How Will Music Unlimited on the NGP Work?

Sony announced earlier this month that its Qriocity media service will bring Music Unlimited packages to the NGP, as well as the PSP and Xperia Play. But what exactly is the service?

Not an iTunes Clone

Much like popular music hubs iTunes, eMusic and Amazon, Qriocity houses millions of digital songs for you to peruse, even holding some exclusive rights to certain artists and tracks thanks to Sony Music Entertainment. Unlike these other popular music services however, you do not pay per purchase, instead coughing up a monthly fee for unlimited access to a large library of music. This makes the service more akin to Rhapsody, allowing you to stream music to your PlayStation devices and even browse several music “channels” based on different genres, time periods and performers.

Adding Music You Already Own

To sweeten the deal, you can also add any music you already own into the service by using the “Music Sync” feature. This lets you instantly access your entire home library of music from any of the supported devices.

Costs

The cost of the basic package is also well below Rhapsody’s entry point. Unlike their basic $9.99 package, you can sign up for Music Unlimited’s basic package–which includes everything laid out above–for the monthly price of $3.99.

A premium package is also available for $9.99 a month and will include additional Premium Channels, a more robust search tool, access to even more music and the ability to create playlists.

But Pandora is Free!

Of course, thanks to the NGP Internet browser, you will likely be able to access free music streaming services like Pandora. Pandora is widely popular, but does lose out to Music Unlimited in that you cannot search for a specific song and hear it right away — Pandora now creates a channel based on that song, perhaps playing later in the playlist. Of course there will be some songs not found in Sony service as well.

In an effort to sway you away from Pandora and into the Music Unlimited service, Sony includes a “Sense Me” feature that attempts to learn your preferences much like Pandora does.

Feeling Old School?

If you’re looking for a more analogue approach to your music, you can always order vinyl records from Sony’s MyPlay media store, as well as CDs. If you are savvy enough, you can even get those to play on your NGP by transferring them to your computer and uploading them via Music Sync.