Downloading from Free Music Sites

You don't have to pay to download music. There are still a handful of sites that offer free music downloadsno purchase or subscription necessary.

Of course, a free music download site isn't going to have the selection of a paid site. Most of these free sites lack music by major artists and labels, instead focusing on songs by new or independent artists. Still, free is freeand it's a great way to check out some new music!

Most of these free music sites offer songs for downloading in the industry-standard MP3 format. You can play MP3 files on virtually every music player program and portable audio player.

caution

Be careful about downloading music and other files from non-commercial websites and file-trading networks. These sites and networks are breeding grounds for computer viruses and spyware; if you're going to download, make sure you're running both anti-virus and anti-spyware software, as discussed in Chapter 29, "Protecting Your PC from Viruses, Spam, and Other Nuisances."

Two of the most popular free music download sites are Ampcast (www.ampcast.com) and Peoplesound (www.peoplesound.com). You can also search for free MP3s across the Web at MP3 Search (mp3search.astraweb.com), which operates like Google or any other search engine, except fine-tuned for MP3 files.