When MP3 was created back in the old days when storage was expensive and limited, it was a brilliant idea. It allowed for music to be compressed so that lots could be stored in a small amount of space meaning that you could have a decent amount of music to listen to from your computer or your personal music player. It also meant that music could be transferred from one device to another quicker than it would be possible using the uncompressed audio file. Downloading music become much easier as it massively reduced the download times.
In its day MP3 was absolutely brilliant, however, that was then and this is now. We are now in the 21st century and one of the major things that has changed is the capabilities of our technology. We now have massive amounts of digital storage available to us for reasonable prices. We have broadband speeds that allow for high definition movies to be streamed straight to our TV's or computers. We have networks that allow us to transfer data at ridiculous speeds, often without wires, around our homes. We have personal music players that contain hard drives or solid state memory with enough capacity to hold more music than you would ever be able to listen to. Good quality analogue to digital conversion is now cheaper than it has ever been and speaker and headphone technology has moved on massively.
What all this basically means is that we now have absolutely no need for MP3 any more, and yet almost all digital music that is purchased online seems to be in MP3 format. MP3 is so amazingly common these days that we run the risk of recording studios reducing the quality in which they do the original recordings as there is such limited demand for these high quality files. The difference is easily discernible between MP3 quality and CD quality especially with high frequency sounds even when using a high bit rate MP3 format like 320kbs. When using lower bit rates like 128kbs the sound quality is so massively reduced from the original that it won't even come close to giving the listener the experience in the way that the artist originally intended. If you absolutely have to get a digital download of a piece of music make sure that you get the uncompressed version even if you then need to convert it to MP3 to put onto your MP3 player. This way you will have the full uncompressed version which will maximize enjoyment and will also help to ensure that music still gets recorded in high quality format.
Jon Hoskyn is part of the team at CJSolutions where the aim is to provide guides to all sorts of useful geeky type things. The website is http://www.cjsolutions.info/ or click here to visit. If there is a guide that you can't find let us know and we will try to produce one for you.
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