The Best MP3 Download Site (And More)

[Dillinger]

Maxim just compared 4 sites/programs for downloading free music, movies, games, files, etc. Their number one pick turned out to be the program I've been using since Napster went down... Limewire. They did a number of tests, including giving some people who have never downloaded anything in their lives an hour to download Weezer's new album, at least $100 in videos, and anything else they could find.

BTW - I have used Audiogalaxy too and also like it. Its a good place to find alternative and unknown bands. And to upload your own music or band's music. You can also set up sharing communities on Audiogalaxy. We could, for example, set up a private "by invite only" Literotica "community" and just share music among ourselves.

Limewire - 5 stars
Audiogalaxy - 3 stars
IMesh - 3 stars
Kazza - 2 stars

Here are the reviews:

Limewire - Works on PC and Mac

It's like walking into a titty bar after a lifetime of burlesque shows. "Nothing could be easier," our guy reported. "I hit the download button, installed the software, and minutes later I was stealing Foreigner's Complete Greatest Hits. Party at my place!"

Grabbing Weezer's Maladroit was almost too easy. "limit searches by quality to find only hi-fi songs," says our guy.

Video - Blookbuster's days are numbered. "Its all here!" said our tester.

Speed - its no iMesh, but it's still decent (37 minutes). Your best bet? Search through files using only the fastest bandwidths.

Overall - Tons of music, great movies and no goddamn hassle. WE HAVE A WINNER!

iMesh - PC Only.

It's an orgy in B minor. "Who needs an hour?" asked our resident genius. "This site is idiot-proof." I Mesh's unique "meshing" technology triples downloading speeds by meshing files from up to seven users as the same time.

Music - Average. Plenty of Weezer but our guy couldn't find Perry Como's "Te Quiera Dijeste."

Video - More pirated movies than you can shake your stick at. Star Wars: Episode II downloaded in under an hour," raved our tester. "Then I watched it , and it sucked."

Speed - the fastest site in all the land (Weezer theft: 19 minutes).

Overall - Great site, but you can't disable file sharing. So what? that means, that while people "share" your files, your computer moves slower than Ozzy on a bender.

Audiogalaxy - PC only

Bill Gates meets Moby in a dark, romantic alley - it's geektacular! "I followed all the directions, downloaded all the software, and got nothin'," complained our tester. "What am I, a freakin' idiot?" Bingo! The trick is finding the nearly invisible "satellite" icon on the uper right hand corner of the home page (Could they have made it harder to find?)

Music - The best site for alternative bands and old-school punk.

Video - Zilch.

Speed - You get music only, but nice 'n fast. "Weezer's latest album downloaded quicker (22.5 minutes) than Kobe Bryant after a rancid bacon cheeseburger."

Overall - It's a great site - now that we found that stupid satellite icon. Too bad a music industry lawsuit may close 'em down.

Kazaa - PC and Mac.

A bootlegger's paradise! The world's most popular download site has music and movies before they hit stores. But there's a catch. "The Altnet software unleashes an army of pop-up ads," says our guy.

Music - More users equals more stuff, but that also means slower and often incorrectly named files. We asked for the Smiths song "Death of a Disco Dancer." We wound up with some snuff film from the '70s.

Video - Great selection. "Britney touches herself 87 times in her "I'm a Slave 4 U" video," raves our tester.

Speed - Slow-w-w-w. Weezer's latest - over 53 freakin' minutes!

Overall - A great site to use after you've looked and failed everywhere else.

 

[lavender]

 

[Dillinger]

Lavy - you were the one who introduced me to AudioGalaxy. I haven't used it in a couple months now. I'm sorry to hear its not what it used to be. I did like the idea that we were able to share files privately or in groups. I hope they still have that?

Meanwhile - if you're looking for another site/program - give limewire a try. I've always just used their free basic program and have been very happy. However - for $9.50 I'm going to give their PRO version a try. Its completely add free. 6 months of free updates. Software support (customer/technical service). I figure why not. It also comes in English, French, German, Spanish and Dutch and supports Windows, Mac, MacOSX and Linux.

 

[Lasher]

Hmmm... ZDNet says Limewire is bundled with spyware. Figures. I'm still using Kazaa lite and sometimes Napigator for those pesky hard to find items.

 

[Dillinger]

http://www.limewire.com - the pro version advertises "*Ad-Free - No Banners- NO SPYWARE" - which makes me think there is a reason for advertising that - ie, the freeversion has spyware. I hadn't realized that. Well, I'm going with the pro version anyway - I have gotten so much great stuff from limewire over the past 1/2 year or so.

 

[Jim_Henson]

Heres a question.

Where can you find Effigy?

 

[Dillinger]

Heres a question.

Where can you find Effigy?

Depending on the time of day and who is connected you can find different things or more of what you're looking for.

I just now opened limewire basic and did a search for Effigy... and only found one song (Uncle Tupelo) - but I could find tons later...

However you can get Johnny says here: http://www.besonic.com/User/0,1391,g0r0l0t0o0i191650,FF.html?session=1&uid=191650&pwd=5djd3qnNsKw=

or

http://www.delta9studio.com/bands/Effigy/Johnny Says.mp3

and more stuff at:

http://www.human.co.uk/gallery.html

And a great site about the band - http://effigy.htmlplanet.com/effigy.htm

 

[Jedi_Outcast]

I use winmx and bearshare (same network as limewire), I'm happy with both, If I can't find it on one I'll find it on the other

 

[Jim_Henson]

Draaah will see now that I'm right, he IS a man.

 

[Dillinger]

Here is a Limewire tip. Limewire uses "Ultrapeers" (These machines accept connections from many LimeWire clients while also connecting to the rest of the Gnutella network. Moreover, the Ultrapeer shields these 'regular' LimeWire clients from the CPU and bandwidth requirements associated with Gnutella, directing traffic to clients in an efficient manner.)

Unfortunately, not all Ultrapeers are as good as others. If you find that you aren't getting many search results with the Ultrapeer you are connected to, simply disconnect and connect. You'll probably connect to a different Ultrapeer, which is more 'connected'.

 

[Feelin' Naughty]

Dillinger, I have a question somewhat alomg these lines, just reversed.
I want to record some CD's onto my hard drive and save them in my shared folder. The only player/recorder that I have saves the music as a wierd file type compatable only with that player. What do I use to save the music as MP3?

 

[wizbit9]

Audiogalaxy - PC only

Bill Gates meets Moby in a dark, romantic alley - it's geektacular! "I followed all the directions, downloaded all the software, and got nothin'," complained our tester. "What am I, a freakin' idiot?" Bingo! The trick is finding the nearly invisible "satellite" icon on the uper right hand corner of the home page (Could they have made it harder to find?)

Music - The best site for alternative bands and old-school punk.

Video - Zilch.

Speed - You get music only, but nice 'n fast. "Weezer's latest album downloaded quicker (22.5 minutes) than Kobe Bryant after a rancid bacon cheeseburger."

Overall - It's a great site - now that we found that stupid satellite icon. Too bad a music industry lawsuit may close 'em down.

Kazaa - PC and Mac.

A bootlegger's paradise! The world's most popular download site has music and movies before they hit stores. But there's a catch. "The Altnet software unleashes an army of pop-up ads," says our guy.

Music - More users equals more stuff, but that also means slower and often incorrectly named files. We asked for the Smiths song "Death of a Disco Dancer." We wound up with some snuff film from the '70s.

Video - Great selection. "Britney touches herself 87 times in her "I'm a Slave 4 U" video," raves our tester.

Speed - Slow-w-w-w. Weezer's latest - over 53 freakin' minutes!

Overall - A great site to use after you've looked and failed everywhere else.

audio galaxy used to be the best on the net untill they came across the law courts

kazaa is (i have found) the best afterwards. but still can be slow and clunky without the avaliablity of AG

Try ernest ranglin or trilok gurtu on kazza and it says "fuck offf. nothing here"

 

[Dillinger]

Dillinger, I have a question somewhat alomg these lines, just reversed.
I want to record some CD's onto my hard drive and save them in my shared folder. The only player/recorder that I have saves the music as a wierd file type compatable only with that player. What do I use to save the music as MP3?

I use creative playcenter which is the software that came with my MP3 player to do that.

I believe Roxio EZ CD Creator can do this. And perhaps Nero as well?

However there are also freeware programs out there that will do this. So I just went to http://www.download.com (CNET) and did a search for "mp3" - there were 500 results. So I went to CNET/Downloads/Windows/Audio and clicked on "Rippers & Encoders" and got 316 results. Then I filtered by "windows 98" and "free" and got 41 results:

http://download.com.com/3150-2140-0...count=&daysback=&swlink=&os=117&li=49&dlsize=

I don't know which of these is best - but give them a try - they've got user ratings.

 

[Feelin' Naughty]

Thank you! *hugs*
I downloaded CDex1.4 and it is busily recording a CD now.
It allows you to save as wav files too.

 

[Dillinger]

I'm glad I was able to help. Let me know how it goes?

 

[Feelin' Naughty]

Works beautifully!
It got all of the CD info, I didn't have to type in a thing.
Recorded in good stereo sound.
Saved everything into my specified file as one folder with album name as folder name.
Saved the entire album as MP3 at 45 mgs.
Thanks again!

 

[Dillinger]

Isn't that great? I love it. 45mb for an ENTIRE album. However to write it in wav/cda to a CD that can play on a regular CD machine its 700+ mb. You do lose a bit of sonic quality but not an awful lot - you only notice it when using good equipment/speakers. I now hear they're going to come out with a newer MP3 format that is even better quality AND lower file size!

I often write MP3's to CDs as well - to play on my stereo and I boost the bass a bit and they sound pretty good. But mostly I store them on my Creative Jukebox and take it with me when I work out and when I travel - great for those long plane rides and excercise sessions.

And, despite the complaints of the record industry, I now buy more CD's than I have in many years. I get to hear music I wouldn't have come across otherwise and when I hear a band I like I buy their CDs.

 

[Spinaroonie]

Words to the wise

Kazaa doesn't work on the mac, they got fooled by a well known scam. A gnutella client with the name kazaa != fast trac network kazaa

Bear Share has spyware too.

The creater of Gnutilla killed himself just a month ago.

 

[Spinaroonie]

And, despite the complaints of the record industry, I now buy more CD's than I have in many years. I get to hear music I wouldn't have come across otherwise and when I hear a band I like I buy their CDs.

My favorite RIAA stat: More CD-Rs were sold last year than premade CDs.

So many things wrong with that it's not even funny

 

[JerseyBoy]

My favorite RIAA stat: More CD-Rs were sold last year than premade CDs.

So many things wrong with that it's not even funny

An inflated stat. Although the burning of audio CD's is incredibly high millions of CD-R's are bought for other reasons as well. The general publics ability to burn CD's is still pretty low.

Of course my mom now knows how to burn a CD...hmmm

 

[Dillinger]

Exactly!

 

[wizbit9]

sony still lost 1/5th of its profits last year through it tho

 

[Spinaroonie]

An inflated stat. Although the burning of audio CD's is incredibly high millions of CD-R's are bought for other reasons as well. The general publics ability to burn CD's is still pretty low.

Of course my mom now knows how to burn a CD...hmmm

Well, even more prominant than that is how they're sold.

I know NOBODY who goes out and buys 50 prerecorded CDs at a time.

Plus it's economical, 5 cents versus up to $25?

Plus the RIAA forget to mention that they get money from every blank CD sold.

 

[BigDawg69]

Excellent ratings Dillinger, I must say I agree with you. Limewire is the best which is unfortunate, because even it is limited at best.

As for a record/playback I prefer MusicMatch. It's the best for cataloguing and then setting up playlists etc. With almost all of a 10gig drive devoted solely to MP3's that's a big job for me. The sound card I bought last year takes a fiber signal to my stereo and then out ot the house. So for me organized playback is a big part of my needs.

 

[Dillinger]

Thanks Dawg.

The playback program I use is the one that came with my Creative Labs Jukebox so its convenient for me to use it to organize the portable device. However, on the computer I usually use WindowsMedia for playback of both audio and mpegs.

I like the portable player because it also has outputs I can plug into my stereo system or my car stereo.

I forgot to mention another download program I have but haven't used in a while Morpheus. But it also uses the same gnutella network as limewire and some of the others.