Ever since the 1950’s there’s hardly been anything more important to a teenager than the music they listen to. Throughout the years, the way anyone listened to music on the go transitioned from car radios to the transistor radios to 8-track players to cassette players to boomboxes and then CD players. Finally, in the late ’90s, a new format came along that once again revolutionized the options available to listen to music on the move.
In 1997, the Saehan Information Systems launched the first portable MP3 player. The company then sold its MPMan player in Asia in the spring of 1998. Later in 98, the South Korean company also licensed players for distribution in North America to Eiger Labs. The Eiger labs company renamed the players as the EigerMan F10 and F20.
What Do the Letters MP3 Mean?
Explaining how electronics work can be tricky since they are so complex in most cases. Simply put, MP3 is a coding format used in digital audio. The letters and number stand for MPEG Audio Layer-3. and is a standard technology that compresses a sound sequence into a much smaller file size, ( about 1/12th of its original size), yet it preserves the original level of sound quality when you play it.
How Do MP3 Players Work?
The way an MP3 player works in how it decodes the file information on the MP3 file. It converts the binary code of 1’s and 0s back to an analog signal that is then sent to an amplifier or speakers. The sound quality can depend on several different things, but the most important factor is the bit-rate of the MP3 file.
The Apple iPod was a very popular portable MP3 player when it first came on the market in October of 2003 because they were so easy to get your specific music onto them using iTunes for Macintosh and Windows versions of iTunes. However, there were other brands of mp3 players available from other companies.
Besides the portable MP3 players, which many people still use, these days there is usually a built-in MP3 player in personal computers, laptops, tablets, and smartphones which can eliminate the need for a separate portable MP3 player. These MP3 players began being built-in other devices since about 1999.
What is an MP3 Download
An MP3 Download is nothing more than when you download an MP3 file. There are numerous websites in which MP3 downloads can be procured through purchases. When you have an MP3 download on your computer you can then organize it into your media library or even put it on your phone/MP3 player.
It needs to be stated that online stores like iTunes do not actually sell MP3 files, instead of selling higher quality, Apple-specific AAC format. Be sure when procuring MP3 files that you get them from reputable sources that are upfront about their file formats.
What are the Advantages of MP3?
MP3 files are very small while still packing decent quality. Prior audio codecs allowed you to compress files to smaller sizes, but would ultimately compromise the quality, leading to artifacts in the audio. Compression artifacts such as noise pops would be frequent, making the listening experience less than pleasant. The audio quality is not the best with the MP3 format, but it is the perfect format for people who enjoy audio-based media and music but do not necessarily care to pay extra for top tier quality.
Are MP3 Downloads Still Available?
MP3 files and players are both still readily available. However, the creators of the MP3 file format (the Fraunhofer Institute for Integrated Circuits ) have essentially abandoned the format and terminated its patent as a result of the rise in popularity of the larger, higher bandwidth formats. This does not mean that you will not be able to get MP3 files in the future, as it merely means that further innovation of that format will cease, not the format itself. It is possible to use third-party software to convert pre-existing audio files into the MP3 format for those who need it.
The MP3’s history is quite storied. While it would be easy to think that it may be on the way out, the truth is that it is one of the most accessible file formats in the world. Because of this, it’s very probable that the MP3 format will remain popular for many years to come.