One of the many features of Rhapsody is that you can put tracks from the Rhapsody Music Library onto MP3 players and Verizon phones. How much this costs and how you do it depends on what kind of MP3 player you have and which subscription level of Rhapsody you have. Let's start with the Rhapsody side of the equation.

Rhapsody comes in three basic subscription packages:

- Free - you can listen to 25 free song streams per month without paying a penny. It is not required to even sign-up for an account. You can listen through a browser like Firefox or Internet Explorer or through the Rhapsody Music Jukebox (which is also free). You can use Rhapsody Free as your music store and buy unrestricted MP3s for $.99 that work on any MP3 playing device like iPods, Sansa's, etc. However, with the free version you don't get unlimited listening or transfer capabilities to portable devices.

- Rhapsody Unlimited - this is the most popular subscription level and gives you unlimited listening (streaming) to the 6,000,000 plus music library that Rhapsody legally manages and offers. You can play music through the browsers, TiVO, Homestereo systems, etc. This costs $12.99 per month but you can get a free 14 day trial by clicking here.

- Rhapsody To Go - The gold standard of Rhapsody Subscriptions which gives you everything the other subscription levels do PLUS the right to transfer Rhapsody Subscription tracks to your compatible MP3 player without paying per song! This is the service level that I have and I love it. I can load up my Sansa MP3 player and have just about anything on it that Rhapsody has in the library and can plug it into my headphones, car or someone else's stereo. Click here to get a free 14 day trial of Rhapsody To Go.

Portable Music Players & MP3 Devices

OK, now that we're clear on which versions of Rhapsody are available, let's talk about portable devices. Due to businesses desire to be unique, different, better, faster, stronger - we have a wide variety of both devices and ways to get music onto them. Here's a short summary:

• Rhapsody Enabled Devices - Rhapsody created a platform for device manufacturers called Rhapsody DNA. This is like a music operating system that various devices can use to get the Rhapsody library into various devices including Sonos, MP3s, Verizon Phones, etc. These devices work THE BEST with Rhapsody To Go. Click here to see a full list of Rhapsody Enabled Devices.
• iPods and iTunes - The biggest portable music player and the biggest music store available. These two were built to work together and they work together very well. These are great solutions if you want to pay for each and every song to own them. The iPod + iTunes transfers songs back and forth in a proprietary file format called ACC. This is one of the big misconption with iTunes in that you DO NOT buy songs from iTunes in an unrestricted MP3 format.
• Play for Sure Devices - Play for Sure was a standard that Microsoft Developed to allow music services like Rhapsody and Urge to play across a wide variety of devices. The problem is that Play For Sure was a lowest common denominator technology that did not allow each of the device manufacturers to really build something cool and third - it didn't work very well. Much lik early versions of DirectX, there were (and are) a lot of compatibility issues between Rhapsody and Play for Sure Devices. Don't go there.
• MP3 Players - Devices that are not Rhapsody Enabled, but are MP3 players (including iPods) can play unrestricted, DRM free MP3 files. You can buy these from Rhapsody for $.99 each and transfer them to these devices to play. Click here to see a good list of MP3 devices.
• Cell Phones - The new generation of cell phones are combining music playing with schedule management with texting with, yes, phone calls. The iPhone works very well with the iTunes pay per song model while Rhapsody works with the new generation of Verizon phones that support VCast for Music.

My recommendation is to get a Rhapsody Enabled device (I'm still using the Sansa e200R which was the first one and it's really good. The new Sansa's and the Haier's are also really good.