Best subscription music service? | The Coffeehouse

BitFlipper

Hi,

I used to use Urge subscription, but since they were converted to Rhapsody I absolutely hate it. Any suggestions for other good subscription services that would work with a 30GB Zen Vision:M?

BTW, I don't want this to turn into a flame fest. We all have our preferences. I used both pay-as-you-go and all-you-can-eat subscription services, and I would never use a non-subscription service again. If I did I would need to pay thousands of dollars for the amounts of songs I listen to. So no-one is going to convince me that subscription services are not a good idea. Plus, I can still "own" a song if I wanted to by paying the $0.99 if I really really wanted to.

Phew, now that that is out of the way, any suggestions?

Lloyd_Humph
If Blackberrys are addictive cellphones, Channel9 is the ultimate addictive website.

Not subscription... but it's perfectly legal, me and phreaks use it, it's dangerously cheap and it's tried and tested... it's always 192-320kbps audio quality. It's really good. And you get to keep the music!

www.legalsounds.com

BitFlipper

Lloyd_Humph wrote:
Not subscription... but it's perfectly legal, me and phreaks use it, it's dangerously cheap and it's tried and tested... it's always 192-320kbps audio quality. It's really good. And you get to keep the music!

www.legalsounds.com

"...according to license ЛС-3М-05-09 of the Russian Multimedia and Internet Society"

Their songs are $0.09? I think it may be "legal" in Russia but I doubt it is legal here. I prefer to stick with something that I know is legal in the USA.

Even at $0.09 a song I would still pay close to what I am paying for a subscription service.

Lloyd_Humph
If Blackberrys are addictive cellphones, Channel9 is the ultimate addictive website.

It's legal, to the best of my knowledge.

BitFlipper

Lloyd_Humph wrote:
It's legal, to the best of my knowledge.

It may be, although I seriously doubt it is legal in the USA. Do you have any reliable confirmation on this?

Even if it is 100% legal in the USA, I think I still prefer a subscription service.

ManipUni
Proving QQ for 5 years!

I use iTunes but:
- The software sucks
- They lock you into a single device (e.g. iPod)
- Don't play nicely with other audio software
- Huge resource hog (on Windows)

But the selection is good, the price is fair, and I have an iPod so whatever.

BitFlipper

ManipUni wrote:
I use iTunes but:
- The software sucks
- They lock you into a single device (e.g. iPod)
- Don't play nicely with other audio software
- Huge resource hog (on Windows)

But the selection is good, the price is fair, and I have an iPod so whatever.

But it doesn't work for anything other than iPods (I have a Zen as mentioned), and it doesn't have a subscription option, so it is definitely not an option for me.

I guess my options are Napster and Yahoo Music?

Michael Griffiths
Fatalism.

I was also a former URGE subscriber; just cancelled my Rhapsody subscription.

I bought a Zune, which overall isn't bad. However, I can't really recommend the library too much... I believe it has the same selection as the URGE music store (initially just a clone of the service, and the new software hasn't changed the back-end library) but in the short time I had Rhapsody I got used to the expanded selection (however bloody hard it was to find any one song...).

The Zune software is also a bit limited. Functional, albeit barely, and assuming you don't want to do anything more than download and play.

I'd suggest playing with it for comparison purposes, but as you have a Zen it's not worth much.

I think Yahoo! also has a pretty good music subscription service, or did last time I checked.

pathfinder
Hard work never killed anybody, but why take a chance?

I have had a yahoo music subscription for a couple of years now. They seem to have most songs that I want, but their music match software stinks. They use Plays4sure... errrr... Windows Vista Certified music....

However, they keep raising their subscription prices and soon it will just be cheaper to buy a new CD every month instead, so this is my last year. I have already told them not to renew my yearly subscription after august 2008.

I think I am going to probably get a Zune or something similar before then. I think Nokia is coming out with a device and a music store soon. Maybe I will wait see what they have to offer.

Audible.com did the same thing. They had a great subscription program and then they canceled it an now its just cheaper to buy the Audio CD from Amazon than to buy their proprietary crap. I have hundreds of Audible.com books though.

alwaysmc2
It's not stupid; It's advanced!

BitFlipper wrote:
I used to use Urge subscription, but since they were converted to Rhapsody I absolutely hate it.

Same. It just happened that my player broke around the same time, so I got a Zune.
You could always get a Zune All-Access Pass, and just strip the DRM so that you can put the music on your Zen. As far as I know the Zune Marketplace is the next best thing over Urge, which was the best!

Aww... poor Urge.

GorbaChavez

In reply to alwaysmc2

#Dec 16th, 2007 @ 6:53 PM

Have you tried looking into Slacker Radio? The online service is decent (streaming only) and is similar in nature to Pandora, Last.fm, etc. The value-add is that they have ported their software to mobile devices, Blackberry, iPod, and their own proprietary player. I had their portable player for a while but it suffered from too many setbacks but they seem to be growing in popularity. It's probalby not a solution for the OP since you already have a device and it's not compatible, but I thought others might find this info useful.

I've run the gamut of music services and still haven't found anything completely satisfying.

blowdart
Peek-a-boo

In reply to GorbaChavez

#Jan 29th @ 8:46 AM

Thanks for that. Bumping a two year old thread. Hmm I wonder if you're astroturfing.

phreaks

In reply to blowdart

#Jan 29th @ 9:05 AM

Astro-turfing?

Sounds kinky.

intelman

Zune.

http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/reviews/2009/01/too-zune-to-pass-judgement-a-review-of-the-zune-marketplace.ars

mp3obsession

Hi, have you tried any of the sites listed on here: http://www.mp3obsession.com/reviews

They are all legal, safe and cheap. LegalSounds is one of the sites listed. Some of the sites also offer monthly subscription services and unlimited services.