MediaCoder

Nero AAC is rather good I believe. FAAC is pretty bad quality wise, IMO. So try the Nero. CT seems to be good quality, but I get M4A problems.

Right now I prefer Nero AAC because it encodes to a M4A container
format that my Nokia phone recognizes. I cannot configure CT AAC+ codec to work with the nokia unless I save in AAC format... but then just about every other program I have won't recognize.

Btw. I tried to use iTunes encoder, it is listed in the settings screen, but I can't see it in the drop down list. I have itunes installed, 6.0.4 I believe. Is support for iTunes encoding removed at the moment?

I found CT encoder sounds better than Nero encoder in the same bitrate level in more occasions (some wide stereo audio), but CT doesn't provide VBR encoding yet which Nero does support.
Have you tried set container to MP4 when encoding with CT?

Yes, but it isn't recognized by my Nokia phone. Reporting the file as corrupt. I need to use a format that works both in iTunes and on the Nokia phone. Formally it supports m4a, but the particular way that CT creates its MP4 container that makes it incompatible with the nokia...

Because if I encode using CT AAC+, but output to Default, I end up with *.aac files. They are unable to play back in iTunes, but works fine on the Nokia and in Winamp (... winamp doesn't support M4A files however ... isn't it lovely? ROFL..)

So as I see it Ct encodes fine for the nokia, but the mp4 container doesn't work.

Btw is the iTunes support in the current build? For some reason it isn't in the list of audio encoders, but present in the configuration screen of MediaCoder.