Slacker G2

usability, portability, price, sound, design

reliability, battery, memory

71% of the reviews on Amazon.com give this product a positive rating.

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All-free music via Slacker online service Great for music discovery, band info, fresh tunes

Controls are a bit testy Poor audio quality at low levels

If you already use Slacker's online service to build your stations and discover new acts, you'll find that the G2 is a vast improvement over the last piece of Slacker hardware. I would recommend this device to certain people I know, but not to...

Updating via WiFi connection eats lots of battery life. The rubber stoppers that plug USB and (unused) docking port get lost easily. WiFi connection requires AC adapter if battery power is below 50 percent. Doesn’t leave room for much music loaded from...

Smaller, slicker, and less buggy than the original Slacker Portable player. Refreshes music automatically via Wi-Fi. Easy to create custom stations online. Player displays album art and artist bios. Also stores and plays your own AAC, MP3, and WMA files.

Software hits some snags. Wireless connections can be spotty. No photo or video support.

By "flair" I mean the extraordinary amount of artist and song information that the Slacker G2 can display. Where iPods simply show song titles and album names, carrying the G2 is like having a copy of Blender magazine in your pocket. Click on an album...

Fabulous audio quality, great recommendations, free music

You can't choose which songs you'll hear unless you pay for the Premium service

As for the Slacker G2—we dig it!

Smaller size, Better audio quality, Longer battery life, Artist and album info, Smaller size, Better audio quality, Longer battery life, Artist and album info

Long boot times, Have to pay for a service if you want unlimited song skips and no ads, Long boot times, Have to pay for a service if you want unlimited song skips and no ads

Now, before you read any further, there’s an important thing about the G2 that Mac users need to know: Slacker doesn’t yet have Mac software for the G2. (Slacker also says it’s working on an iPhone application.) You can use Safari or another Web...

Like Richard Linklater’s Gen X movie of a similar name, the Slacker G2 Personal Radio Player will appeal to the slacker in you. It’s a lazy man’s MP3 player, propelled by Slacker’s own limitless music service, which offers hundreds of songs, album art...