Thursday, December 30, 2010

How to Send Your Media to the Coby MP3 Player

I have to admit, I just love this little MP3 player. My 6 year old son is the primary user for this little device. It is very compact and really easy to use. Transferring just about any file to it has been the easiest so far. When you plug this player into your USB port on your computer, the program pops right up. From the program choose the type of file you want to transfer. It offers choices like Music, Pictures and Videos.
First, lets try some music. Open the file containing your music in mp3 format. (See my post on how to download mp3's from youtube.) Then you just "drag and drop" your music file into the Coby program. It will pop up a box that asks if you want to add this to your library. Click Yes. Then the file shows up on the right side of the Coby program. Right click on the line with the music and choose Synchronize. A green status bar shows the progress at the bottom of the program window. Your tune is now added to your player! That's it.
Next, let's do some pictures. Open the file containing your picture. They are usually stored in a format like JPEG. Then just do the same thing you did with the music. Choose the Photo line on the Coby program. Then just "drag and drop" your pictures into the program. A box pops up asking you if you want to add to library, choose Yes. Once you see the title of your picture, right click on it and choose Synchronize. You are done.
Now for the videos. The hardest step in adding videos to this player is putting them in the correct format to begin with. In my post about how to download and keep youtube videos, I mention the program, Youtubedownloaderhd. The beauty of this program is right when you download your video, it offers the option to convert the file to .avi format. The work is done for you in one step. This awesome little player recognizes this format. Open the folder containing your video, and "drag and drop" the file to the Coby program. Click Yes when it asks to add to library. Once you see your video listed, right click on it and choose Synchronize. Now, if you have a video in another format that you want to add to this player, it is still possible. Use a program like Prism Video File Converter, and convert your video or movie to .avi format. Then add it to your Coby program just as described above.
Enjoy all your favorite files on your Coby player on the go!

How to Send eBooks to your MP3/MP4 Player

Taking your music, pictures and videos with you is awesome. But, how about taking your eBooks with you? A lot of mp3 players now have the ability to store eBooks on them. They are great for taking books with you without having to keep track of an actual book. The first thing I figured out when trying to transfer an eBook to my son's mp4 player was that it didn't support the .pdf format. The .pdf format is the most common format for most documents and eBooks. You can download some great eBooks to your computer and read them there in the .pdf format with programs like Adobe Reader. MP3/4 players are a little different. You need to convert your .pdf document or book to a .txt format. There are a few free programs available to do this for you. The one I am using is called A-PDF Text Extractor. You simply open your A-PDF Text Extractor program, and from the toolbar, choose Open. Then locate the file your .pdf document or book is stored in. Then choose to change to .txt, and click Extract Text. When the program is done, it will open your document or book in WordPad. I would take a moment to review your file at this point. Sometimes unusual symbols show up between lines and sentences. If they are visible in the WordPad file, they will show up on your player. This is distracting to try to read around. You may try another program if this happens repeatedly. You should also check at this point to make sure that the entire document or book was converted. Sometimes just one page is converted. You want to read the whole thing, not just part of it. Once your document or book looks the way you want it to in WordPad, you are ready to send it to your player. Open your Removable Drive folder that your USB cord from your player is plugged into on your computer. Then open the folder with the converted .txt file in it. Then just "drag and drop" or "copy and paste" your book to your player. Once the book is on your player, disconnect the USB cord and open the book on your player. Enjoy your book!

Disney Mix Max Player - How to Add Movies and Videos

Adding music and pictures to the Disney Mix Max is pretty simple. Adding videos is another story. Through many trials and errors, I finally found out what works. Keep in mind, Disney wants you to pay for the videos you add to the player, so this may account for the difficulty in transferring ones you already own. Also, DVD's are not meant to be copied in any way. Don't despair, you can still add them to your player. It's hard, but keep with it, you will get it.
Let's start with DVD's. There is a wonderful program called Magic DVD Ripper that is the simplest way to add just about any DVD to your player. You have to purchase and download the program, so it will cost you. There are a few youtube videos out there that give away the username and password to register the program, but they may or may not work. To use this program, you simply load your DVD into your computer and open the program. Next to the Output file, there is a blank box and a small box with an icon on it. You have to click on the icon box and where it says WMV output profile, you need to choose Disney Mix Max as the option. This will convert your DVD to the format required by the device. When you first download the program, the Disney Mix Max option is not listed as an available output choice, you must pick it for the conversion to work properly. Then you just convert the DVD. It takes a really long time to perform the conversion. The longer your original DVD, the longer the conversion time. But, this is the simplest method and it really works in one step.

Now for the hard part. What about videos that aren't DVD's, or what if you don't want to buy the Magic DVD Ripper program. There is a way to send these to your player. It is long and involved, but it does get simpler to do the more you use it. You must follow these instructions EXACTLY. It will not work if you don't. This process involves 2 conversions to get your videos to play on the Mix Max. See my post on downloading and keeping youtube videos if you want to get a video from there to your Mix Max. I think that testing the process with a short youtube video is the best way to start. Ok, so you have your video. It's probably in the .flv or .avi format depending on where it came from. It's ok, it doesn't really matter what format the video starts in, you still have to convert it twice.
The first program you need is Prism Video File Converter. You can download it for free from a few different websites. There are other conversion programs that will work as well, but I recommend Prism. I have had no trouble with it, and I know it offers the .wmp format you need for the first conversion step.
The second program you need is Windows Media Encoder. This is not optional. The second conversion step requires you to convert your video to a .wmp9 format, and this is the only program I have found that will do this. You can download it from a few websites for free as well.
Now let's get started.

First Conversion
Step 1
Open Prism Video File Converter

Step 2
Add your video. You can either choose the "add" icon with the plus sign, or open your source file and "drag and drop" it into Prism.

Step3
Choose .wmp as the file you want to convert your video to and choose your destination folder.

Step 4
Click Convert. Prism does the rest for you. It will make a sound when the conversion is complete. Then you want to open the folder you stored your conversion in. Don't worry about playing your video at this point. However, I would keep this conversion step stored just in case you run into problems with the second conversion. You now have the first conversion stored, and can try again with the second conversion if it doesn't work on the first try.

Second Conversion

Step 1
Open Windows Media Encoder.
Choose "new session"
Then click on "convert a file" from the icon box that pops up.
Now you want to choose a source file - this is the file that you converted in the first step
You also want to choose a destination file. I would make a new folder to store this step in. You don't want both conversions stored in the same file.

Step 2
From the pop up box, choose "Pocket PC"
Then click the next box at the bottom.
Keep choosing next until it's not an option (3 or 4 times). Don't worry about what the pop up boxes say at this point. When next is no longer an option. Choose Finish.

Step 3
The converter will now start playing. From the toolbar, click Stop.
A pop up box will appear, choose Close.
Then from the toolbar choose Properties.

Step4
This must be followed EXACTLY. It really will work, just enter all the following values.
After you choose Properties, click on the tab that says Compression.
You then see in a white box "Pocket PC." To the right of this box, choose the "Edit" button.
You then see 2 tab options.

In the tab labeled "General"
Make sure both the "video" and "audio" boxes have check marks in front of them.
From the Audio drop down box, choose "Audio CBR 9.2"
From the Video drop down box, choose "Video CBR 9" (no other option, not 9.2 or anything else)

Now toggle to the tab labeled "259kbps"
Enter these values EXACTLY
Audio Format: 128 kbps, 48KHz Stereo CBR (do not choose 128kbps, 44KHz Stereo CBR)
Video Size: 220 x 176
Frame Rate: 30
Key Frame Interval: 2 (some say 5 is ok to choose, I used 2)
Video Bit Rate 384K (Make sure it says this EXACTLY -don't forget the capitol K)
Buffer Size: 5 sec
Video Smoothness: 0 (zero)
Decoder Complexity: Simple -this is a drop down box - choose simple

The total should now be: 521.02
If this doesn't match, recheck your values now.

Click OK

Step 5
Click Apply.
Wait a few seconds. It will say "Encoder Ready" at the bottom of the window now.
Click Start Encoding.
There will be a pop up box that says something like the existing file will be overwritten. Choose OK.
The Encoder will now do a 2 pass encoding. It will run your video twice.

Step 6
An Encoding Results box will pop up.
Choose Close.

You have now completed the second conversion. Don't try to play your video now. I never have gotten them to play on the computer in this format. Don't be discouraged if you do try to play it and it doesn't work.
Now you're ready to send your video to the Mix Max. Open your Removable Drive folder that your Mix Max is plugged in to with the USB cable. Open the file you stored your twice converted video in, and just "drag and drop" your video to the Mix Max folder. You should see a window pop up with the green status bar. Then your video appears in the Mix Max Removable Drive folder. Unplug your USB from your computer now. From the Mix Max main menu, choose the reel of film icon. You should see your video listed there. Scroll down to it and hit the center button on Mickey's face. Your video should play now. Make sure the earbuds are plugged in so you can hear the audio. If you get an error message that says "file not supported," the conversion didn't work. Don't despair, just delete the video from the Mix Max and try again. I recommend that if it didn't work on the Mix Max, you delete the second conversion file from your computer and try it again. Use the first conversion file that you stored from the Prism conversion step and follow the second conversion steps above. This is most likely where you ran into problems. You can start the whole process from the start as well. Double check that the file from the first conversion step is in .wmp format, and not any other (like .avi or mp4). This is really complicated, and trial and error is the way to get it right.
Enjoy your videos and movies on your Disney Mix Max Player.

Disney Mix Max MP3 Player - How to Send Music and Pictures

Everyone recognizes the name Disney. Just add Disney to any product, and get instant sales. My youngest son got a Disney Mix Max MP3 player for Christmas. He absolutely loves it. It's my job to add all his cool music and pictures to it so he can enjoy it anywhere. My son is 4, so the music he likes are tunes like: The ABC song, Counting songs, This Old Man and many more. Of course we have to throw in a few songs that his older brothers encourage him to like as well. We also have some great pictures of family vacations that he wants to look at too. To send them to his Mix Max, is really pretty simple.
You can send mp3 formatted songs and pictures in two ways.
1. Open Windows Media Player and Sync the device.
2. Open the Removable Drive folder on your computer and "drag and drop" or "copy and paste" your files this way.
The Mix Max player comes with a cd that says you should use Windows XP operating system to set up some playlists for the device. This is optional. I use Windows Vista, and the cd does not work with it. I was still able to send all the music and pictures the device holds without this step. You also have the option to make a playlist right on the player. You will need at least 25 songs loaded to do this, but it's straightforward on the screen. Have your young one enjoy all of his great music and pictures anytime.

Wednesday, December 29, 2010

How to Send Videos to Your Cell Phone

Want to send some of your favorite videos to your cell phone? It's not as hard as you may think, once you know what to do. First, check and see if you can find what kind of format your phone supports. Videos come in a few formats, and just sending any format to your phone may not work. For example, most youtube videos are in .flv format. Most phones don't support this. You will get an error like "file format not supported." My particular phone is LG ENV touch with keyboard. When I looked up what video format is supported for this phone, the suggestions were .3gp or .wmp. WMP is Windows Media Player. That sounded like the easiest to use, so I tried it first. Total bust! I didn't work at all. I suggest converting your videos to the 3gp format. To do this, you need a converter program. Don't buy one. The one I recommend is Prism. There are a few free websites to download this program. Here are three I found: 1. prism-video-converter.en.softonic.com, 2. www.brothersoft.com, 3. www.nchsoftware.com. I wouldn't use a site like cnet or a few others that offer free downloads, but you have to be a member and pay a membership fee to get their "free downloads."
After you download the converter, the rest is easy. See my post on how to download and keep youtube videos if this is where you want your video to come from.

Step 1
Once you have the video or even a full length movie loaded on your computer, all you have to do is open your Prism Video Converter. You can open the source file that your video is in and "drag and drop" it into Prism, or you can use the option from Prism's tool bar "add file." It has a big plus sign icon. Now you should see your file listed in some spreadsheet looking boxes.

Step 2
Underneath this is a box that says "save to folder." Choose what folder you want your converted file to go to. I recommend it is not the same folder as the original video. It may overwrite and replace your original video file.

Step 3
Underneath the "save to folder" box are some more boxes. The first words are "output format." Click on the first box. You will see several options to convert your video to here. Choose 3gp.

Step 4
Then just click "convert." The program even makes a noise to let you know it's done converting your file.

Step 5
Next, go to the folder you chose to save the converted video in. Right click on the file and choose "properties." You should see that the file is now saved with the title of the file and .3gp.

Step 6
Now you are ready to send your video to your phone.

I don't recommend you try to sync your video to your phone through Windows Media Player. Since .3gp is not a WMP supported format, you will get "error" when you try to sync the file. If you use a USB cable, I would try to open your "removable drive" folder and send your newly converted file there - by either "drag and drop" or "copy and paste" methods, whatever usually works best on your computer. I prefer to use Bluetooth. I plug in my Dongle Bluetooth adapter to the USB port, and turn on your Bluetooth on your phone. Open your "file transfer service" and "copy and paste" your converted file there. Your phone then shows the message, "receiving file." You can also use the "send to" option if your computer recognizes your Bluetooth adapter through Windows (usually XP). Now check your file on your phone and make sure that your video plays. If it doesn't play, delete it off your phone and try again. You may need to try the conversion again. Enjoy your videos on the go.

iPod or MP3?

If you are like me, you love the idea of an iPod, but the price scares you off. Some of the older iPods are a little more affordable, like the shuffle, but all you get is music on it. I wanted all or most of the features the new iPods carry, but without the hefty price tag (around $200). Check out my most favorite and reliable website amazon.com. I spent hours looking at all of the mp3/mp4 players they have available. Some call them iPod knock-offs. I don't care what you call it, as long as it works. So, with so many options, what do you choose? Read the reviews. If it says "be the first to write a review" steer clear. What you end up buying will depend on the age of the recipient. My boys are 11, 6 and 4. First of all, none of the devices are indestructible. Just forget that right off the bat. Also, almost all players come with mixed reviews. Read some positive and some negative to get a feel for what people like and don't like about the players they've already purchased. It will give you an idea of what you want and don't want in your player, and what is most important for yours to have and what you can live without. The more features you want on your device, the more you are going to pay. If you want it all, just go ahead and pay for the iPod. It really is the most reliable and has the most features. It has the best support as well. You really do get what you pay for.
So, what did I choose? Not iPods.
For my 4 year old, I went with the Disney Mix Max. I chose the blue one since he's a boy. It has a really cute design and it is simple to use. It had to be charged, but so far so good. I've had no problems sending any tunes or pictures over to it. I have Windows Vista operating system, and the instructions say something about working in Windows XP. I was able to use Windows Media Player and sync everything right over. It comes with earbuds, and they must be used to listen to the player. The videos are a different story. I will post about them later. I sat my son down and explained that he had to be a "big boy" and take good care of his mp3 player. He is doing a good job so far. It really makes him feel like he's just as big as his older brothers. The price tag -about $25. Worth it so far.
For my 6 year old, I went with a Coby. I really didn't need all the bells and whistles, but I wanted it to play music, store pictures and play videos. It can also read ebooks. It has a small, about 2 inch screen, and very few buttons to push. It has a pretty simple design and it's really small. It also comes with earbuds, and they too must be used to listen to the player. It came charged and ready to use. All I had to do was plug in the USB, and the program installed itself. It opens and you just "drag and drop" your files into the box. You have to right click and choose "synchronize." and you're done. Of the three players, it really is the most reliable and easiest to use. It requires the least effort to convert files as well. More on this later as well. The price tag - about $20. Well worth it so far and the one I recommend the most.
For my 11 year old, who is very mature and computer savvy, I thought he would really want all the features I could afford. He's been begging for his own cell phone for some time now. I went with the Pyrus mp4 player for him. It has the touch screen, and plays music, videos, stores and takes pictures, records sound and video, and ebooks as well. I was the most skeptical buying this one. It had the most mixed reviews. It seemed that the player either worked right out of the package or it didn't work at all. I crossed my fingers and hoped. So far, it works. One of the drawbacks is that it comes with a stylus, but no where to store the stylus on the device. I did read this going in, so I was prepared for it. It has also been the most difficult to transfer files, especially videos and ebooks. I'll do another post about how to convert these. We have had good luck with the device so far. It is the only one that comes with earbuds, but they are not required to listen to your files. The sound isn't very loud without them though. The price tag -about $55. I still have my fingers crossed on this one. I am curious to see how long it will last. I know my oldest will take good care of it.

How to Sync With Windows Media Player

You have a ton of great music and pictures saved on your computer. Now you want to take them with you. One of the easiest methods is "sync" with Windows Media Player. Any device that comes with a USB cable that hooks into your computer can be "synced." This works for your phone, mp3 (mp4) player, etc. The first and most important step is to make sure your song plays with Windows Media Player. If you try to play the song, and it doesn't play, there's no point in syncing it. It won't work. If your tune plays, follow the following steps. Pictures are different. Make sure the pictures are in a format supported by your device. Usually a JPEG format works.

Step 1
Open WMP (Windows Media Player). Plug your USB cable into the computer. Click on the "Sync" option from the toolbar. Your device should appear and a % synced should show at the bottom. Once you reach 100%, the rest is super easy.

Step 2
Open the folder containing your music, picture, whatever you want to send. Then just "drag and drop" the file underneath the picture of the device in WMP. You can send your files one at a time or in groups. You should see the name of your file listed under the picture of your device.

Step 3
Click "sync." You will now see each file you "dropped" with a % done bar. If the file won't transfer it will say "error." The most common reason that the "error" message appears is that the file is not compatible with WMP. If it won't play, it won't sync.

You are done. Unplug the USB from both your device and your computer and open the file you sent. It should be on your device now. If you plug the USB back into your computer, you can open the "removable device" folder to manage your files. If your file won't open on your device, you can delete it either from the device's menu or from your computer. Now you can take all your cool files with you.

Tuesday, December 28, 2010

How to Put Pictures on Your Digital Photo Frame

I have a parrot digital photo frame. The frame said it will store 300 pictures in it's memory. Not true. I really only got about 50. I recommend a memory card. I have a 2GB memory card that I was using in my digital camera and can get at least 1,000 pictures on it. To work the frame you have to figure out that the center circle button and the two arrow buttons on either side of it are the only way to navigate on the frame itself. This frame said you can send pictures by either Bluetooth or USB cable. I tried the Bluetooth method first. The frame wouldn't pair with my computer. Total bust there. I don't recommend it. To send photos to the frame, use the USB cable. You also have to have the frame plugged into an outlet to get it to turn on. Every time you unplug the power supply, the clock loses the time you program. So, to send the pictures, first find the pictures on your computer. They have to be stored in either JPEG or GIF format to work. Convert them to one of these first, if they are not already in this format. Now edit all of your pictures to the size and style you want. If you have your frame in portrait or landscape viewing, you should rotate any pictures you want to send before you send them. Once you find your folder with the pictures, then open the folder you plugged your USB cable into. Usually you go to your "Computer" option and choose the removable drive. Now you can send the pictures two ways. You can "drag and drop" the pictures into the removable drive folder, or you can select all the pictures at once and "copy and paste" them.
I actually used a little harder method, but it worked better. I put the memory card into my digital camera, and opened the folder on my computer. I rotated all my pictures first and then sent them to my camera. Then, I took the memory card out of the camera, and put it in the photo frame. All the pictures showed up just fine. The camera didn't recognize the pictures, but the frame found all of them.
Now, to look at all my great pictures. Open the menu on the photo frame. I first edited the time, then I went to the settings option. The first thing I did was set the standby mode to "predefined time." I set the time of day that I wanted the frame to start and stop showing my pictures. Then I went to the slideshow option. I set the option to "random." You can choose how you want your pictures to fade to each other, but I think a random method looks the best. I really didn't want all of them to fade the same way. You can also choose how long you want each picture to stay on the frame before it goes to the next one. I chose 10 seconds. It seems really short, but when you are watching the frame, it's really just right. The next option is 30 seconds, and if you are going to watch your frame like a television, 30 seconds is way too long. Exit all of your modes and enjoy the great pictures you took!

How to Send Music to Your Phone Via Bluetooth

I have a lot of great tunes on CD's and downloaded to my computer in mp3 format. Now I want to take them with me. I'm going to send them to my cell phone. I have the LG ENV touch screen phone with full keyboard, but this will work for just about any phone. My next phone will have mp3 player sound on it. This particular phone isn't very loud for playing my tunes. This is not something I knew about when phone shopping. The easiest way for me to send music and pictures to my phone is through my Dongle Bluetooth adapter for my computer. I picked one up from Amazon.com. The adapters sell for under $1, but you have to pay about $5 in shipping. I recommend getting several at a time and sharing with some friends. It almost justifies the shipping cost. When you get the adapter, it doesn't come with any software. You have to go to the website printed on the package and download the driver. The one printed on my package is: http:driverdownload168.com.

Step 1
Once you install the driver, open the program and pair it with your phone. Usually this means just entering the same numbers on both your computer and phone. You only have to do this once, so the numbers don't really matter, the only thing that matters is that they are the same on both. To be able to do this, both the computer and phone have to have the bluetooth on and in discovery mode.

Step 2
In the program on your computer, you should be able to see your phone. Click on your phone and a few of the icons are lit up. Choose the File Transfer Service. This pops up another window. It looks like a spreadsheet.

Step 3
Find your music or pictures on your computer. You will need to open the folder you stored them in. Next, select the tune or pic you want to send to your phone. Right click on the tune, and choose "copy."

Step 4
Navigate to your open file transfer window. Then right click in the window and choose, "paste." You should see the green bars at the bottom of the file transfer window and a % complete. Your phone will say something like "receiving file."

Step 5
Once the file transfer is complete, you should be able to see the tune or pic on your phone. Open it and make sure it worked. If it didn't work, try again. Make sure the you can open the tune or picture on your computer before you send it to your phone. If you get an "access denied" error when you try to paste to your file transfer service, make sure you have paired the phone with your computer. Also make sure your phone's Bluetooth is on. You are done. Send as many as your phone or memory card will hold.

If you are using Windows XP operating system, you may also be able to send the file by right clicking on it and choosing "send to." The options that pop up include Bluetooth. If your computer recognizes your Bluetooth device, you can just send your file this way. I use Windows Vista, and it doesn't recognize this Bluetooth adapter. I use the above steps and they work perfectly. Enjoy your tunes and pictures on your phone anytime!

How Much Memory Do You Need on a Card?

Technology today is wonderful. Our cell phones are more than just a phone. We can play music, take pictures, make videos and even surf the web. So, we want to keep some of the cool stuff we've made, how do we do this? Most of our gadgets, be it a cell phone, digital camera,mp3 player or even a digital photo frame have a slot for a memory card. The most common options for memory cards are micro or mini sizes. First you need to figure out what size card your gadget takes. Usually the instruction booklet tells you this. If you can't find it there, try your card, it won't fit if it's the wrong size. The first question is how much memory should my card have? When you want to buy a memory card for your device, you want to make sure you can keep everything you want on it. I highly recommend that you keep the card stored in the device. Changing cards is a good way to lose them. They are really small and most don't offer a way to label them to tell what you have stored on the card. So, how much memory do you need. Not as much as you'd think. The 2GB card is usually plenty to store whatever you want on it. You can store thousands of songs and pictures on one card, yes I said thousands. This is plenty of room. If you are planning on storing full length movies, and lots of videos, you may want to get a little more memory. 4GB or 8GB should be plenty for all of this. Yes, more is always better, but if you have an 8GB memory card in your phone, how much of it are you really going to use? Do you really need that much space? I don't think so. You will have to decide for yourself, but why pay for more when you don't really need it?

Download and Keep Youtube Videos

Do you have a favorite youtube video? How about the kids? My three boys love youtube. They are constantly finding new videos to watch and going back and watching their favorites again and again. For Christmas this year all three of my boys received mp3 players. Now they want their favorite videos on the go. So, how do I keep them happy? It took me many hours and countless tries to get it right, so I'm going to share what works.
First you have to find your video. No problem. The kids can usually navigate right to it. Now, to keep it. You need to download a program to do this. There are several out there. There are two that I recommend. You have to go to the websites and download from there. The first is www.keepvid.com . The second is www.youtubedownloaderhd.com. Both of these sites are free! I actually use the second one the most, it's a little easier to use.
Now that you have your program and your video, the rest is easy. First, I want to say that most youtube videos are in .flv format. This works fine on the youtube website, but not so much once you decide to keep the video. The easiest format to keep a video in is .avi. Your program that you downloaded offers the option to keep your video in this format. The youtubedownloaderhd also offers the option to convert your video to .mp4 format which is compatible with ipod. I recommend the .avi format unless you are specifically going to send your video to an ipod. The program also lets you choose the destination folder on your computer so you know where to find the video once you are done. Make sure you choose this before you get started.
Now to keep your video, open your program.

Step 1
Go to the video you want on youtube. Watch the whole video and make sure it's the one you want.

Step 2
Highlight the URL from your web browser.

Step 3
Copy the URL.

Step 4
Go to your program and paste the URL in the box.

Step 5
Click download.

The program downloads the video and converts it to the format you selected. It is stored in the destination folder you chose earlier. Now go to your folder and right click on the video. Make sure it plays in Windows Media Player. If it doesn't delete the video and try again. I have noticed a quirk about all the programs that convert videos. Once you have downloaded and converted your video you have to close the program and reopen it to do another video download. All of them seem to stick and not allow you to download a second video once you have completed the first download. Knowing this when you start can save some frustration when attempting to download several videos in a sitting. Enjoy your videos!

How to Download MP3's From Youtube - Free

Looking for some great music? Who isn't? Want to keep your favorite tunes forever without buying them or having to subscribe to a service? I have the answer.
Just about any tune you are looking for can be found on youtube.com. There are a ton of great videos on Youtube. You can type youtube.com in your web browser's bar, or you can google it. Once you have found youtube, type the name of the song or artist in the search bar at the top of the page. It's ok if you don't know the name of either. If you know the first line of the song, try typing it instead. Once you have found the song of your choice, listen to the whole thing. Some youtubers think it's really funny to start out with what you are looking for, then substitute some other video. Usually there are several videos posted with the same song you are looking for. Before you decide on one, listen to a few more. Some have much better sound quality. The actual video doesn't matter at this point. I will post later on how to download the video. Now that you have decided on the ideal song to keep, let's get started.
The web browser you use doesn't matter. All of them allow you to have more than one web page open for different web sites at the same time. I recommend that you open new sites in tabs instead of new windows. This makes it easier to toggle back and forth between the tabs instead of opening and minimizing windows. So, keep the youtube video open in your first tab, then open a second tab.
There are a couple of choices I recommend to download your tunes. Keep in mind that this is only for mp3's. If you are looking for iTunes, you have to get them another way. The first website is a little obvious and it is easier to remember the name. Go to listentoyoutube.com. This site has worked in the past for me, but lately I've been having some trouble getting the downloaded tunes to play. I have had much more success with vidtomp3.com. Both sites are set up pretty much the same, so the instructions are the same for either site. On the home page there is an open box asking for the URL of the tune to download. You need to paste the URL here.

Step 1
Toggle back to the youtube page with the song you want to keep. The URL is already there for you. The web address at the top of your page that starts www... is the URL.

Step 2
Highlight the URL. To do this, move your cursor to to beginning of the www... address. Then hold down the left button on your mouse and move it to the end of the address. When you let go of the mouse button, the address should be highlighted.

Step 3
Now right click. When the menu pops up, choose "copy."

Step 4
Toggle back to your second page. In the empty box, right click, and when the menu pops up, choose "paste." The web address should appear in the box now.

Step 5
Now follow the instructions on the website. After you paste the URL, click on "download mp3." You may have to do this 2 or 3 times.
Depending on your web browser, you may have a few options on what to do when you download your song. Choose save. Don't open it now. Now you have your mp3 saved to your computer!

Now where did it go? You will need to find where your computer stored your download. I use Windows Vista as my operating system. To find my downloads, I open the start menu, and choose "Computer" on the right side of the programs listed. You should have things like Control Panel, Documents, Pictures, Music, Games etc. all listed there. Keep looking in your folders until you find one labeled "Downloads." This is usually where your computer stores these. You can leave them there or make a new folder to store your music in. Now you should check your download to make sure it worked. I recommend that if Windows Media Player doesn't play your tune, you try again with another youtube video. Choose your video and follow the steps again. If your tune doesn't work, just right click on it and choose "Delete." You haven't lost anything. To open your tune, right click on it and choose "Open." You may also choose "Open with" from this menu. Open your tune with Windows Media Player.
If Windows Media Player gives you an error saying something like you don't have the right codec, just delete the tune and try again. You can try to download some codec's but hitting on the right one is luck. If the process worked right and you hear your tune you're done.
You can download as many tunes as you want from these free sites. Just repeat the above steps for every tune you want. Don't forget to check and listen to all of them. It will save you some time later when you want to listen to your music if you make sure it works right when you first download it. Enjoy!