MSN revamps its website

MICROSOFT HAS UPDATED two its major websites with a preview of a revamped version of its MSN home page and the launch of its music download service in the UK.

The Vole is giving its popular landing page a massive overhaul, promising to be slicker and less cluttered as well as offering tighter integration with its Bing search engine.

"Now is the time to clean up the mess on the web, people need less clutter and less hassle to find what matters most to them," said Erik Jorgensen, corporate vice president of Microsoft.

The new site will also offer more localised information, although at first this will be aimed at US users, and will also stick your feeds from popular social networks and sharing sites like Facebook, Twitter, Yelp, Flickr and Pandora into the page.

"Customers told us they want the latest information from their favourite sources, their friends and the breadth of the web and the new MSN home page delivers via a fresh new look and new features," added Jorgensen.

Focusing on the UK, the Vole has also finally launched its MSN Music download service here in Blighty, just a few months after its originally proposed July launch date.

Those visitors with a Windows Live account will be able to log in and purchase DRM free music in either MP3 or WMA formats. Visitors will be able to choose from over a million tracks from all the big players, namely EMI, Warner, Universal and Sony.

Rather than operating on a standard pricing model, the site will instead require customers to buy credits. £8 will get you 10 credits, with each track or album costing a certain number of credits.

Redmond is also trying out a free ad-funded streaming option to help it take on music sites like Spotify, Pandora and Jamendo.

UK music fans can check out the store here, while a preview of the redesigned MSN home page is available here.

Roll outs are expected to start today, becoming widely available to US customers early next year. µ