OT- Music downloading services....best? worst? HELP!!!!

[nov02mom]

OK- I would like to join one of these music services (Rhapsody, Itunes, Napster etc.....) and burn my own cd's. Does anyone have any of these and can steer me in the right direction? I don't even know where to start!!!
Thanks!

[momceecers]

We use itunes and are very happy with it. I would just head to the itunes music store and check it out. You can search if you are looking for specific songs/albums or you can just browse different genres. One thing I like is that you can buy whichever songs you want or the whole album.

If you click on a song it will play a snippet for you. You can also prepay for things, pay as you go, or you can set up a monthly allotment (I have friends who do this for their kids). We have been really happy, but it can be time consuming when you get into it. Just a little warning.

Have fun!

Cindy

[tarahsolazy]

Another happy iTunes customer. However, I am an Apple weirdo, so take my opinion with that in mind.

[DebbieJ]

My DH swears by itunes. But he also is a Mac-head.

~ deb
DS 12/03
And a niece or nephew arriving in early August!

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[Calmegja2]

My best advice is when you decide on your format, stick with it.

I started with I-tunes, but decided I liked Napster better (music selection is stronger for the artists I like).

What it ended up with was that I got rid of my I-pod, and got a Windows Media Player compatible device instead. The format that Napster and some other services uses is not (immediately) compatible with the I-pod, so you have transfer each individual track and re-edit tags to use your music with your I-pod. You can totally use a PC with I-Tunes, but if you're going to be a heavy duty downloader, it's easier to pick your format and service and stick with it. I still use I-tunes occasionally, if they happen to have a song or album I just have to have that Napster doesn't, but that's not so much a pain as if we were to switch everything over (we were looking at close to a 1000 track transfer).

We are Microsoft people here, and Napster devotees, so it wasn't the right format for us. Even burning CD's from two different formats necomes a chore, because you have to transfer (burn out of one program, rip and reprogram into the other).

The I-Pod/I-Tunes service is way cool, but so is my new device, and it works with the programs I want to use to manage our media, so all's well that ends well.

[jbowman]

I love my iPod and iTunes. I think both are very user-friendly. We just pay per song with iTunes (songs are $.99 each & we use a prepaid card), although I've only bought about 12-15 songs total (we mostly burned our own cds onto the computer and copied them to iPod). HTH! And FWIW, we use a PC not a Mac for this.

[nov02mom]

I just realized I should give more info. We are not Mac people, and I'm not planning on buying a separate little player (Ipod for these) just to listen /burn to cd.
Thanks for all the thoughts so far!!!

[Thatchermom]

Not intending to hijack, but what do you have? I asked around before purchasing my Zen Micro, but didn't find anyone on the board with anything other than an Ipod.

[Calmegja2]

Creative Zen Touch!!!!

And I love it....do you love yours?

[aliceinwonderland]

Same here. I'm not a Mac head (not will I likely become one in the near future), but I love my one Apple item, the Ipod--I have not downloaded anything from their itunes store, as I took advantage of a free download offer from the Bargains Board a while back (free for a time period) pus burned my CD onto my IBM laptop.

[caridura]

I have an iPod, so I use iTunes. It's just so super easy to use. I did use iTunes on a PC with my old mp3 player and it worked fine. Now I am on a Mac using iTunes and love it even more.

I have never tried Rhapsody and have not used Napster in years, so I can't really comment on those services.

[Calmegja2]

You should be okay, then, regardless of what you choose, but if you use I-Tune's burner for CD's, and you ever get songs from another service, you'll most likely have to burn and then re-rip them before you make a CD. Same with Napster, if you choose it. You'll have to re-rip anything you buy off of I-tunes. The formats just don't work together, because Napster uses WMA, and I-Tunes uses several different formats.

Not a big deal, if you're not going to be a big downloader. ;-)