles and still images.
MPEG-4 Part 14 was based on Apple's Quicktime container format. MPEG-4 Part 14 is essentially identical to the QuickTime MOV format, but formally specifies support for Initial Object Descriptors (IOD) and other MPEG features.

MP4 versus .M4A file extensions
The existence of two different file extensions for naming audio-only MP4 files has been a source of confusion among users and multimedia playback software. Since MPEG-4 Part 14 is a container format, MP4 files may contain any number of audio, video, and even subtitle streams, making it impossible to determine the type of streams in an MP4 file based on its filename extension alone. In response, Apple Inc. started using and popularizing the .m4a file extension. Software capable of audio/video playback should recognize files with either .m4a or .mp4 file extensions, as would be expected, as there are no file format differences between the two. Most software capable of creating MPEG-4 audio will allow the user to choose the filename extension of the created MPEG-4 files.
While the only official file extension defined by the standard is .mp4, various file extensions are commonly used to indicate intended content:
Audio-only MP4 files generally have a .m4a extension.
MP4 files with audio streams encrypted by FairPlay Digital Rights Management as sold through the iTunes Store use the .m4p extension.
Audio book and podcast files, which also contain metadata including chapter markers, images, and hyperlinks, can use the extension .m4a, but more commonly use the .m4b extension. An m4a audio file does not "bookmark" (remember the last listening spot) on an iPod, whereas m4b extension files do. Users can rename mp4 m4a file extensions m4b to activate this and faster listen iPod features.
MP4 files with audio and video generally use the .mp4 and .m4v extensions, occasionally .mp4v. To add to confusion sometimes raw MPEG-4 Visual bitstreams are named .m4v.
Mobile phones use 3GP, a simplified version of MPEG-4 Part 12 (a.k.a MPEG-4/JPEG2000 ISO Base Media file format, MPEG-4 Part 14 is a derivative of the standard from ISO Base file format too), with the .3gp and .3g2 extensions. These files also store non-MPEG-4 data (H.263, AMR, TX3G).
The common, but non-standard use of the extensions .m4a and .m4v is due to the popularity of Apple's iPod and the iTunes Store.