MP3 is a file format which
stores audio files on a computer in such a way that the file size is relatively
small, but the song sounds near perfect. You can identify MP3 files because
they will end in .mp3. Typically 1 MB is equal to one minute of music or
several minutes for spoken work/audiobooks.
Yes. MP3 is simply
a file format. However, it can be used either legally or illegally. Using
an MP3 is legal if the song's copyright holder has granted permission to
download and play the song. Also, it is legal to make copies from
CD for personal use. However, it is illegal to encode MP3s from CD
and trade them without permission from the copyright holder.
For Windows computers, Microsoft's Windows Media Player handles MP3 and most other sound formats with ease: It's functional but not flashy. Other good free players include
Win Amp, - http://www.mp3.com (Costs $10 to register)
Sonique - http://www.sonique.com/
Where's the music?
Obtaining Software.
Download MusicMatch. This
is the only software you will need to encode mp3's.
Making an MP3 file.
Put the CD you want to encode
into your computer's CD drive. Open the MusicMatch Jukebox. Click on the
button that says "Record" in the Player window. A window will appear listing
the tracks on the CD with track numbers. If you're connected to the Internet,
the names of the songs, the artist and album name will be filled in. If
the album name and artist name do not show up, or you're not connected
to the Internet, then you should enter the info into the appropriate boxes)
Click the box next to each track you want to make into an MP3 file. When
you have finished choosing the tracks click the "start" button found in
the upper left side of the window.
You can use MusicMatch 3.0 to encode your WAV to MP3 or decode
MP3 to WAV.
In MusicMatch Jukebox go
to Options, then File. You will see a menu with options to convert MP3
to WAV or WAV to MP3. There are also MP3 players that can decode an MP3
into a WAV file, WinAmp is one of them, go to 'prefs', then 'output' and
select 'wav file output'. Check our encoders page for additional programs
able to encode and decode files.
MP3 is a relatively new way to store, copy and play sounds on your PC. It does for music what e-mail does for the written word -- making it easy for even a beginning computer user to send and receive sound files across the Internet.
It allows you not only to make your own digital recordings, but also to share them with friends, to grab free music off the Internet and to buy music directly from its maker as a digital download.
It's already beginning to change the way some performers market their music. It's got the music industry in an uproar. And it's become so popular in the past month or two that there are traffic jams at Web sites.
MP3 stands for Moving Picture Experts Group technology, Layer-III.
It's a way to compress digital
music from the fat files you find on standard compact discs into much smaller,
denser files that can move across the Internet quickly and make their home
on your computer's hard drive without taking up too much room.
A three-minute WAV file would take up about 30 megabytes
of disk space and would take several hours to transmit over the Internet
at normal speeds.
The same song in MP3 format would take up only about 2 megabytes and can travel on the Internet across the world in minutes.
Theoretically, the music loses some detail during compression, because MP3 deletes inaudible portions of sound -- that is, sounds that are above or below the frequency of human hearing, or sounds that are hidden behind other sounds.