Microsoft Releases Windows Media Player 11 for Windows XP

Microsoft Corp. today released to the public Microsoft® Windows Media® Player 11 for Windows® XP, a significant milestone for music fans and the digital entertainment experience on Windows. This latest version of Windows Media Player offers consumers a test-drive of the breakthrough capabilities in Windows Media Player 11 for Windows Vista™, including enhanced search and media management technologies, a visually driven user interface, and optimized support for portable music players.

“Windows Media Player 11 is the first media player to be truly designed with the digital entertainment lover in mind,” said Mike Sievert, corporate vice president of Windows at Microsoft. “The fresh, exciting new look, the ability to find songs and videos in an instant, and the enhanced capabilities for syncing with portable devices are not only exactly what customers have asked us for, they’re also a preview of what’s to come in Windows Vista.”

The Windows Media Player 11 Experience

Windows Media Player 11 features seamless integration with URGE, MTV Networks Co.’s digital music service. URGE builds upon MTV Networks’ renowned music heritage, offering rich, hand-crafted programming, first-rate editorial content, and innovative music discovery features to create a truly immersive entertainment experience. The incredibly fast search capabilities of Windows Media Player 11 provide consumers with instant access to the entire URGE catalog of more than 110,000 artists and 2 million songs.

“MTV Networks’ collaboration with Microsoft on Media Player 11 gives URGE users a fully immersive and integrated music and entertainment experience,” said Michael Bloom, vice president of Digital Music at MTV Networks and general manager of URGE. “Our expertise in music programming and design combined with Microsoft’s technology gives music fans the best way to discover and stay connected with the music and artists they love.”

The search capabilities of Windows Media Player 11 also enable consumers to easily scroll through and access music faster than on any other media player, whether the library contains 50 or 50,000 tracks. The powerful Instant Search in Windows Media Player 11 provides results that instantly narrow with each keystroke, whether the consumer is searching in a personal library or browsing URGE. Innovative drag-and-drop capabilities make building playlists and moving music to portable players easier than ever.

Windows Media Player 11 also provides these key features:

• A visually driven experience using thumbnail and album art, an elegant and simple design, and customization capabilities for more personalized interaction
  
  
• Improved device experience with new shuffle sync and reverse sync options, device exploration using the library view, and intuitive help icons that ensure seamless and intuitive syncing and burning of rights-managed content
  
  
• Highly simplified navigation capabilities, enhanced shortcut options, and dedicated category views for all media types, including music, photos and video
  
  
• Better access to content with deep integration of services that blurs the line between online service and media player experiences
  
  
• Industry-first audio fingerprinting capabilities that recognize and import track information for unidentified or misnamed audio files
  
  
• New formats for ripping and music playback, including Windows Media Audio Professional and WAV Lossless
  

Devices and Content

As the most-used media player in the world, Windows Media Player continues to enjoy healthy support from Microsoft’s industry and consumer electronics partners. More than 200 portable and home networking devices worldwide will seamlessly work with Windows Media Player 11, providing consumers with an end-to-end experience. Furthermore, in addition to URGE, hundreds of online music and video services and radio stations worldwide are designed to work with Windows Media Player 11.

“Consumers are demanding more flexibility and options when it comes to downloading content to their portable media players,” said Andrew Yang, COO of iriver America. “When combined with Windows-based devices such as the iriver clix, Windows Media Player 11 provides the most complete solution for accessing, downloading and managing their digital libraries.”

“Windows Media Player 11 is another significant step forward in bringing consumers a better digital music experience,” said Eric Bone, director of product marketing of audio and video products at SanDisk. “By integrating SanDisk’s line of Sansa MP3 players with the new Windows Media Player, we’re giving consumers the ultimate choice of how they manage and where they get their music.”

Availability

Microsoft encourages all customers of genuine Windows to download Windows Media Player free of charge at http://www.microsoft.com/windows/windowsmedia People currently using earlier versions of Windows Media Player will also be notified of the availability of Windows Media Player 11 through a pop-up alert, and Microsoft encourages customers to click on the alert for access to the download.