Concert Houston Rolling Stone - Events, News & Articles

Concert Houston Rolling Stone - Events, News & Articles

So what�s WMA? WMA files are Microsoft�s equivalent of mp3 files, they offer slightly better compression (more music for your MB) and some additional built in copy-write protection for those over cautious record labels out there. More and more mp3 players support WMA files these days so it�s worth looking out for as there is a growing amount of music available for download on the Internet in WMA format. Audio Quality Ever since mp3�s started to show their face in the early 90�s there�s been a constant argument about mp3 audio quality, with many strongly feeling mp3 compressions adversely affects the quality of the sound, whereas others argue that mp3 technology only removes sound data that cannot be heard by the human ear, and so could not be of any lesser quality. I�ve not personally noticed any real difference between the two, with the exception of badly compressed music files, although I can imagine on a fairly large setup for example, some of the missing sound low frequency sound waves could possibly be missed because although you may not hear the sounds, you�d definitely be feeling them! What to look for in an mp3 player. Memory Type There are currently two types of memory available in mp3 players, solid state and hard disk. Solid state memory is usually very fast and does not suffer from skips, where hard drive memory is like a small version of your personal computers main disk storage, although these are not supposed to suffer from skipping, I�ve personally known this to be a problem on certain models during a brisk walk or jog. The main difference between the two is the size available, solid state players are currently ranging between about 256mb and 2Gb, whereas hard disk players have an average storage capacity of around 20Gb, over 10 times larger than the solid state models. So you ask, why would you bother with solid state memory? Well, it�s usually a matter of price, you can pick up a 1Gb solid state mp3 player for under �50 these days but hard disk players start at around �130. Memory Size The size of an mp3 depends on two things, the quality and the length of the track. A good rule of thumb when deciding what size you�ll need is you�ll usually get about 1 min for every Megabyte (Mb), or approximately 200 songs for each 512Mb you have of memory at an average to good recording quality, at that size you�ll be able to store around of course you can get much more, or less by altering the quality of the track. Another term you�ll see around is a Gigabyte (Gb), a Gigabyte is a measure of Megabytes (Gb), where 1Gb = 1024Mb. And if you�re wondering why its 1024Mb and not 1000mb� ask your IT support! I take my mp3 player everywhere