Slacker -vs- Pandora -vs- last.fm

[roscoryan]

OK. I'm honestly not as well versed as many of your are on Internet radio. I remember being very interested in Slacker when they were talking about competition with satellite radio in the car front (which never happened, but their new portable player does look pretty kick ass!).

So, educate me, which one of the big three radio services on the Internet...

* Slacker
* Pandora
* last.fm

...do you prefer, and why?

My preference is with the music and the variety each service truly offers, along with ease of use.

:Smiley_wink:

 

[DAB]

I love the configurability of Pandora, but mostly I love the fact that I can stream it on my iPod Touch. I listen to it at a great deal. I've created one of the best new age ambient channels that I've ever listened too and the play-list are so deep. It does take some efforts to create a good personalized channel. Right now I have a R&B Mix, Country Mix, Contemporary Christian Mix. Very deep and really good SQ at 128kb streaming.

 

[Grüpsaar]

Havent used either extensively, But I like Last.FM and Pandora the most for some reason. I like how Pandora is set up,I guess, and Slacker for some reason just hasnt made me come back more then a few times for some reason. I did use it a lot for a little bit, but still went back to Pandora.

If I had a iphone or something, I'm sure I'd use Pandora on it.

 

[MikeV]

I've only used Slacker and Pandora, but of the two, Slacker gets my vote for two reasons:

1. Professionally programmed stations - Pandora offers nothing like this that I could find, requiring me to create all my own channels. While this does offer a small amount of artist discovery in how the service finds similar songs to the artists/songs you select, I still prefer the knowledge of someone who lives and breathes a genre of music bringing me new artists and songs I've not heard before, as well as those songs I've heard before but completely forgotten about.

2. The ability to take your radio with you, anywhere, without relying on some form of wireless internet. Pandora's great, if you have WiFi or 3G service wherever you are. But some of today's wireless companies still don't have everywhere coverage with their 3G service, requiring either putting up with lower bitrate audio or frequent buffering/skips. Slacker gets around this by caching several hours of each station you choose to save to its portable device. Hours upon hours of audio entertainment that doesn't require a wireless connection.

 

[MM]

I voted for Pandora because that's the only one that I have tried so far. I like that I can have a Modest Mouse channel and it fits similar bands with them.

I like the idea of Pandora as well.

I guess I'll have to find time for the others.

 

[secrecyguy]

Good topic you started. I may take a look into those.

 

[hank-the-dwarf]

for me it's pandora-played around with slacker alittle,but pandora just fits me better-i like to research when i hear new music-every once in a while it will play a song that doesnt belong on the station im on and i just thumbs down or move it to a different station-i love being able to do that!

 

[KTMCDO]

i used both pandora and slacker
i prefer slacker due to the following
1 the desktop player doesnt take up a lot of computer
resources
2 the overall SQ
3 playlists are pretty deep

 

[Music_Rube]

I voted for Slacker, as I haven't really tried the others yet.

I really like the Slacker G2 portable player. It has replaced my XM Inno everywhere except my car (because a car dock doesn't exist for Slacker yet). I also like the fact that Slacker caches its music on the player as opposed to streaming it. No chance of buffering happening, which is always a plus in my opinion.

 

[IdRatherBeSkiing]

I voted for other since I have not ever listened to internet radio (asside from Sirius or XM).

 

[mynameisjamie]

I like them all and since I don't often have time to listen to any it's difficult to say.
I like Last.fm for it's scrobbing abilities. This mean you connect your computers media player and every song you play, it notes it on your last.fm account. Next time you log onto your last.fm account you have a station created off of music that goes with the music you already have.
Last.fm is also much more socially driven than Pandora or Slacker. You can make friends and listen to their stations. Or you can listen to your neighbors stations. These are people whose musical tastes are similar to yours, but different.
Pandora and Slacker are both great in the clutch. If I had the spare $$$ I would certainly buy the Slacker player

 

[gilpdawg]

I voted for Slacker, as I haven't really tried the others yet.

I really like the Slacker G2 portable player. It has replaced my XM Inno everywhere except my car (because a car dock doesn't exist for Slacker yet). I also like the fact that Slacker caches its music on the player as opposed to streaming it. No chance of buffering happening, which is always a plus in my opinion.

Can't you just plug the Slacker player into an aux plug, just like you would an iPod or other similar device? I don't have one, but I'm assuming you could. If I'm wrong, then damn it.:Smiley_wink:

 

[DAB]

Can't you just plug the Slacker player into an aux plug, just like you would an iPod or other similar device? I don't have one, but I'm assuming you could. If I'm wrong, then damn it.:Smiley_wink:

Yeah there is no reason why you can't do that. I'd be curious how the volume output is doing this. I know there are some players out there that don't work very well doing this as the output volume isn't very good.

 

[roscoryan]

Yeah there is no reason why you can't do that. I'd be curious how the volume output is doing this. I know there are some players out there that don't work very well doing this as the output volume isn't very good.

I can tell you first hand the output (and overall SQ) is awesome!!!

 

[MNXMFan]

I can tell you first hand the output (and overall SQ) is awesome!!!

I can second that. Halfway is about all I can take. Pretty impressive for such a little device.

Artifacting is minor, if any at all. On a few songs I can barely notice it, but it is definitely night and day from XM. It is full, alive, and vibrant again, not dull, muddy, and swishy.

 

[gilpdawg]

I think I like Pandora better, after having played with both for a little bit. Slacker's Metal offerings are lacking. AOL's (believe it or not) are better. I do love the G2 device though. If they beefed up their metal area I'd grab one.

 

[MNXMFan]

I think I like Pandora better, after having played with both for a little bit. Slacker's Metal offerings are lacking. AOL's (believe it or not) are better. I do love the G2 device though. If they beefed up their metal area I'd grab one.

You can make your own channel, you know. Just pick as many of your favorites as you can think of, and I bet the mix will be pretty damn good.

I know I plan to try making my own dance channel. The dance channels are good, but I'm picky.

 

[DAB]

You can make your own channel, you know. Just pick as many of your favorites as you can think of, and I bet the mix will be pretty damn good.

I know I plan to try making my own dance channel. The dance channels are good, but I'm picky.

I've tried that with New Age and Christian Contemporary, for the life of me I can't seem to get these channels fined tuned to play what I want. Whereas Pandora, if you add those few artist add a couple of add on songs and then thumb down a few that are outside what you want. It just seems to know what you want.

Maybe with some additional works I'll eventually get it fined tuned (slacker that is).

 

[gilpdawg]

You can make your own channel, you know. Just pick as many of your favorites as you can think of, and I bet the mix will be pretty damn good.

I know I plan to try making my own dance channel. The dance channels are good, but I'm picky.

Sure, but that's Pandora's strength. Slacker should concentrate more on "total genre" streams because I don't think they can "out-pandora" Pandora.

If that makes any sense at all.:Smiley_wink:

 

[DAB]

Sure, but that's Pandora's strength. Slacker should concentrate more on "total genre" streams because I don't think they can "out-pandora" Pandora.

If that makes any sense at all.:Smiley_wink:

Yeah that is my thought exactly. But as many have said the professional programmed channels on Slacker are very, very good.