HP joins hands with Universal music and Hungama.com to launch Connected Music service

Hewlett-Packard (HP) India has joined hands with Universal Music and Hungama.com to launch HP Connected Music. The service is available from Feb 1, 2013.

The service on selected HP notebooks that run Windows 8 will allow users to stream and download unlimited music and video content free for the first year. HP has not disclosed the subscription fee. The service is also being launched in 21 other countries also, but for other countries only three months of free unlimited usage is being offered.

HP's Connected Music service will have a catalogue of over one million songs across genres and languages including Bollywood, devotional, rock, classic, hip-hop, jazz  regional and others. This service will allow consumers to access unique content such as previews, behind the scenes and celeb events to connect with their favourite artistes, including A. R. Rehman, Sonu Nigam, Priyanka Chopra, Anoushka Shankar, Euphoria and celebrities like Justin Bieber, Lady GaGa, Aerosmith and Akon.

From that one million-song database, the users have the options to create a playlist or download the songs. Before downloading any song, the user can hear a 30-second preview of the song and download it in 'wma' format. There is no limit to download the songs, but all the downloaded songs are DRM (Digital Rights Management) protected which means that all the downloaded songs will be locked to your notebook's hardware ID and will only be playable on your notebook.

"We are offering this service to the HP customers as an added entertainment value and every music lover will receive the latest music as soon as it hits the market. We want to give them a complete music package enhanced through HP Device features like Beats Audio," said Vinay Awasthi, senior director, product category, PPS, HP India.

It will also include a section called 'Money can't buy experience' which will be regularly updated with unseen video footage from Indian and international artists. HP has launched 16 Windows 8 devices in India till now. This unique service will be available in 11 of its Windows 8 notebooks including HP1000, HP2000, Pavilion Sleekbook 14, Pavilion Sleekbook 15, Pavilion g6, Pavilion g4, ENVY X2, ENVY 4, ENVY 6, ENVY dv6 and ENVY m6.

In January, 2012, 9XM, a Bollywood music channel in India, had launched an online Bollywood music store called '9XM.Hungama.com' in partnership with Hungama.com.

(Edited by Prem Udayabhanu)