Well, for ya'll who picked up a NetMD device from Sony and hate that crappy software OpenMG that Sony includes with it to transfer music there is another "solution". Well, first, if you have CDs and want to transfer those, I highly recommend the included Simple Burner which works great for that. But if you have gigabytes of MP3s and don't want to do that back assed "check in" and "check out" stuff with OpenMG, there is currently a second way to transfer music over to your NetMD devices, but it may not be one that you'll like. Read more to find out. Real has just released a plug-in for their Real One player (you can get it free at real.com). This NetMD plug-in allows you to use the Real One (even the free player) to transfer music to your NetMD device without the whole check-in/check-out shtuff. But, that means that you'll have to install that bloated piece of software Real One on your system (and risk having Real monitor your Internet surfing, something that can be curbed). So, it's really a not a choice between two evils, rather between a buggy piece of software that treats consumers like criminals (OpenMG) or a piece of software that is big and spies on you (Real One).
For now I'll use Real One, maybe there's going to be more software that supports NetMD, we can only hope. If you use Real One I'd suggest installing ZoneLab's free firewall Zone Alarm on your system and then using it to block Real One from accessing the Internet :) This will block out all their ads and also block their snooping! Ha! :)