Bring On The MP3's!!!
Written: Apr 07 '00
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Product Rating:
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Pros: tons of MP3 files at your fingertips, free!
Cons: can lose downloads when members log off
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| Paragon930's Full Review: Napster |
Are you tired of hassling with FTP sites to find your favorite tunes in the MP3 format? I know I was when I searched for an alternative to that. Who needs all that searching and searching for a song, only to find it but then realize you either cannot log on to a specific FTP site at the moment, or that they have the dreaded ratio system (where you have to upload a certain number of MP3s in order to download any). So, as I said, I was looking for another, easier, way to get access to MP3's.
I used to use audiogalaxy.com (and I reviewed it here a while back too) and that was pretty good because it let me say in the search that I did not want them to return results that were ratio sites, but I still has to deal with FTP. Then another epinionator clued me in on Napster.
Napster turned out to be the answer to all my MP3-finding problems. I could not believe what I saw when I set up my free account. Yup, Napster is free to use.
Ok, so you are all saying to yourselves "But what exactly is Napster? Well, I was just getting to that.
Napster is basically an MP3 community. You join this community by first downloading the Napster software and installing it on your system. After that you run the program, set up your account by filling out a little information, then choosing a member name and password.
Once you have gone through all the technicalities, which is not time consuming at all really, you are almost ready to start the fun part. Before you begin, you should set your preferences up. These preferences are found in the "File" menu under "Preferences".
In the Preferences you can do things such as change your email address, password, Line Speed, audio player, etc... There is also another thing you must decide when editing your preferences: Do you want other Napster members sharing your MP3 files while you are on the server. I was skeptical about this when I first started using the service but then I changed my mind, and now I share my files whenever I log on to Napster. This is the whole basis behind the uniqueness of Napster.
Ok, I know I have not yet told you exactly why Napster is so much better than the traditional way to get MP3's, but I was just getting to that. You see, on Napster, if you search for a particular song while logged on and a search result comes up, that song is there and you can download it right then and there. This is because that MP3 is in the computer of some other Napster member who is logged on at the same time as you are. You are actually downloading the MP3 right out of the other member's computer into your computer!
As a side note, for all of you out there who are skeptical about having people download from your computer, through Napster you can only download MP3 files, it's not as if the members can go searching through your hard drive. In preferences, you choose which directories you keep MP3 files in, or you can have Napster search for the MP3 directories you have, and those are the only files available to Napster users. If you are still not convinced you can just choose not to share your files.
In Preferences you can also choose how many people can download from you at any given time and how many downloads you can have going at any time. The most I've downloaded at one time (and I'm using a 56k modem) was 15 songs. They went rather slowly, but all wound up downloading completely and it was a very efficient way to get a bunch of MP3's at one time.
Also, some added bonuses to Napster is that there is an area where you can manage playlists and play your MP3's through Napster if you want to, and you can also choose from chat rooms in the system to go in and chat with the other members while you are downloading your music.
Ok so all this good stuff about this place and no bad? Nah, there are bad things about the best of things, if that makes any sense. Ok so, you are downloading your favorite song in the whole world, and the person you are downloading from logs off of Napster, what do you do? The answer is, there is not much you can do except cancel the file transfer and search again for someone who is on and has that song. There is the option to resume downloads but when you log in to the community there are different ports you can get put into, and the chances of winding up in the same port as the person you had been downloading from are very slim.
I never log off Napster when I see someone is downloading from me (there is a section of the screen in the "Transfers" section that shows you all your current downloads and uploads), but some people don't pay attention, don't care, or they get disconnected by accident and this causes you to lose your download. But that has not happened to me very often, but it is something you should definitely be aware of.
If you are an MP3 junkie, like myself, Napster is definitely something you would want to invest some time in. I have never not found a song I wanted. It is an easy way to get a large number of MP3's in a relatively short amount of time. Go to http://www.napster.com to download your free copy of the software today!
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
Paragon930
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Member: Erika
Location: Astoria, NY
Reviews written: 56
Trusted by: 64 members
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