What's the difference between Pandora & Slacker?

[o2bnclemson]

Are there any objective, substantive differences, or is it mainly just a matter of preference?

I love my Pandora channels - I've used them to basically replicate some of my old favorite XM channels that Sirius killed. But I'd be willing to try Slacker if there were some good reasons other than just personal preference.

 

[pops.comp]

I think it really comes down to personal choice..I know with my old BB I could cache stations for low reception areas or to conserve battery, but I don't know if the android version does that..I prefer pandora because when I did try slacker, the quality seemed quite a bit lower when I streamed through the bluetooth stereo in my car

 

[acidsamuraix]

i like pandora because its a little more straightforward to me. Less clutter and they also seem to play more lesser known stuff, but that's just my personal experience.

 

[Roy Aguilera]

Pandora has less variety but no commercials.
Slacker has more variety but those lame commercials. If slacker was commercial free, I would use that over Pandora.

 

[johnny99]

Slacker has an unlimited free service. Pandora's free plan only gives you a certain number of hours per month. Slacker does have ads in its free service, but only 5 or 10 seconds every hour.

Here are a couple of comparison between the two. I'm sure you can find others.
http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/index.php/archives/2009/05/28/slacker-vs-pandora/
Pandora vs. Slacker: One "sucks" and the other is like free satellite radio - Orbitcast

Some reviews say that Slacker has problems with sound quality on certain Android phones. I think these problems have mostly been fixed now.

 

[o2bnclemson]

Slacker has an unlimited free service. Pandora's free plan only gives you a certain number of hours per month. Slacker does have ads in its free service, but only 5 or 10 seconds every hour.

Here are a couple of comparison between the two. I'm sure you can find others.
http://lefsetz.com/wordpress/index.php/archives/2009/05/28/slacker-vs-pandora/
Pandora vs. Slacker: One "sucks" and the other is like free satellite radio - Orbitcast

Some reviews say that Slacker has problems with sound quality on certain Android phones. I think these problems have mostly been fixed now.

Thanks for the links. Coming from XM this definitely piques my interest in Slacker. I've not had any complaints about Pandora yet. It has given me some bone-headed "recommendations" for music, but as soon as I give them a thumbs-down it clears it up. The other minor complaint I've had is that it tends to play my female artists all in one big stretch and male in another, but that hasn't been a big deal. I'll give Slacker a try now.

 

[o2bnclemson]

FYI, here's the objective differences as I understand them from using them both so far and from the articles linked above and others:

Pandora is computer generated programming based solely upon the music/artists you suggest and thumbs up/thumbs down. There are infrequent audible ads on the PC and none on the phone, just visual ads, which are non-intrusive and easy to ignore. Since I usually listen through my phone, this is nice.

Slacker is both pre-programmed radio and custom - you can select from existing stations (lots of variety and formats, by the way) and modify them as you wish and/or create your own custom station, similar to Pandora. There are audio ads on the phone or PC version. They're short and not terribly frequent, but a bit disruptive nonetheless. One really nice feature the full version of Slacker has, that I don't think Pandora has, is that it will display the lyrics. This is a very cool perk, but available only on the paid version.

Costs for the full versions of both are comparable - both less than $5/month as I recall.

Regarding sound, playback, interface, etc - I'll leave those alone as they are more subjective.

I can honestly see myself using both and may even dump my XM in favor of them. If HTC puts out a car dock that will work with their devices then I'd be much more likely to so I don't have to put it in my windshield mount and then plug in the power cord and the headset line each time. So far, I'm enjoying my Pandora more, since I took the time to "build" it, but I'll continue to give Slacker a shot for a while. They both definitely have their merits.

 

[Dapke36]

I personally use slacker, and love it. Yes, it has ads, but it has unlimited listening and regenerative skipping. For pandora (at least on the PC), you only get 40 hours a month of listening, and you get 10-12 skips/day, and they don't regenerate.

 

[DeeMat]

I have tried both and always keep Pandora - it plays more of the songs I like and the app has never given me any issues.

 

[Roy Aguilera]

The thing that bugs me about slacker is the audio ads and the ads on the widget. When you start spamming up my home screen, you get the boot.

 

[photog]

I've been using Slacker for over a year, and I love it. I tried Pandora, but it didn't seem to have the variety in the songs I listen to.

Custom stations are incredible.

I do pay a yearly subscription, and it's worth it.

 

[o2bnclemson]

The thing that bugs me about slacker is the audio ads and the ads on the widget. When you start spamming up my home screen, you get the boot.

That's what's really turning me off with Slacker right now. Since I listen through my phone, there are no ads with Pandora (not audible anyway - just little Google Ads that show up on the screen, and that's no big deal). But the Slacker ads seem more frequent than the Pandora PC ads.

I think I'll be sticking with Pandora for my custom stuff, but maybe use Slacker if I'm in the mood for something different that I don't want to take the effort to customize. And I have noticed a difference in the audio between the two and prefer Pandora on that count as well (at least through my headphones and car stereo - both going thru the phone).

 

[o2bnclemson]

Ok, after using Slacker for several days - I officially declare it the winner.

Once I found out how deep you can go, using the web page, in terms of customizing your own station or even one of theirs, that alone far surpasses what I can do with Pandora. Throw in the ability to cache a station for playback without having to stream as well as a deeper song/artist library, and it's no contest.

The differences are far more distinct that I had anticipated, but Slacker is my favorite, so much so that I'll probably be paying the $3.99/mo and then dumping my XM/Sirius which has almost totally sucked since Sirius programming took over.

I am now officially what all my friends and family have been saying for years - a Slacker!