Microsoft Corp. today announced that the first Windows Mobile (TM) -based Portable Media Centers from Creative Labs Inc. will be available to the public tomorrow at Best Buy and Creative.com and inthe coming weeks from Amazon.com Inc., CompUSA Inc., Fry’s Electronics, Good Guys Inc. and other electronics retailers nationwide. Portable Media Centers from Samsung Electronics and iRiverInternational will be available later this fall. Microsoft also solidified content sources for Portable Media Centers, with the first online offerings from MLB Advanced Media (MLB.com) and CinemaNowInc., as well as support from four digital TV tuner card manufacturers and software company SnapStream Media Inc. These announcements give people an increasing range of choices for video content theycan watch any time, any place.
Portable Media Centers are a new category of multimedia players that allow people to enjoy all the digital entertainment they store on their PC — recorded TV, music, movies and pictures — on one device. Portable Media Centers are one of three new digital entertainment products being introduced by Microsoft tomorrow, Sept. 2, including Windows Media® Player 10 and the MSN® Music Service. Windows Media Player 10 lets consumers easily discover, play and transport digital media around the home, on the PC or onto portable devices. MSN will launch a preview release of its MSN Music service in the United States tomorrow, offering music fans access to more than 1 million tracks licensed from all five major labels and more than 3,000 independent labels. Tracks from MSN Music will be available for playback on Portable Media Centers in Windows Media Audio format.
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