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Portable devices from the likes of Samsung, SanDisk and Sony are now labelled "Certified for Windows Vista", and the PlaysForSure website now redirects visitors to the Windows Media pages at microsoft.com.

The company issued no statement, and has yet to reply to a request for comment, so the reasons for the change are not clear. But with Vista a long way from overtaking XP as the dominant version of Windows, the change has raised more questions than it has answers.

Jupiter Research analyst Michael Gartenberg says it's "downright confusing".

"Who at Microsoft looked at this and thought this was a good idea and was something that would help partners sell more devices?," he asks.

"So Plays for Sure is now Vista Certified. Except, isn't Zune also Vista Certified? But Zune content won't play on any other device? And what about XP owners? Do their devices stop working? How on earth do I as a consumer with an older device understand how this new branding maps to what I own?"

Cosmetic change

In fact, underneath the new branding nothing appears to have changed. Devices that were previously badged with the PlaysForSure logo will continue to play Windows Media DRM files, at least for the time being.

But the change has reignited concerns that Microsoft will allow what was PlaysForSure to whither away. Those concerns first surfaced at the start of the year, with reports that

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the company would concentrate on its Zune platform, which uses an entirely separate DRM. Zune players cannot play content from stores such as Napster that signed up to PlaysForSure; conversely PlaysForSure/certified-for-Vista devices are locked out of the Zune store.

Microsoft said at the time that while Zune remains confined to the US, PlaysForSure was likely to survive.

In fact it may not be Microsoft that kills it off. Should the record companies all decide to ditch DRM, then the incompatibility of competing copy-restriction technologies is no longer an issue as far as downloads are concerned. The same cannot be said of subscription services where the ongoing availability of music is tied to the paying of monthly fees, as Virgin customers discovered.

Some music subscription services that will continue to require DRM have already sought alternatives. Napster, for example uses the Open Mobile Alliance's open-source DRM for its mobile service.

For the moment, it does not expect Microsoft's rebranding to affect its business in any way. "Since our launch, we have offered consumers very detailed lists of more than 100 compatible devices for our monthly flat-rate service," says Rob Gottlieb, marketing manager at Napster. "Therefore, consumers are used to checking our lists, instead of looking for the 'Plays For Sure' logo."

Update: In an email statement, a Microsoft spokesperson confirmed that no major changes have been made to the structure of the PlaysForSure programme and that device manufacturers have known about the change since October.

"The rebranding is a name-change only,"the spokesperson said. "No major changes have been made to the structure of the PlaysForSure program and Microsoft continues to work closely with its partners to provide a comprehensive platform for testing and certifying hardware. The rebranding of the PlaysForSure logo to Certified for Windows Vista had previously been communicated to our hardware partners."

The spokesperson also assured device users that "Any digital media device with the Certified for Windows Vista logo will work great on a PC running Windows XP and Windows Media Player 11."