Until recently, the music industry seemed to regard the internet with a combination of fear and loathing.

But with the advent of software that stops people sharing files online, record companies are finally beginning to give internet users what they want: a convenient way to download music and burn it to CDs and portable players, while giving artists the rewards they deserve.

The root of this new-found confidence is digital rights management (DRM) software, which is attached to the file like a padlock and can only be opened with the right key.

That key comes in the form of a software certificate that is sent to and stored on your hard disk or portable music player when a song is bought. Every time you play the file, your media player will be told to find the certificate before bursting into song.

With DRM under their belts, the record companies have opened their dusty copyright libraries to online music services.

The recent relaunch of Napster - the original, but illegal, file-sharing network - as a legitimate paid-for service has brought the sites into the limelight, and forced some of the others to cut their prices or offer special deals to entice customers to their services.

Now that there is choice for consumers, we have cupped an ear to a selection of sites to see what you get for your money and what limitations DRM places on you.

You'll find that some of your favourite artists are missing from the online stores. This is because of the complex legal framework of the music industry where different people may own the copyright to the lyric, tune, production and publication of a single song.

When the store can't get all the rights holders to agree, the music can't be sold. You won't find any Beatles or solo Elton John tracks at these sites, for example, but despite this there are enough familiar artists at each site to keep most music fans happy.

You will need a sound card and a reasonably fast PC to download music from these sites, and a CD or DVD burner or portable music player to allow you to make use of music you download.

On average, songs download at a rate of about 1Mb per minute so a broadband connection will make life easier. You'll need version 9 of Windows Media Player to access WMA files that are protected with DRM or WinAmp 5.

Napster
www.napster.co.uk
This is the latest incarnation of the file-sharing service that kick-started the music downloading phenomenon back in 1999. It's now back as a fully legal downloading service, charging £9.95 for a monthly subscription.

This gives you access to over 700,000 tracks, which you can download to up to three computers and listen to for the duration of your subscription to the site. Your subscription doesn't allow you to burn music to a CD or copy it to a portable player, however. There is an extra charge of 99p per track for that.

It's the only major service to provide free software to play songs, and the process of choosing, downloading and playing your music is done with the Napster software rather than on the website.

The software has some neat functions. You can select tracks from your collection and tell it to make a 'radio station' for you. It will come back with a list of recommendations which, when we tried it, included a good mix of old favourites and interesting new choices. You can also listen to other people's playlists or see what others are downloading.

Searching for music within Napster is also quite intuitive. If there are no exact matches for your search, it will return similarly named acts for you to choose from. The player also gives you access to the cleverly designed online music magazine, Fuzz.

If you don't want to subscribe, you can still use the Napster Light player to organise and play your music. You will still be able to access Napster's library of tracks, but you won't be able to hear more than 30 seconds of a track without buying it, and tracks will cost slightly more than for subscribers.

Do be aware, though, that if your subscription lapses you will lose access to all tracks you have downloaded from Napster unless you have paid to keep a permanent copy on CD or a portable player. We would advise you to transfer bought tracks quickly, just in case your subscription lapses.

MyCokeMusic
www.mycokemusic.com
MyCokeMusic, in common with Tiscali, MSN and Wanadoo, has a library of 350,000 tracks to choose from.

This is because the four sites all buy their music from the same company, OD2. We were disappointed that the four sites had done relatively little to make themselves stand out from each other.

Unlike Napster, there is no subscription service so you will have to buy credits before you can download anything. The more credits you buy at once, the less they cost - from 99p for 99 credits up to £40 for 5,000. You can spend the credits in your own time, so there's no need to use them all at once. Children or those without credit cards can pay by text message, at £1.50 for 99 credits.

Each track on MyCokeMusic costs 99 credits to download permanently, or you can stream any track for one credit. Most albums can be bought for 799 credits, although others cost 99 credits per track where there are multiple copyright holders.

You can browse through charts in genres, leaf through the alphabetical listing of artists or search for an artist or title using the search boxes. If you want to check out the music first, you can listen to a free 30-second sample at a low quality by clicking the icon to the left of the song in the listing.

The free samples are available to all, and you don't have to log in or have an account to hear them. The same player is used if you choose to stream tracks but be aware that streamed tracks play at the same low quality as the 30-second samples.

MSN Music Club
www.msn.co.uk/musicclub
Microsoft's site lets you buy cash credits in packages from £2 (for £2 of credit) to £40 (which gives you £50 credit), or you can pay £1.50 by text message for 99p of credit. Parents of youngsters with access to phones should make a note of this.

Alternatively, you can subscribe for £10 per month, which gives you £13 credit. Most of the downloads cost 99p, although some are cheaper and, as with MyCokeMusic, albums cost from £7.99.

You can browse through the charts and A-to-Z artist listings or search for a specific track. Entering a search word into the Artist box will bring up an artist's page if there is only one match, or a page listing several possible matching acts. This makes it very easy to find the music you're looking for.

You can also choose to listen to a short free sample or stream the track at low quality for one credit. MSN also has its own music website which has articles and reviews as well as charts.

At the bottom of most of these articles are links which will take you directly to the MSN Music Club download page for that artist. It's a useful touch, although it's not as good as Napster's version.

Tiscali
www.tiscali.co.uk/music/musicclub
Tiscali's packages range from £4.99 for 500 credits to £49.99 for 6,200 credits. Single songs from the 350,000 track catalogue then cost 99 credits to download.