SanX is the Japanese company response for the "Relaxuma," or "relaxing bear." Like many Japanese characters, you'll find him o­n all sorts of products from pencils to digital cameras.

In fact, Tomy has announced a new portable MP3 player shaped like the Relaxuma. Details inside.

Tomy Corporation will release the "Chara-Tune Relaxuma," a portable audio player shaped like the "Relaxuma" character o­n March 30th. The price is 9,240 yen. Supported operating systems are Windows 98 SE, Me, 2000, XP, as well as Mac OS X 10.1 ~ 10.4.

It features 128MB of internal memory, can supports the playback of MP3/WMA files. It takes the shape of "Relaxuma" in an "pose appreciative of music," with the character carrying an audio player, which acts as the controls. The feet are adjustable, so it can be made to stand or sit down. There is no display.

Supported bitrates for MP3 are from 8 to 320kbps, and for WMA, 5 to 256kbps. Connection with a PC is via USB. It takes o­ne AAA battery, which provides about 8 hours of playback. The dimensions are 95 x 65 x 40mm (H x W x T), and the weight without the battery is 50g.

The main target is young women, and the subtarget is "grade school girls who have demonstrated a remarkable increase in digital audio player ownership ratio since late last year." Tomy said that this Relaxuma is the first, and they plan to expand this "Chara-Tune" series.

Inspired by:
http://www.watch.impress.co.jp/av/docs/20060210/tomy.htm

Press Release (PDF):
http://www.tomy.co.jp/press_release/press/2006feb10.pdf