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| Sunday, 05 March 2006 |
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Features |  |
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MP3? Sounds good to me! Sinha Dissanayaka We had gramophones and subsequently record players which played the good old 33 and 45 r.p.m. records. Then came audio reels and thereafter, audio cassettes. Then came the Compact Disc (CD), which took sound quality and portability to a new level. Could the inventers better that? You bet they did! MP3 is an awesome mode of storing and playing music or other audio recordings, so MP3 mania has well and truly caught on! What does MP3 stand for? A trio of singing parliamentarians? Hmm.. The language or lyrics used might cause even the rap singer Eminem to blush! Ok, the word MP3 stems from "Moving Picture Experts Group Layer-3 Audio", but who cares about its technical definition? You can basically record or listen to songs, music or any audio file in MP3 format! How do you play MP3s? You play records with a record player, cassettes with a cassette player and so on, so logically, MP3s would be played with an MP3 player, right? Correct, but there's more to MP3 players that make them exciting, functional, compact and unbelievably mobile! A whole variety of Electronic Appliances and "Gadgets" contain MP3 players, and the list continues to increase. The traditional home "Hi Fi set up" as it's popularly known in Sri Lanka, used to contain a CD player, Radio Tuner and Cassette Player. Thereafter the VCD and DVD, and now MP3 have been added to the list "Home theatre" essentials. The latest car audio systems contain MP3 players. Any media player on your Computer can play MP3s, provided your computer is fitted with a soundcard and speakers/earphones. If you have a file on your computer with .mp3 at the end of the file name, that is an MP3 file which can be opened and played using, for example, Windows Media Player or Winamp. Specialized MP3 players such as the I-pod boast of the ability to store and play thousands of songs in a hand carried device. Ultra compact MP3 players are now ultra small, ultra light and ultra convenient to use. Some players combine as a USB memory flash drive and are as small as your thumb. Many high end mobile phones have builtin MP3 players which could be listened to in stereo using the provided hands-free headset. During a call, the music stops, and the call can be answered on the hands-free at the touch of a button! Due to the advent of compressed digital storage such as flash memory cards, a vast number of songs can be stored in a tiny space. These cards usually come with memory capacities of 128 MB (Mega Bytes), 256 MB, 512MB, 1 or 2 GB (Giga-bytes) Talk about innovation! Here are some amazing examples of Gadgets with MP3 players: Casio Corp. of Japan, naturally, came up with an MP3 player watch. Pens with MP3 players are now available. Cameras with MP3 players are now on the market. You can listen to MP3s on certain bracelets and necklaces! Yes, there is a Swiss Army Knife fitted with one, too! Sunglasses which couple as an MP3 player/hands-free unit are now in western markets! Where do you get MP3 songs or files from? The internet is one source of audio files or Music in MP3 format. You can also convert audio CD files and songs or even voice recordings from a digital Dictaphone into MP3 format on your Computer, using programs such as Winamp, Jet Audio or Nero. Using the same programs, you could convert an MP3 file into, for example, an Audio CD file. Advantages of MP3 Technology Essentially, MP3s provide CD quality music, while taking up only a fraction of the storage space a CD would have needed. MP3 files are easily stored and are capable of being speedily transferred. This means more songs at high quality, less storage equipment and more freedom! |
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