THOSE accustomed to downloading individual songs as MP3 files may be in for a jolt if they try downloading complete concerts. The files are, of course, a lot bigger.
If you don't have a high-speed connection, be prepared to give your computer and phone line over to downloading overnight (at least).
And get ready to learn some new technical lingo. Many of the new concert-download sites offer two file formats, MP3 and FLAC.
MP3 is known as a lossy compression format. That means that if a standard audio file is compressed to MP3 and then re-expanded for burning onto a standard CD, the resulting file is not an exact copy of the original: audio information has been permanently lost.
FLAC (short for free lossless audio compressor-decompressor), on the other hand, is lossless. If a standard audio file is compressed to FLAC, the resulting file is not as small as an MP3, but when re-expanded it should be an exact copy of the original file. Audiophiles prefer lossless compression formats, but those files are bigger and take longer to download.
For instance, Phish concerts at Live Phish Downloads generally take up three CD's once uncompressed (about 2 gigabytes, or 2 billion bytes of information). In MP3, the same concert would occupy only about 150 megabytes and take about 20 minutes to download over a 1-megabit broadband connection, or about six hours over a 56-kilobit dial-up link.
In FLAC, the show might occupy 900 megabytes.
Because lossless files are bigger, concert downloading sites generally charge more for them. Live Phish Downloads, for instance, generally charges $9.95 for the MP3 version of a concert and $12.95 for FLAC. (The New Year's Eve concert costs more because it occupies four CD's.)
Here are a few sites that sell downloads of concert recordings, generally for about $10 for an MP3 version and $13 for a higher-quality format.
www.livephish.com About 50 Phish concerts, as well as side projects by band members.
www.livedownloads.com A few shows from the Radiators, the String Cheese Incident and Yonder Mountain String Band.
www.primuslive.com A collection of 30 Primus concerts.
digitalsoundboard.net Performances by Steve Kimock and a recital by Palisades Virtuosi, a classical ensemble.
pearljam.com Links to song-by-song downloads from the Apple iTunes store.