Vitals

• Type: Store
• Number of titles: 300,000
• Format: WMA
• Player: Any DRM-WMA-compliant player (most WMA players)
• Website: http://musicdownloads.walmart.com
• Comments: Website-based; good for bargain shopping

We had to include Walmart.com for its retail dominance and cheapest overall download price at 88 cents per track. The website-based five-and-dime music store doesn't make you download a music jukebox. Just search the popular-music-heavy library of 300,000 tracks, download your WMA, and play your music in Windows Media Player or a WMA-compliant jukebox.

Like iTunes and others, Walmart shoppers will be able to transfer their files to compatible portable devices, license music for up to three computers, and will be able to burn a song up to ten times.

In our search for Billboard's Top 25 tracks, we found the same number (21) as in iTunes Music Store. However, outside the Billboard chart, Wal-Mart's offerings of other genre-specific artists fell below the other online shops. We found only 13 songs and zero albums for The Roots, while Musicmatch yielded 80 songs and two albums.

Official word from TechTV Labs

The library has some holes, but if you want cheap WMA downloads, visit Wal-Mart.