[Since I will be away for quite sometime, here is a tutorial written up by kyohei in the hope that it will make your lives easier when finding music. Here goes...]
I think it is important to teach people how to find music on their own. Also the fact that neko28 will be off to Korea and will not be able to update as frequently. This guide is for asian multimedia only, not American (but you could implicitly use this method for such uses). So here is how to find what you want:
Before You Search:
You have to know what you’re looking for to find it. Make sure you know enough information such as the artist name and song/album/MV. Wikipedia is a good place to find such information.
Lesson 1: Search Engines
Search engines can be your best friend. My personal favorite is Google. Sometimes if you type the song name, album, or MV in search, a link will come up with a blog, forum, or some website that has a link for what you’re looking for. Words of warning though: Avoid generic words and definitely avoid chinese websites. If you think the website is unsafe, then don’t go to it.
For example, if you needed to find Minwoo’s ‘Sentimental Reason’: you would type ‘minwoo sentimental reason’ in the search. You would be able to find the album from several sites on the first page. Even Neko28′s blog is on the first page of google.
Tips: If nothing comes up in your search, try being less specific.
In an artist’s name, there could be many different names. Try different romanizations of the name, and if need be, try the Korean text [hangul] name. In the previous example, use ‘Min woo’ instead of ‘Minwoo’
Lesson 1.5: Search Engines Advanced
Now you know how to use Google to find what you’re looking for. Yet, what if google does not help much? Try defining your search with quotes. Like the previous example, do this instead: Minwoo ‘sentimenal reason’. It makes it more specific so that it looks for ‘sentimental reason’ exactly.
If you know the media could be on a particular site, use the ‘site:website search-term’ method. Example:
site:z-degrees.net Min woo sentimental reason
This will search inside the website’z-degrees.net’. This can be very useful. You can also use this for megaupload and a few other fileshare sites.
What if what Google said was not actually on the website? Another important skill is Google’s ‘cache’. You may have noticed that many websites in Google’s search has a ‘cache’ link near it. The cache is just Google’s documentation of the website that Google saves on its own drives. Therefore what Google said was on a website was actually there, it is just that the site had been updated. So whenever there is an updated website, try the cache link to see if you can find what you’re looking for.
Lesson 2: Forums
Forums on Asian music can be the one of the best ways to find asian multimedia. It brings a whole community of people into one central place. This is very effective in updating with the newest/best stuff in a variety of areas. They require a sign-up, but they can be very much worth it. You can post/request/etc. Also note lesson 1.5: Since the search option is disabled in both of these forums, use the ‘site:’ method. Two forums you must sign-up to are:
z-degrees.net
z9.invisionfree.com/bww2
Other ‘okay’ sites:
asianload.com/forums/
getasianmusic.com
Lesson 3: Blogs
As you may have noticed (considering you are here), blog sites are frequently used for news and sharing multimedia. I have many blogs in my favorites list that I go to to see if there is anything new. It would be smart to use [site:wordpress.com SEARCH] or blogspot/livejournal/etc to find what you’re looking for. Since you all know the in’s-and-out’s of blogs I will not go far with it. Some good blogs that I personal think are great:
DBSKer@blogspot -Very condense DBSK discography
bigbangkorean@wordpress – Very up-to-date Big Bang Fanblog/discography
supajunia@livejournal -everything about super junior.
sweetxmelodies@blogspot -Media that covers a lot
many many more….
Lesson 4: Other websites
Not really much to say here. Well I have been writing ‘less on’ each lesson (Well I thought that was funny T.T). Other good sites that I have marked are:
bww2.com – Really recommended for -individual- songs. Not albums or mv’s.
soompi.com – You won’t find downloads here. BUT it is a very good forum for korean entertainment.
aheeyah.com/lyrics/ – Very good site for lyrics.
yesasia.com – Buy your music.
megadownload.net/ – SEARCH inside megaupload and rapidshare. Try to be broad in your searches and copy/paste the url and not go inside the links. ‘site:megaupload.com’ also works in Google.
Lesson 5: Tracklists
To find tracklists I usually use wikipedia -haha-. It is actually really accurate. If I cannot find it on wikipedia, then I use google search:”artist – album”. OR I search: “artist discography” and see if I can find anything there.
If these do not work, I use yesAsia. I find a random track from the yesAsia album tracklist (since you cannot copy/paste) and google “artist – track” to see if I can find the tracklist that way. If this does not work, I use korean websites that are either free or sell music. IF all else fails and it is on YesAsia, I would write it myself, but I have never had to get this far
Basically you have many options !
Bonus Lesson 5: Movies (not MV’s) and Dramas
The method for finding asian movies / dramas online is similar. You could use the methods above, but movies/dramas are different than music. They are much larger in size and are often cut down into pieces for easier downloading (although I feel everything in one piece would be easier, but not everyone has the same bandwidth as I).
Forums: Forums are the number one method of downloading higher quality video. They are communities similar that to asian music. Some music forums have video sections. z-degrees.net and z9.invisionfree.com/bww2 are two forums that cover both music, movies, and dramas, although they are quite limited. A good movie-oriented site is idols-unlimited.com/community, however, it does have a good share of ads/pop-ups. A very recommend drama forum is d-addicts.com, however the use of torrents is necessary.
Streaming: There are a large number of streaming sites that offer low-quality video at the cost of convenience. My favorite is ‘aznv.tv’ (Yes, ‘.tv’ and not ‘.com’). It has a high selection of dramas to watch and a few movies (all english subtitled). It has very very little ads. However, it is necessary to have winamp to watch the streams. Other streaming sites are:
mysoju.com – A pretty good streaming site. Very high selection.
crunchyroll.com – I personally don’t like this site, but that is only me.
Other sites:
chinkymovies.blogspot.com – A blogger who has links to a variety of movies/dramas. She reviews many of them as well.
silentregrets.com – Very good drama site.
veoh.com- As long as the video is under 30min you can watch it streaming at decent quality. Otherwise, it is necessary to download using their VeohTV program. It downloads as an avi. It is a decently good site that is easy and convenient to use. I get dramas from veoh when I don’t get them from torrents (I am a quality-freak; I really try not to watch movies or dramas streaming).
Overall:
If you want high quality video, you must download them from forums or other sites. If you do not mind quality, then you can stream it, however, the number of stream-ed video is limited.
[Big thanks to kyohei!!! When i have time, i may add in extra tips]
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semoga ia memberi ilmu buat anda semua