By now most people know there is a difference in ringtone quality. Some people still use ringtones that say the ring, ring. Technically those ringtones are monophonic ring tones. They play only one tune at the moment.  This sort of ringtone wouldn’t be good enough for terminator theme music ringtones.

Most phones today support polyphonic ring tones. Compared to monophonic ringtones polyphonic ringtones sound more like music. Polyphonic ringtones can play several notes and sounds simultaneously. Polyphonic ringtones are also known as midi ring tones. Some carriers and cell phone manufacturers talk about Hi-Fi ringtones or mobile phone melodies.

Then we have different polyphonic ring tones. Motorola Base Tracks or groove tunes are special polyphonic ringtones which you can edit. And there is also a quality level for polyphonic ring tones. A polyphonic ringtone can be of polyphony level 4, 16, 24, 40 or 48. A bigger number is much better. A level 4 polyphonic ringtone can play 4 tones at the same time.  This is much better for terminator theme music ringtones.

Nokia also has their own special ringtones called Truetones, which allows users to have songs and special effects as ring tones.  Most phones can play free MP3 ringtones.

The latest thing is 3G audio ringtones that are full-length ringtones or music files. The format of 3G audio ringtones can be MP3, AAC or any other music files. 3G stands for third-generation mobile telephone technology and 3G ringtones means ringtones that are downloaded via 3G.