Rob's Media Rant

So what alternatives exist? Can you still get music at a reasonable price, quickly and easily? I did a little research and came up with what I think are the top alternatives. There are several good options out there!

I’ve reviewed the top six sites that I think are the cheapest, quickest, and with the largest catalogs that will probably suit most people. Even if you've never used AllOfMP3 before, read on to get introduced to the much cheaper alternatives to the mainstream online media providers.

For me, just the fact that this site has it’s own download manager with music search capability makes LegalSounds.com more attractive than most of the other sites.  Having a download manager means the chore of downloading and searching for tracks is made done quicker and easier than it usually is when using a web interface.  Although similar in purpose as the AllOfMP3 Explorer (or AllTunes), it is somewhat different.

The catalog is searched online - not offline - which means that you always have the latest catalog search results, without storing the database on your PC. The LegalSounds.com downloader obviously has a somewhat different design than the AllOfMP3 or Alltunes programs, but it is easy to quickly get used to.

All tracks cost $0.09 - every song - which is the bargain of all of the inexpensive music providers out there.  All tracks are between 192kbps and 320kbps - which is better than several of the other music providers out there.

Payment options include VISA, MasterCard, Diners Club or JCB and several e-wallets: WebMoney, Yandex.Dengi, Rapida, e-port, and Kredit Pilot.  The site interface has a very classy design, and is available in English and Russian.

LegalSounds.com also has a bonus program: for each payment of $25 or higher, you get free track downloads. For $25 you get 25 free tracks, $35 gets you 50 free tracks, on up to $100 with a total of 200 free tracks. If you use the $100 bonus option, this effectively bring your total price per track down to about $0.076 per track. 

JustMusicStore.com boasts an enormous catalog - over 159,000 albums are claimed to be online (much more than AllOfMP3 had). The extensive catalog contains lots of older tracks, too - which lots of listeners want (I, for one, find myself downloading CD's I used to own but that I lost somewhere along the way).

There are two groups of song prices: those between $0.11 and $0.15, and those between $0.28 and $0.39.  I don't know what determines which songs fall into which category, but it seems that most popular tunes are in the cheaper category.
Your price per track depends on how much credit you purchase ($50 of credit gets you the $0.11 price, for example). 

You can pay with all major credit cards and PayPal, which means that this site will appeal users with only PayPal as an option. The recorded bitrates are good, usually 192kbps or better. If you’re looking for the widest selection available , then this is the site for you!

JustMusicStore downloads are fast - and I suggest getting an external download manager (FlashGet or something similar). This site also offers free previews of individual tracks or entire albums, although they are at lower quality than the downloaded tunes.

iSOUND.be seems to be similarly priced as JustMusicStore.com, but with a different catalog size - they don’t claim to have the huge number of albums that JustMusicStore does. That probably won’t matter, since with almost 60,000 albums the catalog is still bigger than many other sites out there.  The encoding rates are good at 192kbps or greater (often 320kbps).

Similar to JustMusicStore, there are two “classes” of track prices: those between $0.11 and $0.15, and those between $0.28 and $0.39 - and again there doesn’t seem to be any clear cut reason for a particular track to belonging to a particular class.  Again,  most popular albums seem to all be in the $0.11-$0.15 range.  Your price per track depends on how much credit you purchase ($50 of credit gets you the $0.11 price, for example).  You can pay with all major credit cards and PayPal, which will appeal to those of you that want to use PayPal to buy music.

iSOUND.be also provides pre-listening to entire albums, so you can be sure you really want an Album before you purchase it. Downloads are fast, and with the aid of an external download manager (FlashGet or the like), you should have no problem managing your downloads.

MP3Sugar.com offers a large bonus offered when charging up your account: if you buy $34 worth of credits, you get an extra $10 worth of credits included. This site uses a fixed pricing scheme of $0.18 per track which means that you may get a better deal on some albums here than other websites.  Like most other sites, you are not given the option to pick the encoded bitrates of the tracks.  There seems to be no default encoding rate, with some albums being encoded entirely at 192Kbps, and others using a mixture of encoding rates. 

Downloading from MP3Sugar.com is easy and fast, and again using an external downloader like FlashGet will make your life a lot easier.

Major credit cards are accepted (VISA, Mastecard, JCB, DinersClub), but nothing else for topping up your account. If you want to use PayPal or some other more exotic payment method, you’ll have to go elsewhere.

Another site that uses a fixed-pricing scheme, GoMusic.ru has a great catalog as well.  Each track has a fixed price of $0.19, which could mean that you'll make out better at some other sites due when downloading larger tracks (longer songs). 

They accept major credit cards, but not Amex or Discover. Alternatively, you can pay with Webmoney, the PaySafeCard, UKash, or use an interesting feature that allows you to charge directly onto your home phone bill. If this kind of payment method interests you, then GoMusic.ru may be for you (as of this writing, no other sites offer this feature!)

Like most sites, you don’t get to choose what bitrate you’d like to have the MP3 encoded in, and there are no formats other than MP3 available. The songs are encoded at various rates (including Variable Bit Rate, or VBR). The website interface is available in either English or Russian, and seems to flow well.

MP3Search.ru has been around in some form or another since 2000 and first got into the MP3 business in 2004.  With predictable pricing of $0.19 per song, you’ll make out better getting some larger albums here than on other websites that charge by the size (or length) of the tune.

They accept major credit cards; alternatively, you can pay with Webmoney, the PaySafeCard, UKash, and some other less popular payment types.

Like most sites, you don’t get to choose what bitrate you’d like to have the MP3 encoded in, and there are no formats other than MP3 available. The songs are encoded at various rates (including Variable Bit Rate, or VBR). The MP3Search.ru website interface is available in either English or Russian. Downloads seem fast and the website is pretty easy to use.