May 19, 2008 by sharky
Other contenders like Libble and STMusic have equally found a growing share of the market among music enthusiasts, and should not be overlooked. They possess two things that What and Waffles don’t: First; they’re fairly easy to get into, and second; you’ll be able to maintain a good sharing ratio (and thus keep the account).
We’ve put together a collection of stats and criteria used to distinguish the various qualities of four major music trackers. UPDATE: All statistics were collected ‘live’ from each tracker on Sept 23, 2008.
Quality of Music: The Torrents
When comparing trackers, the single most important criteria to consider is the quality of the releases (torrents). We’ve broken it down into a number of sub-categories:
Total Number of Torrents
The torrent count is a great way of benchmarking the quality (if not quantity) of any tracker. Below is a look at the number of torrents for each (as of Sept 23/08). From these stats it’s clear that two stand high above the rest:
| Music Tracker: | Number of Torrents: |
| Waffles | 198,887 - Total torrents, as reported on home page. |
| What.cd | 265,154 - As reported by stats on home page. |
| STMusic | 18,756** |
| Libble | 10,095 |
**STMusic did a major housecleaning on April 8/08 and deleted 20,000 dead torrents, thus reducing the count from 60K to 40K (May 19/08). By Sept 23, the number has dropped to less than 20K.
Music Quality
As you’re already aware, music comes in many formats; even MP3’s can be broken down into sub-categories, mostly based on bitrates. Typically, pro music trackers will not carry 128 (or even 160) bitrate for MP3’s - the most common format found on P2P / Limewire - since it’s deemed too "lossy". 192 is the default minimum, and most music enthusiasts will even avoid that, opting for FLAC, MP3 (VBR) or MP3 (V0) instead. Here’s the torrent count for each tracker in a variety of audio specifics and formats:
| Specifics: | Waffles | What.cd | STMusic | Libble |
| 192 kbps bitrate | 25,579 | 28,813 | 672 | 2,340 |
| 256 kbps | 5,979 | 6,611 | 17 | 610 |
| 320 kbps | 24,821 | 35,576 | 4,065 | 1,624 |
| MP3 (VBR - V0) | 45,524 | 60,568 | 1,993 | 1,869 |
| MP3 (VBR - V1) | 621 | 1,117 | 0 | 13 |
| MP3 (VBR - V2) | 26,841 | 34,458 | 2,651 | 1,408 |
| Ogg | 512 | 537 | 21 | 5 |
| APE (lossless) | 0 | 553 | 10 | 0 |
| DTS | 97 | 93 | 3 | 0 |
| MP3 (ALL formats) | 141,286 | 148,897 | 9,218 | 9,028 |
Lossless Audio (FLAC)
True music aficionados know what we’re talking about here - lossless audio. Get yourself a good pair of PC speakers (or 6) and fire up some FLAC audio. Never again will you download music from Limewire, we can assure you.
People who like lossless audio, like it a lot. FLAC is quickly becoming the standard among audio connoisseurs, and private trackers are made for distributing FLAC. Ever tried to search for "flac" at mininova? You’ll get 500 random results. Here’s a breakdown of the 5 music sites, and what they offer in regards to lossless / FLAC audio torrents:
| Music Tracker: | ‘FLAC’ (Lossless) Torrents: |
| Waffles | 49,208 |
| What.cd | 64,158 |
| STMusic | 1,451 |
| Libble | 768 |
Promo / Advance Releases
One of the reasons fans use private trackers is to get the music before it hits the stores. An "Advance" release is a retail copy of a CD far before its scheduled official retail release date, usually through a manufacturing connection. A "Promo" is usually sent to radio stations for publicity reasons which eventually lead to a leak on the Internet; however some promos are from an online source. Either way, these are highly-coveted releases, and are the main fodder of user requests. Here’s a look at what these trackers offer in terms of Advance and Promo torrents:
| Tracker: | ‘Advance’ torrents: | ‘Promo’ torrents: |
| Waffles.fm | 1,219 | 2,894 |
| What.cd | under 40** | 1,367** |
| STMusic | 183 | 977 |
| Libble | 461 | 247 |
** Both of these stats for What.cd are ridiculously low, since the tag for ‘advance’ and ‘promo’ (and ’scene’) are seldom used. What.cd does offer the latest ‘leaked’ music - but you’ll need to search for it the old-fashioned way: by Artist and Album Title.
Media Formats / All Other Categories
Music trackers don’t just offer music: eBooks, audiobooks, Music DVDs, e-Learning videos, comic books, and an assortment of other torrents co-exist as well. Here’s a look at what each of the featured trackers offer in terms of miscellany.
| Format / Category: | Waffles | What.cd | STMusic | Libble |
| Applications | 3,769 | 4,939 | 0 | 35 |
| eBooks | 1,519 | 2,026 | 0 | 18 |
| audiobooks | 1,611 | 1,895 | 39 | 25 |
| eLearning | 386 | 708 | 0 | 0 |
| Comedy | 950 | 1,540 | 0 | 66 |
| Soundtracks (OST) | 3,323 | 4,147 | 145 | 83 |
| Comics | 1,093 | 1,197 | — | — |
| Vinyl | 2.052 | 6,407 | 1,015 | 0 |
| Music Vids / DVDs | 0? | 0 | 243 | 0 |
‘Scene’ vs. ‘Non-Scene’ Releases
Music itself can be divided into "scene" and "non-scene" sub-categories - a ’scene’ release would be one that came from a proper ‘release group’, whereas all others would include torrents uploaded by existing tracker members (aka. ‘user torrents’). For reasons obvious, most users will agree that a proper scene release will trump a user-submitted torrent, and some trackers allow for filtering of the search results into both of these genres.
| Music Tracker: | "Scene" Releases: |
| Waffles | 26,747 |
| What.cd | 1,843 |
| STMusic | 7,007 |
| Libble | no results |
Tracker Statistics / Other Criteria
The quality & quantity of torrents is not the only criteria that differentiates one tracker from another. Below is a collection of other stats, info and tidbits from each one:
Getting an Account
One thing that no one can contest is that it’s more difficult to get an account at Waffles than it is at What.cd. By no means is this indicative of the quality of the tracker; it’s merely a reflection of demand. And both are more difficult to get into than the old OiNK. The others are more easily attainable, and may even open publicly to new signups on the site (on occasion). Here’s a look at getting in, from hardest to easiest.
| Waffles.fm | Invites are near-impossible to find. Members who have them can only use them during very brief periods when the site is not full. It’s easier to find someone giving away their entire account than it is to find an invite. Never publicly open to new signups. |
| What.cd | Invites are not common, and awarded to qualifying members at least once a month (usually the 8th and 22nd). Keep an eye on ‘Invite Forums‘ around these dates. Never publicly open to new signups. |
| Libble.com | Invites are somewhat common. Their site even mentions joining the IRC channel in search of an invite - irc://irc.rizon.net:7000/libble.com. Once in a while they’re open publicly to new signups. |
| STMusic.org | Invites are very common, and can be found just about anywhere. STMusic is ‘cleaning house’ on inactive / bad accounts, so expect it to get a whole lot easier to get in. At last check, they weren’t publicly open to new signups (without an ‘invite code’). |
Reader’s Polls - Popularity
One way to judge who is the best music tracker is to ask around. We searched, and found a few polls with varying results. Don’t read into this too deeply, although it appears that Waffles has the edge.
Internet Traffic ‘Ranking’
Here’s a comparison of Alexa traffic rankings for the five trackers (as of May 19/08).
| Music Tracker: | Alexa Rank: |
| Waffles.fm | 12,479 (May 19/08) - 16,875 (Sept. 23/08) |
| What.cd | 12,660 (May 19/08) - 12,522 (Sept. 23/08) |
| STMusic.org | 13,424 (May 19/08) - 19,863 (Sept. 23/08) |
| Libble.com | 89,840 (May 19/08) - 169,368 (Sept. 23/08) |
Ease-of-Uploading & The ‘Leecher Crisis’
Both What and Waffles suffer from too many seeders and not enough leechers - making it very difficult to maintain a good sharing ratio. And of the two, Waffles is even more difficult to seed on than What.cd. Unless you know the tricks, it may be best to start off with an account from Libble, STMusic or Funkytorrents. It’s fairly easy to seed on these three, even from your home BT client like µTorrent. You’ll not need a seedbox, nor will you need to upload your own torrents.
Number of Registered Users
The number of users doesn’t necessarily increase the quality or quantity of music releases on the tracker, but having more members should (statistically) increase the variety of torrents - although there’s no definitive proof of this. Here’s a breakdown of the number of registered users on each tracker:
| Music Tracker: | Current # of Users / Max #: |
| What.cd | 59,184 / 100,000* |
| Waffles | 35,135 / 40,000 |
| STMusic | unknown (stats not shown on site) |
| Libble | 7,753 / 10,000 |
*What.cd recently increased their max. user limit from 60K to 100K.
Tracker Stats:
UPDATED - As of Sept. 23/2008:
| What.cd |  |
| Waffles.fm |  |
| Libble.com |  |
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