| What is MP3? |
MP3 is an audio
compression codec that allows users to compress songs, speeches, and
monkey sounds (Yes, they're out there...) dramatically without
noticeable loss of quality. MP3 stands for Motion Picture Experts
Group Audio Layer 3 (MPEG Audio Layer 3), and because its ability to
compress songs, it became de facto standard for music distribution
over the web.
|
| MPEG? What's that? |
MPEG, pronounced M-peg,
is the nickname given to a family of international standards used for
coding audio-visual information in digital compressed format. MPEG
developed not only the MP3s, but played important roles in many other
audio-visual technologies including mpeg movies and DVD.
|
| How does MP3 work? |
Magic. :) Actually, it's
quite simple (in concept, that is). What MP3 codec does, is that it
gets rid of parts of audio that you and I cannot hear. Our human ears
are quite limited in that after hearing something loud, you can't hear
quiet sound for short period of time. MP3 codec calculates and deletes
that part. This is how MP3 achieves its great compression ratio
without the apparent quality loss.
|
| Are MP3s Legal? |
MP3 is just a file
format. MP3s by themselves are perfectly legal. Also, if you rip MP3s
from a CD that you own, and use it for your personal enjoyment, it is
legal. However, it becomes illegal when you start trading MP3s or give
MP3s away to your friends without permission from the copyright
holder.
|
| How do I play MP3s? |
There are a number of MP3
players out there, from software that runs on your computer to
hand-held portable MP3 players. I personally use Winamp but there are
a lot of other nice MP3 players as well. So, go and search around!
|
| MP3 skips a lot! |
MP3 requires a lot of
computer resources. If your computer is not fast enough, or if you are
doing something cpu-intensive, MP3 will skip. You might be able to go
into Preferences of MP3 players and set it to lower quality to listen
to the music without skipping.
|
| How can I resume dropped downloads? |
There are several
programs out there that lets you resume dropped downloads. One we
recommend is Download Accelerator. Most recent servers do support
resuming, and if you use Download Accelerator, even if your computer
restarts while the song is being downloaded, you will be able to
resume from where you left off. Also, Download Accelerator speeds up
your downloads by up to 300%! If you download a lot of stuff, you
should seriously look into getting one of these programs as they do
make your life somewhat easier.
|
| FTP? What's FTP? |
FTP stands for File
Transfer Protocol, and is one of the main ways to get the file gets
transferred over the internet. Think of it as a way for people to
share their files with others. Although Netscape and Internet Explorer
has built-in support for FTP, their they are not quite powerful enough
for anything other than simple downloading, so if you think you'd be
using FTP a lot, you should get a FTP client. There are hundreds of
FTP clients out there, and most of them are freewares, or sharewares
that you can try out for free.
|
| What is a ratio site? |
Ratio site is a FTP
server that expects you to upload some stuff before you get to
download from the server. You must have a FTP client to be able to
download from Ratio sites. There are number of ways the servers
measure the uploads and downloads. Some lets you download X number of
files every time you upload 1 file, while others regulate by measuring
how much bytes you've uploaded and downloaded.
|
| Why can't I play this MP3 that I've
downloaded? |
There are many reasons
why the MP3 is not playing. Your speakers might not be plugged in, or
the volume might be set to mute. If you are sure the MP3 player is
working, and only that certain MP3 is not working, then you should try
re-downloading the file. You should also check the MP3 player help
file and readme file as well.
|
| The download speed is really slow.
What can I do? |
If you are on a dial-up
account, there isn't much you can do but wait. If the download is really
slow, or if you are on ADSL or Cable, it might mean that the server is
swamped, or there is conjestions on the Internet. You might try
downloading from another server or downloading at some other time.
|
| Okay, I have bunch of .xls, .bin, and
other weird files. Now what? |
In short, you download
the files to your computer, then you must rename the files to one of
the applicable extensions (mp3, zip, or rar).
You must rename the files into .mp3 from whatever file
extention you had before. If .mp3 does not work, you should then try
renaming the file to .zip (use winzip) and see if you can unzip
it. If it still doesn't work, rename it to .rar (use winrar)
and see if you can unrar it.
|
| I don't have the password to the ZIP
file! |
We don't have the
password either.
Because of number of links our scripts process each day, and because
the process is fully automated, it is impossible for us to know the
password of those zipped files. If the files have password, and the
link-gathering script picked it up, a "Unzip Password" field
will be shown in the Download page that tells you the password.
We've found that some MP3 files can be extracted by using the password
on the password page.
If you know any other password that has worked, please post it in the forum.
|
| My question is not here! |
| If you have any other
questions, please post them in the forum. |
