Audio Sites

Microsoft's Media Player In Windows 10 - how to install it.

VLC The best, free audio and video player. It can recognize almost every file type.

Audacity This audio recording software is free and very powerful especially if you want to transfer CDs and records to digital file formats.

Media Jukebox is a free, do-it-all audio player and recorder.

Media Jukebox Wiki has a lot of good help for using Media Jukebox.

RealAudio The RealPlayer is pretty old but is still a good audio and video player. It is most useful if you want to download and save videos that you watch in Facebook, TikTok, etc.

Internet Archive

- is a collection of copyright-free audio and video material. A great collection of live music recordings, podcasts, lectures, etc.

Free Music Archive is full of free music downloads. Not a lot to get excited about but good surfing.

Free Audio Archive is full of free audio recordings including narrated books, music, podcasts, sermons, speeches, etc.

7Digital ($) sells downloads of albums in a variety of formats including high def and FLAC.

Audio File Magazine has reviews of recorded books as well as narrators.

WavSource has a variety of sound clips from movies, TV, speeches, etc.

SoundSnap is a collection of audio sound effects and sound loops. Users rate the sound.

Movie Sounds has many sound clips from movies.

Historical Speeches - recordings from History.com.

US History and Politics Out Loud includes a lot of recordings of political speeches and conversations among politicians.

TinFoil has samples of ancient tin and wax recordings.

Radio Garden has radio stations from all over the world. You can select a station by navigating to a location on the world map.

Steam Music With These Free Apps is a 2020 MakeUseOf article which reviews free music apps.

Sounddog - various sound recordings and short phrases - mp3 format.

MP3 has free music - not updated since early 2015.

Audio Review - audio reviews including home theatre, car audio, stereo, etc - includes a bulletin board service and chat room.

Audio/Visual Science Forum - is a heavy traffic forum for audio/visual stuff including high-def, DVD, CD, etc.

Real Music Guide is all about RealPlayer and Real Media.

Eminent Technology's Multimedia Speaker test

Tests your audio system for phasing and frequency response.

Sound and Vision has reviews of audio and TV equipment. Used to be more generous with its online offerings - no more.

Sound Stories has a collection of interviews with crusty folks. Very interesting documentary stuff.

Internet Museum of Flexi-records Are you old enough to remember the plastic records that you got for free in cereal boxes and magazines? Well, there here and you can listen to them.

McFadden's CD, CD-R, CD-RW FAQ has good info on the difference between CD-R and CD-RW, differences in blank CD's, etc. This site has not been updated since 2010.

ecoustics has info on home electronics, mostly hi-fi stuff. Very large collection of links to sites related to CD, DVD, audio, TV, etc.

ecoustics DVD Reviews has a long list of DVD reviews sorted by year.

DVD FAQ as good as McFadden's CD FAQ

Library of Congress Recorded Sound Reference Center has an archive of sounds from motion pictures, broadcasts, and other recorded sources.

Film Sound is about movie sounds and how they are made.

Find Sounds searches for recordings of sound effects and other short audio files.

Global Music Network has recorded performances available for viewing or download, mostly jazz and classical.

One Minute Vacation has a collection of 60 second sound segments from various parts of the world.

MetaCritic gathers reviews of movies, DVD's, music, games, etc. , and consolidates them into a one stop source.

ASoftMurmur - free audio background when you want something soothing.

Digital Audio Quality Test This is a quick test of your audio system if you are thinking about getting expensive, high res equipment. There are 6 recordings with three levels of quality - you pick the one that sounds best in each case.

Dreaming With Jeff Meditative music created by Jeff Bridges (yes, that one). Weird thing is you can't buy the album but you can hear the entire thing on this site.

Podcast Alley - has information about podcasting as well as downloadable material.

NPR Morning Edition is a daily international news podcast from NPR.

Podcasts for Geeks is a collection of periodic podcasts that are relavent to those who like the techy side of things.

CNN Podcasts

The Guardian's Science Weekly Podcast

Comedy Bang Bang - comedy podcasts including interviews of comedians.

Mentalpod - aka "The Mental Illness Happy Hour" is a collection of podcasts about mental issues usually presented with a lighter side.

Bloomberg Advantage - podcasts around business and technology issues with interviews of the movers and shakers.

Fresh Air is the Terry Gross NPR podcast.

NPR One is collection of podcasts sponsored by NPR.

NPR Podcasts

Best DIY Home Improvement Podcasts according to LifeHacker (2023).

Stuff You Missed In History Class is a podcast about historical events you probably never heard of but are very interesting.

Monkey See aka Pop Culture Happy Hour, is a podcast from NPR about trending stuff in pop culture.

Serial

is a great daily podcast the presents true stories as serials with a different half-hour episode each day.

PCMag List of Podcasts (2019)

Switched on Pop is a podcast that dissects pop music and discusses the artistic, creative, and theoretical underpinings.

Internet Archive Live- recordings of live musical events, most by bands you never heard of but excellent quality.

Internet Archive 78 RPM - collects old 78 rpm recordings that you can listen to.

How to Use Audacity to rip CD's, record ring tones, etc.

Last.fm requires their own player software. The site asks for your favorite artist and they suggest others that you might want to listen to.

Audio Extracter has free software that extracts and saves the audio portion of a variety of audio and video formatted files.

How to Transfer Cassette Tapes to Computer

PMP Network has interviews with stars of various media: Mitch Ryder (Detroit Wheels), Mark Lindsay (Paul Revere and the Raiders), Peter Funt (Candid Camera), etc.

10 Neuroscience Podcast Sites - from MakeUseOf.

Brain Boosting Podcasts - mostly aimed at kids but the rest of us who don't read Scientific American will probably enjoy these also.

Comedy Podcasts - as reported by the MakeUseOf folks.

12 Podcasts to Warm Your Mind, Body, and Soul - according to LifeHacker (2023).

RealAudio