James Delahunty
6 Jan 2006 6:12
In a move following the company's 2005 decision to cease producing iPods, Hewlett-Packard has now stopped distributing Apple's iTunes software with its PCs. Instead the company will now distribute Real Network's Rhapsody software. HP had been distributing iTunes with new PCs since 2004. The deal had been announced at the Consumer Electronics Show in Los Vegas. Now that HP is distributing Rhapsody instead of iTunes, customers will also receive a 30 free trial to Real's music subscription service.
iPods sold by HP accounted for about 5% of all iPod sales. The popularity of the iPod has lead to massive profits for Apple, but not a lot was gained for HP. The original deal with Apple was secured by the former HP chief executive, Carly Fiorina, who was ousted from the company in February 2005. It wasn't until July that HP ended the iPod deal with Apple under new chief Mark Hurd.
Source:
The Inquirer
Interested in iPods? Visit our iPod discussion forum.