How does Napster work?

Posted by: tahir

How does Napster work? - 16/07/2004 07:55

I've recently signed up for napster and burnt some CDs the thing I don't understand is how does napster burn the CD so quickly when it has to download 700 mb as well as burn? Is it just transcoding the wma files to cda or what?
Posted by: BartDG

Re: How does Napster work? - 16/07/2004 08:52

I don't know how Napster works, but I can tell you that it won't download 700mb/cd. It will download the music in mp3/wma format and then the cd burning tool will transfer those files to wav format and burn them onto cd.

This means that the download is effectively 50-70mb/cd, no more.
Posted by: tahir

Re: How does Napster work? - 16/07/2004 09:00

That's what I thought, so why am I paying £9.95 a CD for a bunch of wma's transcoded to cda that I'm going to rip & encode as mp3??? I asked Napster and they said that the cda is downloaded for burning, but it just can't happen that fast
Posted by: peter

Re: How does Napster work? - 16/07/2004 10:20

Quote:
That's what I thought, so why am I paying £9.95 a CD for a bunch of wma's transcoded to cda that I'm going to rip & encode as mp3???

Good question.

Peter
Posted by: msaeger

Re: How does Napster work? - 16/07/2004 10:23

I thought most people used those services to get individual songs not the whole album. Like if you have ten albums that you only want one song from.
Posted by: tahir

Re: How does Napster work? - 16/07/2004 10:25

Quote:
I thought most people used those services to get individual songs not the whole album. Like if you have ten albums that you only want one song from.


I tend to download & listen to complete albums
Posted by: tahir

Re: How does Napster work? - 16/07/2004 10:30

Quote:
Quote:
That's what I thought, so why am I paying £9.95 a CD for a bunch of wma's transcoded to cda that I'm going to rip & encode as mp3???

Good question.

Peter


I only started using it because Napster's CS said that when I chose to burn I'd be getting "Original CD quality files", I wish someone did a (fully legit) allofmp3.com. I don't mind paying for music I just want the option of encoding to whatever I'd like at whichever quality I choose
Posted by: msaeger

Re: How does Napster work? - 16/07/2004 13:46

I like complete albums too, that is why I haven't bothered with those services.
Posted by: msaeger

Re: How does Napster work? - 16/07/2004 13:49

I would like to see when record labels sell their cds directly that they would mail you the actual cd and also let you immediatly download the entire album in some format. Even wma files that expire in a short time would be good enough.
Posted by: JeffS

Re: How does Napster work? - 16/07/2004 14:11

I've bought whole albums online before (just got two this weekend). I like it because it's cheaper and you gete the music immediately rather than having to go out or wait for it to ship. So far I haven't noticed any quality loss doing the rip-encode process, but I'm keeping the origional drm files for my wife's Karma (when I get a replacement).
Posted by: tahir

Re: How does Napster work? - 16/07/2004 14:58

I'm not interested in owning the CD, I've already got 1200 of the buggers, I just want the music, full CDA or lossless so I can decide how I encode it