Q: What does MP3 mean?

A: MP3 is the abbreviation for MPeG1 Audio Layer 3 - where MPeG comes from MovingPicturesExperts Group which is a standard to compress movie data. MP3 audio compression enables users to lower the size of an audio file by on twelth of the original size - in acceptable (near CD) quality. One minute of MP3 compressed music takes up around one Mb of storage space (without compression one minute of music takes up to 30 Mb!). The descendant format to MP3 is AAC - see below for details.


Q: How can I convert my favourite CD tracks to MP3?

A: You need a CD Ripper, or an all-in-one software solution. Checkout the following categories in our Software section: All-In-One and CD-Ripper!


Q: Should I encode my selfmade MP3´s in 128kbps or in 160kbps or even higher?

A: Though 128kbps files are widespread - use 160kbps. The file will be a little bit bigger but the treble will be clearer. After experimenting with 128, 160 and 192kbps encodings we feel you should use even 192kbps to raise the quality of the bass. 256kbps are said to be so near to CD quality that even trained test audience could not tell whether they were listening to CD or MP3.


Q: How can I convert MP3 (back) to WAV - to burn a AudioCD ?

A: One of the most easy ways to do that is to use WinAMP. The Plugin that writes WAV-files under WinAMP is called DiskWriterPlugin. When it is activated, the song you play back is not played back as sound - but written to the path on your Harddiskdrive (HDD) that you specified - as a WAV file.
You activate the Plugin as follows:
Leftclick onto the WinAMP surface. On the pulldown appearing choose ----> Options, then ---> Preferences/ Audio I/O, then find ----> Output Plugins, now choose -----> Nullsoft Disk Writer Plug-In and specify the path you want the WAV to be written to. Confirm.
Press the play button on the WinAMP surface ! You will not hear the song that is played - it´s written to your HDD.
Do not forget to put the setting back to the "WaveOut" Output PlugIn that was in use before you changed it.

Once you have made a WAV file out of your MP3 - it´s the usual way to burn it as an AudioCD.


Q: What is the legal situation ?

A: The legal situation is delicate ! What is legal - what is illegal:

Downloading MP3 Songs from the Internet

Downloading of songs that have a copyright protection is generally illegal. There are legal Companies that provide free MP3´s of artists who are not afraid of being copied. Check out our section containing free Star MP3 downloads: Music Download.

What kind of MP3s are legal, then ?

If you do your own MP3´s of CD´s that you own - there is no problem.

Q: What are the minimal system requirements to play back MP3´s ?

A: You should have a 100 MHz Pentium at least to play back MP3´s in sufficient quality (i.e. without gaps while playback). Mind however that if you want to do something else on your computer while listening to MP3´s - or if you want to use PlugIns - a 100 MHz will not be enough !


Q: What software do I need to play back MP3´s ?

A: You need a MP3 player ! Famous software players are WinAMP or K-jöfol -these are the two players that have the least need in CPU power. See the MPeX.net Software section for the best software players currently available.
Furthermore there are hardware devices on the market to play back MP3´s - portables, stand alones and car devices updated weekly.


Q: Are there any portable devices on the MP3 market ?

A: Yes - the market of portable "MP3man´s" is booming. There are many different Players such as standard portable devices, MP3-CD portables or Car-MP3 player.


Q: How can I obtain MP3´s ?

A: There are certain download services that feature newcomers whos MP3´s are free for download for everybody. See the Music Download section for more info's and links. These services are completely legal !

On the other hand there are certain searchengines that list MP3 servers in the WWW or FTP. Keep in mind that a lot of these services list MP3 files that are copyright protected and that copyright laws may be violated by downloading these files.
To search more than 25 searchengines at once via MPeX.net´s MetaSearchEngine "MPeX.net SeeKeR" - click here

Another way is to use the famous software called Napster - an easy to use software to swap MP3 files. Keep in mind that swapping files which are copyright protected via Naster is a violation of copyright protection law and can be prohibited.


Q: I am trying to download a song via a searchengine - it´s not working ! Why can't I download this song that I want ?

A: The WWW pages offering MP3's for download are often overrun by the sheer mass of download requests. So if there are too many people demanding to download from the server half (or even more) of them will not be allowed to do it . Too often it does not become clear that the server has a bandwith problem - and you are simply turned away. Some pages give the out the note "Too many users".

Downloading via WWW is not the best way - use the FTP instead.


Q: The Nomalize function does not seem to work - the song that I normalized sounds still to be the same volume as before.

A: Normalizer software (eg. built-into Audiograbber) search the song for the Peak Levels -that is the loudest parts of the song. The volume of the song is then increased or lowered proportional to the peak levels found. If the song you normalize is very calm and has only a few very loud peaks it will not sound so much different, before and after normalization.


Q: What is the follow-up format to MP3?

A: MP3 was originally invented by the "Fraunhofer Institut für integrierte Schaltungen" - they did the descendant to MP3 called : MPEG-2 Advanced Audio Coding (short AAC).
AAC is amazingly good - the sound quality of a 128kbps MP3 is reached by a 98kbps AAC (and because the compression is "deeper" the AAC is of cause smaller having the same sound quality).


Q: How can I get my hands on an AAC encoder?

A: Well, Fraunhofer is playing it save this time. AAC is released - it was implemented into Liquid Audio - a "save" audio format that is used to legally distribute music over the Internet.