The KaZaA Community (KaZaA)

Name: Wolfie1974

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Product:	KaZaA
Date:	05.08.02 (884 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Resume Downloads, Big Database, Easy Navigation

Disadvantages: Adult Content, Potential Virus(s)

What is KaZaA?

KaZaA in short is a FREE peer-to-peer downloader application. This actually translated into English is a file sharing community allowing you to access a massive shared distributed database of files (well .. almost English). The software allows you to search for files that other members are willing to share meaning that the files are not situated on some remote server, but actually sitting on their hard disks ready for you to download directly from them. Similarly you as a member also have the "option" of sharing files with other members allowing them to access part(s) of your hard disk (read-only) for them to download from. Some of you by now will probably be saying .. "dodgey .." but as i said it is optional as to whether you wish to share or not.


What can I download?

The search facility currently allows you to search for Audio, Video, Images, Documents and Software but also allows you to search under the heading of Everything in case you are not sure what category the file will qualify as. I will discuss the search facility more in the Features section.


Signing Up

Once you have downloaded this software (just install KaZaA, the rest is not worth bothering about .. trust me!), simply run the application and you are presented with the sign-up screen which is a straight forward process of you supplying them with your requested username, password and your e-mail address. There are currently 99,362,235 members at the time of writing this sentence so you will need to be patient when trying to get your required username. Do not worry about being spammed with e-mails, I have been using this software for roughly 2 years now and have had no problems at all.


Features

OK, you have now logged on and you are ready to use this cool piece of software that nice Mr Wolfie has recommended to you! The interface is very intuitive and presents you with an Internet Exp
lorer style screen with the KaZaA home web page on the Start tab - these tabs are at the top of the screen under the menu.

The search tab will allow you to search for the file of your choice in the category that you specify, there is also a 'more options' filter that will help you narrow your search which differs depending on what type of file you are looking for - an example being if you are looking for MP3 audio, you can choose the title, artist, quality bits-per-seconds, etc.. then simply hit the 'Search Now' button and wow lots of files are listed to choose from, to download one of these just double-click on it and the download begins.

You can check the progress of your download by going to the Traffic tab, this will show you the current progress of all the files that you are currently downloading aswell as those being downloaded from you. If you think a download is too slow you can right click on the items and choose 'find more sources', this will then hunt down people with the same file and download it from them, also to be noted is that a file can be downloaded from a number of people at the same time, in which the file is broken up into at most 8 pieces from which a single piece is download from each person. You can also log-off from the web at any time and resume your downloading next time you want to go online.

Under the My KaZaA tab you can manage the files that you want to share with others - this shows all the different types and amount of files in each category that you are currently sharing and allows you to add/remove directories from your sharing list. A little advice would be not to use your 'C' drive for downloading or sharing, i use this as a general rule when downloading anything because a virus to the 'C' drive can be rather costly as opposed to a secondary drive.

There is also a Theatre tab which allows you to view your Movie files whilst they are being downloaded -
a handy little feature in ensuring that what you are downloading is in good working order, after all you wouldn't really want to download something that is 700MB to find that it is completely useless.

I should also tell that the software allows you to have complete control, you can set the maximum number of downloads, bandwidth used by other users, whether you wish to share or not. There are also changable settings if you have a firewall installed.


Messages

This is great if you want to ask another member any questions or even just chat with them if you have the time - the messaging interface is hardly your ICQ or Messenger though, it is just a simple write your comment and send or reply.


Adult Content

A big issue for those of you with young ones, a "family filter" is provided which allows you to filter out any offensive content, potential virii and bogus files, i have used these and have found them to be rather reliable. The filter is also customizable allowing you to add words which you do not want to see in your searches.


Summary

A very good piece of software that I have used for many years with a huge database of files from an MP3 track to a 700MB movie file. I have found it to be very useful for finding files that I have not been able to find elsewhere. I can't think of a bad word to say about it, so I totally recommend this 10/10 and it's FREE.

The software is FREEWARE and can be downloaded from one of these sites:

http://www.kazaa.com
http://www.download.com

Thanks for taking the time to read my opinion, kind regards .. Mark

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