iTunes Plusby Mary Ann Romans | More from this Blogger 02 Jun 2007 05:05 AM Apple recently unveiled the new iTunes Plus service for iTunes customers. With the service, you can download higher quality audio tracks that are DRM-free for an extra fee. But is it worth it? DRM is the technology that protects music tracks from piracy. The drawback to DRM is that the quality of a track can suffer. DRM-free music, or unprotected music, generally sounds better, with clearer tones and less overwhelming noise or screechy-ness. Under the iTunes Plus service, audio tracks that are DRM-free will cost about $.30 more per track or song. This might be worth it to anyone who has their iPod or other media player connected to quality sound equipment. For me, I generally listen to my tunes on my laptop, so any upgrade to DRM-free tracks would be wasted on the fact that I don't even have good speakers or a subwoofer. It is a shame, I know. Early reports of the service do point to some problems and flaws in the service, so you might want to wait for the kinks to be ironed out before you take it for a test run. Firstly, Apple requires iTunes 7.2 or later to use the iTunes Plus service. iTunes Plus users who choose to see all of the unprotected DRM-free tracks cannot see the regular, less expensive versions of the songs. And while browsing through protected versions of the songs, the unprotected DRM-free tracks are hidden. It would be nice if you would be able to choose your version based on the song. Santana might warrant an upgrade, but downloading a Raffi song is a different story. There also appears to be a very annoying error box that pops up whenever you try to change your preferences. The changes will be made, but the box complains anyway that there was an error. The iTunes Plus service offers upgrades on your existing music with just the $.30 fee per track, but it seems that upgrading happens in a hit or miss fashion. Sometimes the tracks upgraded, sometimes they error out. What do you think? Will you be trying the iTunes Plus service? Mary Ann Romans also writes for the Frugal Living Blog here at Families.com, where she shares money saving tips for today's families. Related Articles: iPod Study Links Usage to Failing Pacemakers Learn more about Mary Ann Romans  Mary Ann Romans is a freelance writer, wife and mother of three children. She lives in Pennsylvania with her husband, the kids and a 16-pound cat. Relevantcomputers tags User Comments No comments on this article yet. Be the first to comment! Community Tags DRM, iTunes Plus, unprotected music Discuss this article
|
Computing categories |
