Mp3 supscription service

There are several popular music services which will work well with your SanDisk.

First, do you want to purchase the songs, or subscribe to them? Purchase means that you own the tracks. You can play them on your computer, transfer them to the SanDisk, and burn them to CD.

Subscription means that you can listen to them on your PC and transfer them to your SanDisk. But you can't burn it to a CD. The tracks remain active so long as you maintain your membership. Once you quit, the tracks will "die" and no longer play.

The advangage of purchase is that you own the music. The downside is it'll cost you 75 cents to $1.00/track.

The advantage of subscription is that you pay a flat fee a month for an unlimited amount of music. So long as you maintain the subscription you can have your music. But you can't have it on CD (though that may not matter, doesn't to me), and it all goes away if you quit.

I like the subscription model better. To me, it's ideal.

So who do you go with?

For purchase, you CANNOT use iTunes. Their music does not play on the SanDisk. It only works on iPods. So they're out.

That leave Rhapsody, Napster, Yahoo and Virgin, who just came onto the scene.

I have used all but Virgin. Napster and Rhapsody are the most expensive, Yahoo is a little cheaper. They all offer three levels of service. The purchase service lets you buy music for under $1.00 a track. You pay for what you need and you can use it any way you want.

The second level lets you listen to all the music you want to, but only on your PC. You cannot transfer it to your SanDisk.

The top level, around $12-15/month, lets you listen on your PC AND transfer to your SanDisk. This is the most flexible level, but the most expensive.

You can try out these services for free for a few days. I like Yahoo and Rhapsody, and avoided Napster because it was the most expensive for awhile. But they are all around the same price now, so price may not be the differentiator.

Yahoo has the highest "bit rates" for their music, withe Rhapsody being lower and Napster lower (along with Virgin), but to tell the truth, people say you really can't hear the difference. So I wouldn't choose for that.

I like Yahoo's interface, but they are still new a still a little buggy. Yahoo also offers lots of radion stations to listen to.

Rhapsody is stable and has lots of music and great radio stations. Their interface is slightly less clear to me than Yahoo, but I have always had luck with them and they are very reliable. Further, they have a customer service number you can call, which Yahoo does not (and I just went through hell with Yahoo this week when I purchased a CD and only 3 of the tracks would download ... I basically had to call AMEX to stop payment because their customer service was useless ... actually useless is being kind ... it was the worst I have ever experienced from any company in any business!).

Napster is stable and mature and has lots of music. It's a good choice, but it's the most expensive. It works very well and is a good choice.

Keep in mind that these are NOT mp3 tracks, but WMA tracks. mp3s do not have copy protection and digital rights management, which you need to assure purchase or subscription be enforced.

All of these services are, of course, totally legal. Here are the URLs:
www.napster.com
www.rhapsody.com
music.yahoo.com

Have fun.