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[Galley]

Source: http://news.com.com/RealNetworks+slashes+song+prices/2100-1027_3-5312143.html?tag=nefd.top

RealNetworks will kick off a high-profile digital music marketing campaign Tuesday, highlighting the new iPod-compatible technology that has swung the company into conflict with Apple Computer.

For a limited time, RealNetworks will offer song downloads from its music store for 49 cents, along with half-price albums. A nationwide print, radio and Web marketing campaign will promote the offer, along with a Web site touting "freedom of choice" for online music consumers.

This promotion brings Van Halen's "Best Of Both Worlds" down to $5.99.  That's less than 17 cents per track!  

[edbro]

What is the bitrate and do you buy through the RealPlayer?

[Galley]

All RealPlayer Music Store tracks are 192Kbps RealAudio 10 AAC files.  These .RAX files are playable without conversion on many Palm handhelds and some Creative Zen players.  Real's new Harmony technology, introduced in RealPlayer 10.5, allows you to purchase tracks that are compatible with any player that supports DRM, whether it be AAC or WMA.  

[dcwebman]

All RealPlayer Music Store tracks are 192Kbps RealAudio 10 AAC files.  These .RAX files are playable without conversion on many Palm handhelds and some Creative Zen players.  Real's new Harmony technology, introduced in RealPlayer 10.5, allows you to purchase tracks that are compatible with any player that supports DRM, whether it be AAC or WMA.

Can you please clarify this a little for a novice? I thought they would be AAC so I could play right away in MC but I had to go through the burn CD, rip into MC as MP3 routine that you have to do with other download sites. So is AAC different from RAX and is there another way than the usual routine to get them into MP3 format?
Jeff

[JimH]

AAC is the codec.  It's the way the files are compressed.

After the files are compressed with AAC, Apple and Real apply encryption to protect them from wide distribution.

I believe that the encryption is different for each, but Real has also found out how to write encrypted files in Apple's format so they will play on an iPod.

MC uses Apple's Quicktime to play AAC, so MC can play unprotected AAC and protected AAC, but only Apple's variety.

[Galley]

This is straight from karl_lillevold, a RealNetworks Sr. Codec Engineer:

As you know, the RealNetworks music store sells songs in 192 kbps AAC (as opposed to iTMS at 128 kbps). When transferring your purchased songs to the iPod, the AAC itself is not touched, but the Helix DRM is transmuxed to a DRM that is compatible with the iPod, i.e. fully protected and without trans-coding. If you then transfer the file back to your PC (for instance with Anapod), you get an M4P file, that is a protected MPEG-4 AAC file.

In other words, the conversion from Protected RealAudio 10 AAC (.RAX) to Apple's protected AAC (.M4P) is lossless, but conversion to protected WMA is lossy.  I sold my iHP-120 as it did not support DRM-protected files of any kind (and most likely will not for the foreseeable future).  I ordered a 4G 40GB iPod from the Apple Store and will have it next week.  You can be sure I'm gonna load it up with 49 cent tracks and half-price albums from the RealPlayer Music Store.  

[tlongacre]

Can someone tell me?

Am I right to understand from the above post that if I buy a song from RealNetworks, download it to my iPod and then upload it again, I *will* then be able to play it in MC?

I am interested because there is a song I want and the only place I can find it (in any format) is on Real.

thanks.

[Galley]

No, songs that have been converted to .m4p by RealPlayer will not play in iTunes, since the rights weren't acquired through the iTMS.