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Wifi Ipod Competitors The Future Of Portable Music

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by Kevin Maney
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Apr 19 2007 12:00am EDT

WiFi iPod Competitors: The Future of Portable Music

A couple of years ago, I first met the folks developing the MusicGremlin -- the first WiFi-enabled portable music player. And they posed an obvious but, at the time, often-ignored question: Why the hell would you want a PC acting as a middleman between you and your portable player? The process of downloading music first into iTunes or another jukebox, and then uploading to an iPod or other player is like flying from Des Moines to St. Louis by going through O'Hare.

Tech companies are increasingly trying to get the PC out of the picture. They're making WiFi-enabled music players and systems that let the players download music directly. Microsoft is getting there with Zune. Sirius and Slacker are trying a version. And now, there's SanDisk, with its new Sansa Connect. My friend and former colleague Ed Baig reviews the Sansa today.

Clearly, this is the future of portable players. How long before Apple builds it into iPods? sansa%20portfolio

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