Anime Music: VQF FAQ page
Question: What is VQF; why is this music in VQF format and not MP3?
Answer: VQF is a highly-compressed music format allowing CD-quality sound at only 96Kbps (about 0.7MB per minute). Why not MP3? Well, MP3 only offers "near-CD quality sound" at 128Kbps; on the cheapo computer speakers that came with my system, the two formats sound prety much the same. With my new speakers (or if I route my computer's sound through my home-theatre sound system), there's a HUGE difference in the sound. Don't argue with my opinion there; last time my hearing was tested, they said I had "perfect pitch".
Summary: VQF sounds better and is smaller than MP3. One other thing, it's quite difficult to burn a VQF onto a music CD; don't ask me how to do that.
Question: "I don't like VQF. Give these files to me in MP3." (exact wording of a few emails sent to me)
Answer: Don't bother asking me this question; it would be a waste... my response will vary (depending on the tone of your message and how I'm feeling) from me not responding at all, responding with a simple "no", me flaming you, to posting your name and email address on every page of my site until you apologize. Look in my guestbook for the three posts by "Billbob"... he got his REAL name, email address, and address posted in one of my site updates; he was unhappy with the results.
Question: How to play VQF music?
Answer: First you need a relatively recent computer; I've heard that VQFs will play on systems as slow as a Pentium 90; anything faster will do it fine... you can download the free Yamaha VQF player from www.VQF.com (there are Windows and Mac versions, and VQF works with Linux too!), and VQF.com has a free plugin for WinAMP as well. If you have WinAMP (v.2.09 or newer) and you'd rather not go through the hassle of downloading both the Yamaha VQF player and the VQF plugin for Winamp, then donwload and unzip this file (345KB) into c:\program files\winamp\plugins\ folder of WinAMP on your computer (if you specified a different folder when you installed WinAMP, unzip to your \winamp\plugins folder). If you have troubles with that, check the readme file that's included in vqffiles.zip... also try upgrading to a newer WinAMP before emailing me.
Question: Why is the music zipped?
Answer: If I leave the files as VQF, then when most people click on the files on my system, their web browsers will not understand the format and will try to display the music as text. That's not a good thing... but those browsers will know to save a ZIP file to your harddrive. I am aware that there's hardly any space savings by zipping these files.
Question: "I am having problems downloading"
Answer: In the past I used normal links
Question: Why aren't all the tracks from all the CDs online?
Answer: Let me give you a couple reasons... The first is because YOU SHOULD BUY THESE CDs YOURSELF IF YOU LIKE THE MUSIC. That's the intent of this site. If you buy the CDs, you support the artists that made the anime and the music, and encourage them to make more anime and anime soundtrack music. BUY THE ORIGINAL CDs OF THIS MUSIC.
The second reason comes down to cost: I have 2.83 GB of anime VQF music... the cost associated with keeping them all online would be $1450 PER MONTH. If you're interested in sending me a cheque for $1450, then I'll put them online for you.
Question: "Can Arjun email these files to me? Can Arjun email an entire soundtrack to me?" (again, exact wording of an email)
Answer: No. For emailing single files, I can only send 1MB at a time. For emailing entire soundtracks, read about why I don't have all my music files online.
Question: Can people request music?
Answer: YES!!!! Please post your requests in the webforum (the link is in the left column). However, DO NOT request for me to put an entire soundtrack online, because it makes me mad. (that's the reason my music section was offline for so many months)
Question: "I have a website. Can I put your files online? Can I link to your files?" (people have asked me these questions before)
Answer: You can put my files on your site, but I'd appreciate a link to my website as well (www.Japanese-Animation.net). YOU MAY NOT UNDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES LINK DIRECTLY TO THE MUSIC/VIDEO FILES ON THIS SITE. I pay for my bandwidth, and by linking to my files you are effectively stealing from me.
Question: "My question/problem wasn't answered here. What should I do?"
Answer: If it's a question you think somebody else might want to ask, please post the question in my webforum (the link is in the left column), or else you can email me.
Legal Stuff:
Of note: this site doesn't make money. It does a very good job of losing it, in fact! I don't believe that this site is in any way damaging to the sales of these shows or soundtracks; if somebody downloads something and doesn't feel that it's worth their while to purchase the CD, they wouldn't have bought the CD anyway. I will NEVER post an entire soundtrack. I will also NEVER cycle through all the tracks on any one particular CD. If you feel that your or your company's copyrights are being violated, then either send me an email whose headers I can trace back to your company, or send a fax to (419) 781-1333 on your company's letterhead and the offending files will be removed within a week (barring any unforeseen technical difficulties on my part).
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