Slacker Portable Music Player Offers Portable Customized Music Streaming

The Slackerportable music player became available for pre-order today, giving people a portable version of the company's free online music streaming service, which like Pandora, lets you create customizable stations around the artists they like. They also announced the premium version of the Slacker service, which lets users skip more songs, replay songs, and avoid the 1-2 ads the company plans to include in each hour of programming.

You can create as many stations as you want on Slacker.com, and those channels will automatically sync to the player, which is available in 2GB (15 channels, $200), 4GB (25 channels, $250), or 8GB (40 channels, $300) capacities. The player will grab those stations over Wi-Fi or USB, so you don't have to worry about loading new content onto your player before leaving the house.

As with the online service, you'll be able to click a Heart button to add a track to your favorites. If you subscribe to the premium version of the service, those tracks will become part of your collection. If Slacker notices that you listen to a particular channel a lot on the portable device, that channel will automatically become "deeper," by containing more tracks. But you don't have to subscribe; apparently, the player will work equally well with the free version of the service, which includes an ad or two every hour, restricts song skipping to 5 per hour, and doesn't let you rewind. In addition to subscribing to these stations, which automatically refresh over Wi-Fi or USB, you can also add tracks to the device manually.

Slacker makes adjustments to your listening habits when you skip or"heart" songs on either the device or the web-based player, and all ofthat information gets integrated into your account no matter whereyou're listening. To get you started, Broadband Instruments cancustomize your player before it ships to you, so that whatever channelsyou've set up for free or as part of a premium subscription onSlacker.com are added to the device before you get it. "If you wantedto, you could never go back to a PC again; you could use Wi-Fi forever"
to manage the content on the device, according to BroadbandInstrument's Jonathan Sasse.

At some point next year, Slacker will offer a car kit for around $200
that will allow the device to pull down new music from Ku-bandsatellites, which are normally used for television. The device works with Mac and Windows.

Here's the press release:

Slacker Announces Availability of Portable Personal Radio Players

Slacker Portable Players Give Music Lovers Freedom to Enjoy Personal
Radio Anytime, Anywhere

SAN DIEGO, Calif. Slacker, Inc., today announced the availability of
the world's first truly portable personalized radio players. Slacker
Portable Players in 15, 25 and 40 station capacities extend the
personal radio experience of the free Slacker Basic Radio and recently
announced Slacker Premium Radio services.

Whether choosing the free or premium radio services, the players
provide customers access to the extensive Slacker music library and
associated artist profiles, album reviews and large cover art on the
4" vivid color display. Simply refresh your personalized Slacker
stations via Wi-Fi or USB to ensure you always have the newest hits
and classic favorites at your fingertips.

"With the Slacker Portable Radio Player, for the first time, people
can play their personalized radio stations wherever they go, " said
Dennis Mudd, CEO of Slacker. "We've created a groundbreaking portable
music device that lets people play their favorite music without
working at it, whenever they want to listen."

Revolutionary DJ technology built into the device, and a new class of
radio licenses, allow the Slacker Portable to play highly personalized
radio stations even when not connected to Wi-Fi or any network.

Slacker has previously announced new licensing deals with all of the
major record labels and thousands of independent record labels, which
provide the Slacker Portable direct access to an extensive music
catalog. The portable players can automatically create perfect radio
stations without the requirement of having to manage content or even a
direct connection to a Mac or PC.

About Slacker Portable
Designed to work with Slacker Basic Radio and Premium Radio services
Personal radio stations play anytime: online or offline
Automatically refreshes personalized stations via Wi-Fi or USB
Heart and Ban buttons enable personalization on the go
4" color screen displays artist profiles, album reviews and large cover art
Available in 15, 20 and 40 station capacities
Plays your existing music collection (MP3, WMA & AAC)
Up to 10 hours of battery life
Removable, rechargeable battery

The Slacker Portable comes with earphones, USB 2.0 cable and carrying case.

Slacker listeners that order the Slacker Portable will have the free
option to have the player pre-loaded with their favorite stations and
linked with their Slacker account (Basic or Premium) so it is ready to
play right out of the box with personalized radio content.

Slacker Portable Availability
The Slacker Portable Player is available for pre-order in the U.S. now
at www.slacker.com at a MSRP of $199.99 (15 stations, 2GB), $249.99
(25 stations, 4GB) and $299.99 (40 stations, 8GB) and is scheduled to
ship on (or before) December 13th, 2007. Pre-loading of personalized
stations is available on all purchases from www.slacker.com.