Hello Carol
First with play.com you can download files again if you loose them
see:
http://www.play.com/Music/MP3-Download/6-/Help.html?page=playdigitalfaq
The MP3 format is most common meaning that it is supported by all
software and hardware players.
It is a lossy format meaning that you loose some quality during the
conversion process ; largely depending on the bit rate. Of course
price can be an issue but I personally would not consider a file
encoded in less than 196 Kbps; play.com do them in 196 - 320 kbps
The M4A format offered by apple is lossless (also called Apple
lossless) meaning that it is exactly like the original which is the
best (FLAK is another lossless format and there are others).
Converting a file in M4A to MP3 or WMA is feasible, but as these are
lossy formats, you will loose something but in practice at about
256Kbps chances are that you will not notice any difference.
Finally converting from one lossy format such as WMA to another such
as MP3 is bad news as you loose quality further; this is because each
format uses a different acoustic model (related to the sensitivity of
the ear to different sounds) so put simply each format removes their
own bit off the sound.
Regards
Isaac
-----Original Message-----
From: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On
Behalf Of Steve Nutt
Sent: 24 January 2009 19:15
To: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [access-uk] Re: MP3'S FROM PLAY.COM
Hi Carol,
If you buy from Play, you can't download again if you lose them, so
back them up.
If you buy from iTunes, then you can always re-download, but they are
not MP3 files, but higher quality. They use Flac files which are
M4A. These can be played with Winamp or Windows Media Player, if you
download the right plugin for Windows Media Player.
There are other companies like 7DigitalMedia
http://www.7digitalmedia.com that sell them in MP3 format, and you
can re-download from them too.
Most stores sell in MP3 or protected WMA formats. Apple sell in M4A
and M4V for video. These can be converted to MP3 if they are not
DRM-protected. Apple is removing DRM from their stuff, so I am
beginning to like iTunes.
All the best
Steve
-----Original Message-----
From: access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:access-uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx] On
Behalf Of Carol Pearson
Sent: Saturday 24 January 2009 18:11
To: Access UK Mailing List
Subject: [access-uk] MP3'S FROM PLAY.COM
I'm thinking of switching to purchasing MP3's instead of CD's and so
here are some questions ...
As always, I apologise that I didn't follow the thread when it was
last discussed. Anyway, here are my questions:
Are MP3's available in various sampling rates etc., and can you buy
individual tracks from CD's, or do you have to buy the whole CD where
a CD is listed rather than a single track? Are they all .WAV format
and, if you lose them, can you get them again without charge?
