slotMusic was a brand of microSD

memory card A memory card is an electronic data storage device used for storing digital information, typically using flash memory. These are commonly used in digital portable electronic devices. They allow adding memory to such devices using a card in a so ...

developed by

SanDisk SanDisk is a brand for flash memory products, including memory cards and readers, USB flash drives, solid-state drives, and digital audio players, manufactured and marketed by Western Digital. The original company, SanDisk Corporation was acquir ...

preloaded with music in

MP3 MP3 (formally MPEG-1 Audio Layer III or MPEG-2 Audio Layer III) is a coding format for digital audio developed largely by the Fraunhofer Society in Germany, with support from other digital scientists in the United States and elsewhere. Origin ...

format. They were first available at

Wal-Mart Walmart Inc. (; formerly Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.) is an American multinational retail corporation that operates a chain of hypermarkets (also called supercenters), discount department stores, and grocery stores from the United States, headquarter ...

and Best Buy stores in October 2008. The current selection of songs comes from

Universal Music Group Universal Music Group N.V. (often abbreviated as UMG and referred to as just Universal Music) is a Dutch– American multinational music corporation under Dutch law. UMG's corporate headquarters are located in Hilversum, Netherlands and its ...

, Sony BMG,

Warner Music Group Warner Music Group Corp. ( d.b.a. Warner Music Group, commonly abbreviated as WMG) is an American multinational entertainment and record label conglomerate headquartered in New York City. It is one of the " big three" recording companies and t ...

and EMI Music. As of mid-2011, SanDisk's website lists a total of 14 albums available in the SlotMusic format. The audio files contain no digital rights management, and are encoded at minimum

bitrate In telecommunications and computing, bit rate (bitrate or as a variable ''R'') is the number of bits that are conveyed or processed per unit of time. The bit rate is expressed in the unit bit per second (symbol: bit/s), often in conjunction ...

s of 256 to 320 kbit/s. A slotMusic albums may also include high-quality images and videos in multiple formats. The contents of each microSD card may be altered by the user, enabling them to add or remove files from the slotMusic card as desired. Another type of card, slotRadio, was developed in 2009 which had radio-like controls. A slotRadio card had more restrictions on how it worked, such as not being able to backtrack to a previous song.

References