Best Buy, RealNetworks' Rhapsody, SanDisk Join Forces for the Best Buy Digital Music Store

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Best Buy intros the Best Buy Digital Music Store, a new service that will give customers an easy way to enjoy, manage, and discover music. The new Best Buy’s service is powered by the RealNetworks Rhapsody 4.0 music service, and features both a permanent download store and a subscription download service. As part of this launch, Best Buy also will carry and promote the SanDisk Sansa e200R Rhapsody MP3 players, which have been optimized to work seamlessly with the Best Buy Digital Music Store. The Best Buy Digital Music Store and the Sansa e200R Rhapsody players will both be available at participating Best Buy stores as of Sunday, October 15th.

The Best Buy Digital Music Store will launch with an exclusive track from Diddy, coinciding with his new CD, Press Play, which goes on sale October 17. A year in the making, "Press Play" finds Diddy joined by a who’s who of contemporary artists and producers. Among the guest performers are: Christina Aguilera, Mary J. Blige, Jamie Foxx, Big Boi and Fergie. Diddy was joined on the production side by such studio stars as Kanye West, Pharrell Williams, Will.I.Am from the Black Eyed Peas and others.

The Best Buy Digital Music Store powered by Rhapsody is part of an agreement between Best Buy and RealNetworks relating to digital content services. As part of this agreement the parties will be jointly promoting the Best Buy Digital Music Store in connection with Rhapsody optimized devices. Best Buy intends to include Best Buy Digital Music Store software and service offers in its stores, and on Bestbuy.com. Rhapsody 4.0 gives the Best Buy Digital Music Store a customer friendly music listening experience. Based on the Rhapsody digital music service, Rhapsody 4.0 adds more flexibility and features to help listeners discover new music, and was specifically designed for tight integration with the Sansa e200R Rhapsody player.

The Best Buy Digital Music Store offers millions of songs that can be accessed in two different ways:
* Customers can purchase songs, whether or not they subscribe to the service, for $.99 per song.
* Customers can subscribe to the service for $14.99 per month for unlimited music listening. The music can be played on a computer or loaded onto the Sansa e200R Rhapsody, or any compatible MP3 player, and can be listened to without limits as long as the subscription is active.

Based on SanDisk’s e200 MP3 player, the Sansa e200R Rhapsody line is designed to work seamlessly with the Best Buy Digital Music Store.

The Sansa e200R Rhapsody comes with a free, two-month subscription to the Best Buy Digital Music Store, allowing consumers unlimited access to millions of songs; continuous new music with Rhapsody Channels (with the ability to save and skip songs); personalized music based on a subscriber’s favorite artists and listening history, and hundreds of preloaded songs including major artists via Rhapsody Channels and Playlists. After the free, two month subscription, the customer purchases a subscription in order to keep it active according to its terms.

The Sansa e200R Rhapsody is available in capacities ranging from 2 to 8GB, and comes with all the world class features of a standard e200, including audio, video and photos; digital FM tuner; integrated voice recorder with built-in microphone; strong, scratch-resistant alloy casing; a microSD expansion slot for additional memory capacity; a sleek, thin design with large 1.8" TFT color screen, and a customer replaceable, rechargeable Lithium Ion battery with up to 20 hours battery life (based on continuous playback at 128 kbps MP3).

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