Microsoft today launched its counterattack on Apple's iTunes, with its music download service MSN Music in the United States.

Aimed at luring more users to the world’s largest software maker’s online service, launched initially in a test mode, MSN Music offers songs for download at 99 cents each, the same price as Apple’s online store.

Users can access MSN Music from a browser as well as a brand new version of the Windows Media Player that also was unveiled.

"We believe we’ve built a better service than the Apple service," Yusuf Mehdi, MSN vice president, told Reuters.

Mehdi said that MSN Music would launch with more than 100,000 songs and grow quickly to more than one million. The songs will be encoded in the Windows Media format at a higher bit rate than Apple’s standard format for iTunes, resulting in better sound quality, Mehdi claimed.

Microsoft had been working to be the first to offer Beatles songs for download for the debut of MSN Music. While they are not being offered on the service yet, "we feel very comfortable that they’re going to be offered online soon", Mehdi said.

MSN Music is mainly designed to draw more users to the MSN portal, which in turn will help drive advertising revenue, a major source of profit for MSN.

Microsoft, for its part, touted its simplified MSN Music interface, with white backgrounds and minimal design elements, which allows users to sign up for an account with fewer clicks than iTunes.

Microsoft also said that MSN Music would also be integrated with the upcoming launch of its revamped search engine so that music downloads would be included in search results for music-related queries.

Microsoft is targeting Google's pole position as the web’s most popular search engine and is planning to launch its own MSN Search service this fall based on its own technology.

One of the key differences between MSN Music and Apple’s iTunes is that users won’t be limited to single store and single device type, but rather be able to choose from a variety of devices and online music services.

MSN Music is one of a few other stores that users can access via the Windows Media Player. Napster also offers music downloads and CinemaNow offers movies online.

Hardware makers such as Rio, Creative and Dell are also making portable digital music players that work with Windows and store downloaded music.

Although Microsoft gave few specifics, it is also planning to integrate its music services with it instant messaging service, so that people swapping text messages can listen to songs together and eventually access other playlists during instant messaging sessions.

Microsoft also said that portable media center devices for storing and playing audio as well as video content, would be available in Europe from mid-September.

Times Recommends

• Minister in talks with Saudis to protect creditors
• Premier Inn hits back in £29-a-room row
• Bankers hit back at 'populist' bonus supertax