YO!

I'm downloading music, and I'm ok with the '.mp3' and '.m4a', but what are '.rar' and 'flac' yo?

.rar is like a .zip file. You can unzip it using Winrar.

Not familiar with 'flac'. I'm sure you can search Google for it and find out what software you need to use a 'flac' file.

.rar in WinRar files. They are a form of zip file. It's a great way of bundling music, movies, games and other stuff to send quickly and efficiently.

.flac is a music format like .MP3. It's lossless format basically. It's a form of .wav file where there is very little to no compression which results in little sound quality loss. The problem with .flac files is that they are HUGE and take up a ton of space for a sound that is NOT, in my opinion, that much different from an MP3.

Your best bet is to stick with either MP3 or M4a format.

If you can avoid it, don't download a RAR file. Same for ZIP. They could easily contain viruses. ;-)

that's what they make Virus Scans for. And music RARELY ever comes in rar format unless you're downloading it from a warez style site.

Overall though, not a good idea to download anything in RAR or ZIP format unless it from you someone you know VERY well and trust

thanks for the advice everyone, i'm struggling to get a good version of winrar anyway, everything is just a 40 day trial.

i'm downloading music from torrent sites, and there's quite a lot of .rar and .flac ones. i'm not sure how you play .flac files, as windows media player doesn't seem to play them at all.

If you download the FLAC ones, you need a special codec to play them on both Windows Media and Winamp. Just look up FLAC PLAYER on yahoo and you should be able to download it for free.

As for the RAR ones, just make sure you virus scan them first before you use them.

Try WinZip? I can't remember if it's WinZip or WinRar that I use, but I have an "evaluation" copy that, while it is a "trial" version, doesn't have a 40-day limit (or indeed any limit!).

Okay I just checked and it's WinRar that I have.

Actually, a lot of sites are converting their downloadable files to .rar because what it does is compress the files to a smaller size, and most sites find that suitable for file storage. When I downloaded Linkin Park's new live CD, all the songs came in one single .rar file. Treat a .rar file the same way you would treat any other file. Any file could contain viruses.