Wal-Mart Selling DRM-Free MP3s

Big B

Big B

HWF Godfather
Love 'em or hate 'em, Wal-Mart is making some news again. No healthcare this time, either. They're selling MP3s without controversial DRM technology.

Wal-Mart said it would sell the "DRM-free" MP3 downloads of music by artists like the Rolling Stones, Amy Winehouse and Maroon 5 for 94 cents per track or $9.22 per album. It said the new format let customers play music on almost any device, including iPods, iPhones and Microsoft Corp's Zune portable media player.

This could give Apple a run for the money, depending on selection and if they offer unedited versions of certain artists.
 
When I pay for music, I prefer to have it on CD for the quality. High bitrate mp3's are ok, but I still want the case and album art.
 
Same here. I'll rip my music in 168kbps .wma format. I haven't tried .ogg, but .wma is natively supported by my cell phone. I know MP3 is popular, but I do noticed the difference by going with .wma. Now, yes, .WMA may not be popular with everyone, but it comes with Windows and I can turn off the DRM option (nice since I loose my key).

Still, it's a very popular format, and while obviously flawed, I think it's a very big step in the right direction. Wal-Mart has the ability to say "Jump!" and the industry they're dealing with will ask "How high?"
 
yeah, i've tried ogg, and even though people say that its just as good as mp3, or whatever else, i've found that it isn't really up to snuff.
 
Swansen said:
yeah, i've tried ogg, and even though people say that its just as good as mp3, or whatever else, i've found that it isn't really up to snuff.
Click to expand...

Ogg gives slightly better quality than mp3 below the 192kbit rate, but above that there's hardly any difference between them. I've tried ogg, and found it was very good for the size but not many devices support it, so it's always mp3 for me.
 
Addis said:
Ogg gives slightly better quality than mp3 below the 192kbit rate, but above that there's hardly any difference between them. I've tried ogg, and found it was very good for the size but not many devices support it, so it's always mp3 for me.
Click to expand...

weird, maybe it was a conversion issue or something, but i found the ogg was worse quality than mp3. But i actually use ATRAC3 plus, cause thats what my player uses :D
 
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