Slacker Portable available tomorrow

We'd heard at CES that Slacker Portable wireless PMP was due to be released tomorrow, and now Laptop's gone and confirmed it for us. Slacker's marketing VP says that 2008 is about expanding the Slacker service, with additional products, including some from Logitech, and even Slacker apps for mobile devices. Still, they've got to get those initial $199 4GB and $299 8GB units out the door -- tomorrow is the first day of the rest of your life, Slacker.

[Michael @ Jan 30th 2008 9:10PM]

Yeah...tomorrow's not CES.. =)

[LiQuiD_FuSioN @ Jan 30th 2008 10:06PM]

Not if you're illiterate.

[w00t @ Jan 30th 2008 11:20PM]

They heard at CES that the device was going to be released on the 1st Feb.
Which, unless I'm mistaken would be tomorrow!

So, the statement is correct :)

[Dave Skaggs @ Jan 30th 2008 11:23PM]

@w00t

You are mistaken, seeing as there are 31 days in January, so tomorrow (in terms of when it was written) would be January 31st.

[w00t @ Jan 31st 2008 12:19AM]

@Dave, Current UTC time is:

04:32
31 January 2008

So at the time of writing my post was essentially correct. Not everyone is in america so universal time is probably most useful on the internet :)

[Noah @ Jan 30th 2008 9:13PM]

It isn't?! You there, boy in the street, what day is it?

But yeah, the Slacker Portable is looking like a great device, let's just hope it's not crippled or hobbled in some crucial way, like some other recent products that I won't even mention.

[Dave @ Jan 30th 2008 10:10PM]

*cough* HTC + MSM7200 chipset *cough*

[John @ Jan 30th 2008 9:19PM]

CES is tomorrow? Did I fall asleep for a year?

[Justin B @ Jan 30th 2008 9:25PM]

Was this to be posted 3 weeks ago?

[Jack Storm @ Jan 30th 2008 9:28PM]

Longest CES ever?

[Ty @ Jan 30th 2008 9:30PM]

"We'd heard at CES that the Slacker Portable was due to be released tomorrow..."

Can I work for you guys now?

[telepheedian @ Jan 30th 2008 9:39PM]

http://www.engadget.com/2008/01/18/want-to-write-for-engadget/

[paul34 @ Jan 30th 2008 9:32PM]

They're tryna catch me white and nerdy?

[Steffen Jobbs @ Jan 30th 2008 9:35PM]

What's it got those buttons for? Presets or something. It looks like it got a lot of weird controls when all it should need is a four directional arrows and a select button.
What, no touch screen or WiFi. Meh.

[Aegil @ Jan 30th 2008 9:52PM]

It has a touch screen and wifi according to the info on the website.

Sadly, no service in Canada.

[Lee @ Jan 30th 2008 9:50PM]

Need wifi in the area and the cheap version has 15 personalized channels? I think I will stick with my XM and my Inno. Over 200 channels plus mp3 w/ no need for wifi.

[Backlin @ Jan 30th 2008 9:54PM]

Right on dude. Also, by having the Inno, you have the greatest variety of music at your fingertips. Heck, some of it's not even music.

[Aegil @ Jan 30th 2008 9:55PM]

only need wifi to update the stations, player appears to cycle previously streamed songs when you have no connection. Also, the ability (as a premium member) to save a song to the player intrigues me.

[NEOne @ Jan 30th 2008 10:44PM]

The photo that Engadget uses for the Slacker shows the player plugged into a prototype dock. The player itself doesn't have all of those buttons on it and in fact more recent photos of the dock don't either.

The player doesn't need a wifi connection to stream music. The player uses wifi to load a selection of songs for each of the stations.

The best thing about Slacker compared to satellite radio is that you can customize the stations and also create your own stations or share stations with other people.

[atomicthumbs @ Jan 30th 2008 11:03PM]

I say again, the Pandora will be better.

[rickhamilton620 @ Jan 30th 2008 11:24PM]

I want one, but i'll wait to see what others think first.

[Reid @ Jan 30th 2008 11:29PM]

That looks pretty hot.

[AJ in the East Bay @ Jan 30th 2008 11:34PM]

I can't see myself buying something called a Slacker, even though I own a game console called a "Wii" ;)

[wraith808 @ Jan 31st 2008 3:00AM]

People are so pedantic, but from only their own point of view, not even taking into account that they might be the ones missing something. *rolls eyes*

But yeah, that does look hot...

[toyotaboy @ Jan 31st 2008 1:54PM]

Since when is Weird Al alternative? Isn't he in the easy listening section with the rest of the comedy albums?

[Trongod @ Jan 31st 2008 9:28PM]

I guess I'm the only one that finds this device as extremely limited. So you can have this thing download songs, that are based on what you like, but not exactly what you want and you can't save them. WTF can you really do with this. Just get some other PMP and make a freaking playlist! That's personalized! It's like last.FM, you search for a band you like, you hear one song from them and then the rest is shit.