Dell discontinues hard drive-based MP3 players

Earlier this month, Dell discontinued its line of Digital Jukebox players.

I compared the Dell Pocket DJ to the 3G iPod and iPod mini in the past, and although there are nice features I just don't think the Dell unit holds up, especially with the intangibles.

That said, we shouldn't necessarily interpret this as Dell completely abandoning the space. Dell hasn't, after all, abandoned their flash-based model, the Ditty. Combined with the success of the (absolutely wonderful) nano and rapidly falling flash memory prices, you have to expect them to try to compete there. Sandisk is doing ok with this approach. There have also been rumors that a PMC device will replace the DJ line.

Consumer Tech