Read our critical review and see how MP3Download stacks up

iMP3Download Review

0/5 Stars

not recommended

Enjoy listening to music, but hate all the high costs and extra fees of those download sites or internet radio? Want to download but don’t have much time online?

With their claims to be 250 times faster than Kazaa, MP3Download may be just the place for you.

Offering users unlimited free music downloads, fast searches regardless of whether you’re looking for songs or movies, and the ability to download and play all your favorite songs, MP3Download claims to be the #1 downloading site on the web. Boasting more than 15 billion files, membership grants the user instant access to the largest network available, as well as allowing you to burn your very own CDs.

These are some big claims, but MP3Downloads appears to back up its words with free 24-hour technical support, the ability to download as many songs as you’d like without fees or the hassles of Spyware or Adware and, even better, you are granted the ability to mix and burn your own compact discs to play in your car. There are no per-song fees, no monthly fees, and you get high quality cd burns and digital quality sound for the one yearly fee. By now, I bet you’re about to start chanting, “Sign me up,” aren’t you? But just hold on for a moment.

While this sounds like a great deal, as with many things in life, you must push forward into the fine print (or in this case, website) a bit deeper. Only after you’ve supplied the company with your email address, do you get to find out the prices, which is always something that sets off warning alarms. Nothing like getting emails for the next 6 months from sites like this, because you’ve given them your address.

While still affordable (you can sign up for unlimited access for a mere $34.95), now you discover that there are additional fees if you want to download DVD movies. What’s more disturbing, is that there is a cost of $14.95 in order to download movies, but the company neglects to tell you whether that’s for 1 year, 2 year or unlimited access to the movies offered at MP3Download. Not only is this unexpected and inconvenient, but it could also prove to be very pricey if you’re not careful.

To soften the blow of feeling as if you’ve been tricked, MP3Download offers you $250 in bonus gifts - Software to burn CDs and DVDs, using your standard CD burner (so you can only burn discs if you have some kind of burner already installed?), and you get free MP3 music and DVD movie players (most people already know where to get these ones for free), a virus scanner, Adware remover, pop-up blocker, personal firewall and more. Over $250 in values, MP3Download tells us. That should make it a good deal, right?

Wrong. Most of these goodies can be downloaded elsewhere and there is no guarantee that their software isn’t some form of substandard trash that may actually do more damage than good to your computer. Most Windows systems, come with their own firewalls and it’s a known fact that companies must continually update their virus definitions, in order to stay abreast of the latest troubles on the web. Operating anything less than a top line virus protection puts your computer at risk.

While MP3Download starts off strong and draws people in with what seems to be a simple, straight-forward style, it becomes all-too apparent that they are being led down the primrose path instead. Forfeiting promising ideas for the usual scams and gimmicks, the nicest thing that can be said about MP3Download is that it’s on a par with all the other music download websites out there. Score 0/5