Real Rhapsody Music Download Service

About the Real Rhapsody Music Download Service

Real Rhapsody is a membership based MP3 downloading service. Members have access to a library of over a million songs spanning several genres, in addition to frequent Rhapsody exclusive material, like live tracks, streaming live performances, and music videos. While you can access the Real Rhapsody library for free, listening to up to 25 steaming songs per month, to be able to download music, you must sign up for one of the Real Rhapsody membership plans. The two levels of Rhapsody memberships are:

• Rhapsody Unlimited – The plan gives you unfettered access to the entire Rhapsody network and allows you to listen to as many tracks as you want every month. You can also share the songs with your friends. If you choose to purchase any songs, you will receive a 10% discount per track. The price for this plan is $12.99 per month.

• Rhapsody To Go – With this plan, you can access tracks in the same way you would with Rhapsody Unlimited, but you can upload these tracks to your favorite MP3 player. Which players these songs will play in, however, depends on whether or not you actually pay for the track. If you haven’t paid for the track, you need a Sansa Rhapsody MP3 player. If you play for a track, the songs will play in any MP3 player, including an iPod. The Rhapsody To Go plan costs $14.99 per month.

While you don’t have to have to download Rhapsody software to listen to Rhapsody music on your computer, using Rhapsody software makes your music easier to manage.

So, What’s the Catch?

The Real Rhapsody music download service works great for many people; for a low monthly fee, you have millions of songs at your fingertips. The thing is, however, that you are essentially paying rent for your music. With Rhapsody, if you download a track and own a track even after you decide you don’t want to pay for a Rhapsody membership, then you have to purchase that track on top of your membership fees. Even with the Rhapsody To Go plan, you can take Rhapsody tracks with your on your Rhapsody MP3 player, but if those tracks become locked after your Rhapsody membership defaults, as do any other Rhapsody songs you are saving on your computer. If you want to keep a song after your end your membership, listen to a song on a non-Rhapsody MP3 player, or burn a song onto a CD, there will be an additional charge for that song.

Rhapsody certainly has a top notch selection of music from which users can choose, and for the price, it does give you a lot of flexibility with how you use your music. Just keep in mind that you are paying rent for all of those songs, not actually downloading them to keep. A better way to think of Rhapsody is like a subscription based radio station on which you are the DJ. You have access to the station’s catalog while you’re there, but once you leave the building, the music stays behind.

Your Rhapsody Experiences

Do you use the Rhapsody music download service? Would you recommend it to a friend, or was your membership short lived? Tell us your thoughts on Rhapsody by leaving us a comment at the bottom of the page.