Apple Keynote ends with Tony Bennett and DRM free iTunes

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The Apple Keynote lacked hot hardware announcements besides the new 17 inch MacBook Pro, but the good news is that 10 million songs on iTunes are going to be DRM free. Additionally there is a new pricing structure with $0.69, $0.99 and $1.29 per track. The labels decide at which price tracks sell.
There is also great news for iPhone 3G users. iTune music can also now be purchased over 3G and synched back on your computer at home. Read more

Posted on Tue, 6 Jan 2009 12:50:08 CST | by Luigi Lugmayr

MSI Eclipse X58 Motherboard with DrMOS unveiled

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MSI announced the Eclipse series motherboards for the new Intel Core i7 platform.
The MSI Eclipse X58 motherboard supports the latest processor Intel Core i7 with LGA1366-pin design, along with ultra-high bandwidth QPI (Quick Path Interconnect) transmission system and high-speed DDR3 memory.
For better eco-design in power-consuming, Eclipse series has further utilized and extended the second-generation DrMOS technology, which introduced exclusively by MSI since the P45 series, to the power-supply modules of the X58 chipset and DDR3 memory, improving its power efficiency more than 95%. Read more

Posted on Tue, 18 Nov 2008 06:40:23 CST | by Luigi Lugmayr

Apple Drops DRM-Free tracks to $0.99 in iTunes Store

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Apple officially announced today that it has dropped the price of all iTunes Plus DRM-free tracks to $0.99. All of the iTunes Plus tracks use 256 kbps AAC encoding.

Apple says the iTunes Plus catalog is the largest DRM-free catalog in the world covering artists from labels including EMI, Sub Pop, Nettwerk, Beggars Group, IODA, The Orchard and more. Read more

Posted on Wed, 17 Oct 2007 12:30:24 CDT | by Shane McGlaun

Apple lowers price of DRM-Free iTunes Songs to 99c

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The WSJ reports that apple is reducing the prices of DRM-free songs from $1.29 to $0.99.

Steve Jobs said that new iTunes Plus pricing would go in effect latest today.

Apple's new low pricing on DRM-Free music is driven by the competing lower-priced offerings from Amazon.com and Wal-Mart. Read more

Posted on Wed, 17 Oct 2007 02:57:09 CDT | by Luigi Lugmayr

Wal-Mart Launches DRM-free Music Download Service

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Wal-Mart launched a music download service today that sells all MP3 digital tracks for only 94 cents. What’s even better is that their MP3 tunes are DRM free. You can get an entire album for $9.22.

The music will play on most devices including the iPod, iPhone, and Zune. Wal-Mart is selling music from major record labels Universal and EMI Music. "As we consistently strive to help our customers shop smart at Wal-Mart, our new 'DRM-free' MP3 digital tracks give them the ease and flexibility to play music on virtually any device at a great value," said Kevin Swint, Wal-Mart's senior director and divisional manager for digital media. "Also, we're excited to launch our MP3 catalog with major record labels such as Universal and EMI Music that includes music from popular artists like The Rolling Stones, Coldplay, KT Tunstall, Amy Winehouse, Maroon 5, George Strait and Nelly." Read more

Posted on Tue, 21 Aug 2007 12:52:10 CDT | by Shane McGlaun

DRM Free Apple iTunes Plus is Here

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Apple today launched iTunes Plus. You can now download DRM-free music tracks featuring high quality 256 kbps AAC encoding for audio quality virtually indistinguishable from the original recordings for $1.29 per song.

iTunes Plus is launching with EMI’s digital catalog of recordings, including singles and albums from Coldplay, The Rolling Stones, Norah Jones, Frank Sinatra, Joss Stone, Pink Floyd, John Coltrane and more than a dozen of Paul McCartney’s classic albums available on iTunes for the first time. Read more

Posted on Wed, 30 May 2007 08:41:45 CDT | by Luigi Lugmayr

Amazon to Launch DRM-Free Music Store

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Amazon.com today announced it will launch a digital music store later this year offering millions of songs in the DRM-free MP3 format from more than 12,000 record labels.

EMI Music’s digital catalog is the latest addition to the store. Every song and album in the Amazon.com digital music store will be available exclusively in the MP3 format without digital rights management (DRM) software. Amazon’s DRM-free MP3s will free customers to play their music on virtually any of their personal devices — including PCs, Macs, iPods, Zunes, Zens — and to burn songs to CDs for personal use. Read more

Posted on Wed, 16 May 2007 09:26:41 CDT | by Luigi Lugmayr

EMI Music DRM-Free on Apple iTunes

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EMI Music first major label to offer commercial DRM-Free music downloads in CD quality. This could be the start of a new era for music downloads.

The EMI Music content will be available in lower quality with DRM as before and in for about %30 premium ($1.29/€1.29/£0.99) in CD quality with DRM removed.
iTunes will the first store to offer the whole EMI Music catalog DRM free.

"Selling digital music DRM-free is the right step forward for the music industry," said Steve Jobs, Apple's CEO. "EMI has been a great partner for iTunes and is once again leading the industry as the first major music company to offer its entire digital catalogue DRM-free."
Read more

Posted on Mon, 2 Apr 2007 07:45:00 CDT | by Luigi Lugmayr

New Surround Sound MP3 Format with LWDRM is Coming

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The german Fraunhofer institute the original creators of the MP3 format are supposed to release a new version of the format this summer with surround sound and a LWDRM (Light Weight Digital Rights Management).

The MP3 Surround ability of the new MP3 format is based on Agere Systems' technology. The encoding uses psychoacoustic techniques to capture spatial and speed information for additional channels, thus preserving compact file size. The new format is backward compatible.

LWDRM allows copying of MP3 files, but the user needs to mark files first with a digital signature and register it. So when a file appears on a P2P network, the original copyright violator can be identified directly through the signature - Is this the end of free illegal file sharing?
More details on DigitalAudioNews and in a PC Magazine Article.

Read more

Posted on Thu, 29 Apr 2004 08:55:27 CDT | by Luigi Lugmayr