Proceed to checkout

Similar to many other people I've found it is sometimes cheaper to buy individual MP3 files of music rather than buying a CD. That's especially true if I want only one track of the album. Most of the MP3 files I've bought over the last couple years have been from Amazon. The process was fairly easy. I downloaded their "MP3 downloader." When I bought a track or album the downloader would put it on the C drive (though I wanted it on the F where there is more room) and tell Windows Media Player to put it in its library.

I had discovered a few things I wanted to get so yesterday evening I did my browsing and was soon ready to order. I clicked four items into the MP3 cart. I clicked on the button that said something like "Proceed to checkout." This time a little explanation text appeared and asked me to click again. My purchases would go into the Cloud Player and I could download it from there.

I didn't want it on the Cloud. I don't have a variety of devices I want to play the music on. I want the actual file, not the rights to use the file.

So before I completed the purchase I found their customer service and called. That person was very kind and patient as she walked me through the process. But I was on the phone with her for at least a half hour.

Yes, the purchase went directly to the Cloud Player, though I was assured it could be downloaded from there. So I bought.

First there were problems getting a proper view of the Cloud Player that showed my purchases and didn't have a popup in front of it, a popup with no close button. That one confused my guide.

Then the Cloud Player went through my purchase history, every CD I had ever bought through Amazon that had an MP3 equivalent, and loaded all those tracks into the Player. When my guide said I could find my latest purchases by clicking on the "Recent Additions" button I got all 403 tracks. We had to come up with search words to find what I wanted to download.

But the Cloud Player didn't seem to recognize the downloader program. I started it up manually and up popped a box to say that this was an old version and didn't I really want to upgrade? Perhaps, but not now! I had already been on the phone a long time and did not want to sit there to wait for an upgrade to install, especially one that might want me to close all programs and reboot my computer.

Finally, I could find the new tracks, select them, and the downloader worked. Of course, MP3 files are not small and it took a while. The service rep was, bless her, patient and saw me through to the end. She assured me it would all go much more smoothly the next time. I'm not sure I want a next time.