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I hate posting replies to my own question. But maybe this is helpful to someone out there. I experimented by renaming tracks from .OMA to .OMA.mp3. MCrew works perfectly (no track length is shown, life's tough and then you die), and the track plays. Just one problem. I can reimport this track (it stopped working under the old name!) to SS, but the codec and duration are not properly parsed. Of course SS doesn't find the renamed one using its original database entries, as the only provision is for MOVING a track. Once reimported, the track DOES play in Sonic Stage, though. Stephen

The *only* thing that matters is the mode (or bitrate). If you are using Hi-SP (256kbps), Hi-LP(64kbps) or "PCM" (1411kbps), you are correct, and no driver should be needed. No promises, mind. As you know, you cannot upload SP, LP2 or LP4 anyway with your units. However you can DOWNLOAD those formats to MD or HiMD. LP2 is a particularly good deal (and still quite acceptable quality) on HiMD as you get twice as much space, compared to a. LP2 on std 80m disk and b. HiSP (256kbps). I try not to assume and make generalisations because someone always pops up a month later and misinterprets them. And everyone seems to have different needs. Take me for example - I couldn't live with *just* HiMD; I value and treasure the many recordings I have made in SP, LP2 and LP4 on various decks. The only thing that I can promise is that you should be able to get EVERYTHING working under the XP virtual machine - because it is designed to work.

Once you've got it downloaded (and also Microsoft Virtual PC), now you may have to turn on Hardware Virtualization. If you can't turn HAV on (supposing your CPU does not support it) there is a workaround, but I have no idea what THAT will do to your USB support. Then once you're in the Virtual machine running XP mode you will have to play with the USB connections. Haven't done that myself, but I know it's there. I didn't say it wasn't complicated One reason I have strenuously and actively avoided Windows 64-bit. Note: the above is all only really necessary if you actually have to connect up a netMD device, or a HiMD device in netMD mode. W7-64 is actually smart enough to run most 32-bit applications OK, and I believe SS is OK based on what I read from posters here. HiMD does NOT require drivers, but without them you will not be able to access "legacy" MD disks in your HiMD unit. The one exception to all this is that there is claimed to be (I only say that because I haven't tried it myself, since I don't have W64) a driver for the MZ-RH1 for Native W64, just released. But it has to be extracted from the install package for the so-called X-application, Sony's new "way forward". It is also claimed that it will work. But I seriously doubt it will help other models (note: the RH1 and M200 are one and the same MD hardware, the M200 merely has a mic in the package). Note added many months later: there's a way to make the NETMD760.SYS work with ANY NetMD unit under Win64.

I just went through this process for a bookshelf unit. It was fairly painful but ultimately successful. For a 10 year old piece of equipment there were real resistors that needed changing (resoldering). What you have (from the FM frequencies) is the Japanese-only model of the NW-E507. I am not hopeful that you can fix this easily. 1. The Japanese-only models seem to come out first 2. The Japanese-only models typically will have their own service manual, which I cannot read. I already downloaded the general service manual, and (just as for my bookshelf unit) it makes no mention of the the Japanese-only model. The "Tourist" model is described. 3. The Tourist models always have "world band" frequencies, namely 76 to 108 mHz, and usually some means to set the parameters for the destination country (there are other things to set, like the channel spacing). So yours is NOT the "Tourist" model. Having said all of that, it's clear that there are no replaceable parts and, just as suggested by others in this thread, the chances are that the hardware is the same. It's a risk you're going to have to take if you want to fix this. There's a significant chance that you will end up with something useless. Hope this helps....

Did you download XP mode?

Correct. You can run it in the XP emulation mode, with a fair amount of jiggery-pokery. But this requires W7 Professional or Ultimate which 90+% of people do not have. It's possible (rumoured, even) that with the last update for the RH1, the NetMD driver for that unit (only that one) will work natively on W64. But the rest.... no way. They are locked to the 32-bit world, as is Sonic Stage itself. The way forward is back!

I almost forgot to mention - for the price of the SX750 you also get this EXCELLENT piece of Software from Sony (retail $54 online). It handles ALL the formats including MP3, WAV, the new LPEC but most of all ATRAC, ATRAC3, and ATRAC3+. It's worth it for the conversion ability alone, in my view. The editor is very solid - about the only thing I know of in the "pro" version that might be useful is BATCH conversion. But you have that with SonicStage anyway, provided you can tame the beast. But Sound Forge 9 has already rescued me and some tracks of mine from a tight spot or three. Stephen

Comments (mostly factual, some opinion) in random order, on the above: - it's quite possible to play back both HiMD and LoMD (sorry new term I invented on the spur of the moment because I'm sick of explaining that NetMD has to do with the transmission, not the data itself) on the PC WITHOUT installing SS, once the files are decrypted. For LoMD you simply need a codec or two that are publicly available. For HiMD you need a vastly reduced subset of the Sonic Stage install, Avrin has already documented this. In addition ffmpeg (on linux at least) will play all (possibly except AAL) formats. However as you still need to decrypt things, stick with SS until the #linux-minidisc project is ready. - my own preference for a replacement is the much cheaper ICD-SX750 (and it has bigger brothers with more memory too). It doesn't have a removable flash memory card - but said flash memory cards have become quite unreasonably expensive lately. I did a nice recording (at CD quality) of the choir I play for yesterday afternoon and the result is amazing. It has built in mikes and stand, 2GB memory, weighs 2oz + two AAA's, fits in a shirt pocket and has otherwise all the features (including recharging the AAA's via USB) of the PCM-M10 for about $120. It plays back MP3 but for compressed recordings its LPEC (STHQ setting, 128kbps) beats ATRAC especially for voice, and I am sure that would include your application. - SS isn't that unfriendly when you consider the several technologies it has to bridge. - here's a start on what you need for the WMP setup (and you might well want to read all of the folloeing thread to convince yourself that what lies below here is not in the least harmful) 1. Start by adding the atrac1.zip file (download it, unzip it, and then double click on atrac1.reg to enter it in your registry). 2. Open up the registry editor and take a look at (it's possible it's numbered something else instead of 1) [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MediaPlayer\Player\Extensions\Descriptions] The first entry should look a lot like this. Add in ";.oma" at the end before the ")", note I am using quotes as delimiters, so don't reproduce my quotes, only what is between them. "1"="Audio file (*.wav;*.snd;*.au;*.aif;*.aifc;*.aiff;*.wma;*.mp3;*.oma)" 3. Now look at this key (it's possible it's numbered something else instead of 1) [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\MediaPlayer\Player\Extensions\Types] "1"="*.wav;*.snd;*.au;*.aif;*.aifc;*.aiff;*.wma;*.mp3;*.oma" Similarly add ";*.oma" (no quotes, should be right after mp3) on the end You could do all this (except steps 2 and 3) by poking around in WMP, I think but best to be sure. Just below is the registry file. I pasted the text before I could figure out how to upload it (duh!). Rename from .txt to .reg once you have satisfied yourself it won't do anything harmful (it shouldn't). Then double click the file in Windows and it will get entered to your registry. Stephen atrac1.txt PS there's nothing mysterious about this. I simply searched the registry for everything containing ".oma" (except the bit you need to look at and edit by hand, above) then gathered it all up into a single text file. Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00 [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.oma] @="" "Content Type"="audio/oma" "PerceivedType"="audio" "MP2.Last"="Custom" "MPlayer2.BAK"="OpenMG_Oma" [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.oma\OpenWithList] [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.oma\OpenWithList\wmplayer.exe] [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\.oma\OpenWithProgIds] "omaFile"=hex(0): [HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\MediaPlayer\Player\Extensions\.OMA] "Runtime"=dword:00000007 "Permissions"=dword:0000002f [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Applications\mplayer2.exe\SupportedTypes] ".oma"="" [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\Applications\wmplayer.exe\SupportedTypes] ".oma"="" [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{CE3FB1D1-02AE-4a5f-A6E9-D9F1B4073E6C}\SupportedTypes] ".oma"="" [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\CLSID\{F1B9284F-E9DC-4e68-9D7E-42362A59F0FD}\SupportedTypes] ".oma"="" [HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\MIME\Database\Content Type\audio/oma] "Extension"=".oma" [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\Applications\mplayer2.exe\SupportedTypes] ".oma"="" [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\Applications\wmplayer.exe\SupportedTypes] ".oma"="" [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\{CE3FB1D1-02AE-4a5f-A6E9-D9F1B4073E6C}\SupportedTypes] ".oma"="" [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\CLSID\{F1B9284F-E9DC-4e68-9D7E-42362A59F0FD}\SupportedTypes] ".oma"="" [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Classes\MIME\Database\Content Type\audio/oma] "Extension"=".oma" [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Multimedia\MPlayer2\MIME Types\audio/oma] "AlreadyRegistered"="yes" "ReplaceApps"="mplayer2.exe|amovie.ocx" "Extensions.SpaceSep"=".oma" "Extension.Key"=".oma" @="ATRAC Sound" "UserApprovedOwning"="yes" "Extensions.CommaSep"="oma" [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Multimedia\WMPlayer\MIME Types\audio/oma] "ReplaceApps"="wmplayer.exe|mplayer2.exe|amovie.ocx" "UserApprovedOwning"="yes" "Extensions.SpaceSep"=".oma" "AlreadyRegistered"="yes" "Extensions.CommaSep"="oma" "Extension.Key"=".oma" @="ATRAC Sound" [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Internet Settings\AllowedDragImageExts] ".oma"=dword:00000001 [/code]

Let's deal with this in chunks, you raise too many issues. 1. You should set up WMP to be the default player, NOT SonicStage. You should know how to do this, if you don't I can walk you through it. Start by rightclicking a file and "open with", select "Choose Program" and then set your choice to be the default. Doing this will NOT affect your ability to open SS and play as you are used to. 2. The quality is independent of the application used to play files. The two progs are just front ends to the guts of OMA playback. 3. It's necessary/advisable to decrypt your files (I can't remember whether it was you asked about this) so that the next time you do something significant to your 'puter you don't lose the lot. Just because WMP will play them does NOT free them from encryption. When you are comfortable with playing file in WMP, I can show you how to set up WMP to allow you to easily open directories and files and make playlists. But it requires a bit of "magic" so let's wait until you've done the first part. Stephen

I hope this is it.. I just uploaded it. Please let us know. As noted there, if you have an RH1/M200 be sure to cleanse your system of all NetMD drivers before trying to upload with that (portable) device. Also, highly recommended to install Avrin's 4.3 Ultimate over top of whatever you have. THAT may eliminate the above concern I just noted. However what's there should solve your problem. Welcome to the forums! Stephen PS if you don't want that deck, there are probably people here who would be happy to purchase it from you.

Yeah you will be fine.. until you get some protected book (eg from a public library) that you cannot remove the DRM from, such as an Adobe-protected PDF or Epub. When you get to that point, holler and I will tell you the trick. It's a bit subtle. Just one word of advice (this required hours of shouting on the phone to divine this information). When you sign up for Reader (the Sony Store) you make a password. THIS PASSWORD IS ALSO YOUR ADOBE PASSWORD. If you also sign up for an account by going to the adobe web site, everything goes to r*tsh*t and you will have to beg Adobe on bended knees to merge the two accounts or delete one of them and set the password to something known so you can change it to match the one for the reader store. If you did as I did, the two password thing gets you books which simply expire randomly, and an application on the PC that spends its whole time trying to validate your DRM. This actually brought my laptop crashing to halt effectively. Maybe that's what's happening to you. Stephen

Sorry missed your first post... the Library IS only a database, it doesn't copy files, just holds the data about where files are. If you disconnect the drive where the tracks are, maybe the DB gets marked as "not present" for that track. SonicStage also has a courtesy feature if you import across a network, to copy the files to your "local" db. But most people are using an external HD because they ran out of space. "External" probably doesn't count as "across a network". If the tracks are on another ****machine**** eg. \\livingroom\ddrive\sonicstage\importedfiles\<blah blah> then what's in the database should survive almost anything. However if you have the external drive on USB or Firewire, perhaps it is changing its drive letter. There's no magic here. As I said, perhaps now is the time to go in and look and see where the DB really is pointing. Do you have Excel? Finally (now I read your other post), maybe now is the time to start using something else to organize tracks. Windows Media Player will work quite fine, but you have to do some fancy stuff (once) to get set up that .oma will show up in the list of files to be scanned and/or opened. After that, it's trivial. Stephen

(Obviously) you can swap cables as a quick test. Sounds like you might have to set the proxy address to the address of your router. (look at that setup screen very carefully, and enable setting of this stuff by hand by selecting Manual).

Wonder if you got a patch or crossover cable? These days most ethernet jacks work either way but you might just be unlucky. If the cable is yellow (or red) you may be unlucky. Look for one that is white, blue or grey There are probably some settings on the TV telling it to look for your particular server (router). Also the router (obviously) needs DHCP turned on. Take a look on page 51 of the (English) manual. Welcome to the forums!

Increasingly it looks to me as if the Second+ Gen (RH10, RH910, DH710, not sure about RH1/M200) have a quirk. The quirk is that they write deleted track headers to the disk even when a disk is "formatted". Then SonicStage attempts to recover the rights the next time that disk is connected. I think it is THEN that things mess up. I need to re-check tomorrow, but it looks as if 1st generation HiMD do NOT do this. Anyone?

OK. Just as I suspected. Question: were any of the tracks you deleted (had they been) transferred FROM a PC? Stephen

"failed to read the data" is the scary observation. From where I can see, that has NOTHING to do with permissions or capability. It has EVERYTHING to do with a track, or track info just recorded not being accessible to the firmware in certain circumstances. Almost like a Y2K bug, I am thinking. What's weird is that it varies from one unit to the next. I'd really like to track this down (for my own reasons). Would you mind if I ask 1 or more questions in an attempt to diagnose? Here's the first: Did you AT ANY TIME (after using it to record as HiMD) erase tracks by any means (computer or by "erase track" or even "format", both the latter 2 functions by using the unit's own buttons), before trying the microphone recording? Stephen

Both microphone and line in should be transferable. I currently have some issues with my RH910 (actually I have 2 and only one is behaving oddly). So many different people have recently noticed oddities with this unit I am beginning to think something is weird. Best I can suggest is to find someone with a different HiMD unit and see if the disk is OK. My weird experiences ALL relate to the RH910 not being able to read its own disk (just written perfectly) when the same (just written) disk can be read in other HiMD units. But I had trouble with 1GB disks only. Someone else just this last week had trouble with 80m disks, though. What's really weird in my case is that my 910 always reads ANY disks made by OTHER units just great. I would definitely put that disk on one side until you can find something else to play it in. Any time you make the smallest operation (even an upload methinks) to a HiMD, the unit may need to alter it and rewrite the TOC. If you have a dubious unit/disk combination, avoid at all costs until you have recovered the data you wanted. It's just possible the Linux-Minidisc software QHiMDTransfer won't mind if the disk is write-protected. However I am not 100% sure that the write-protect is even noticed by the firmware of the drive, sadly. If the recording is important to you, you're welcome to send me the disk and I will try to recover it. But the mail these days has been a bit unpredictable. Might take up to month for there and back - or we might be lucky. PM me if interested, I'll try my best. Stephen

As you've discovered, you can't do that. A disk is formatted EITHER MD or HiMD, never a mixture. When you record a disk in any HiMD format, it takes up the whole disk. Period. If you managed to do it with the DS70 (don't know the unit, but it must be non-HiMD, correct?) you should not have been able to do so. Because the HiMD formatted disk should have had enough tracks for the Sharp to know that it couldn't record because of no space. You can't transfer anything recorded on the Sharp via USB, anyway. Hope this helps.

Hi Adrian, Last time I checked, it was not possible to do this without compiling source code and inserting a secret key (to break the secret encryption that Sony is not willing to share with the world). That is something your average Mac user is so far from being able to do, that it is pointless making one specific claim with qualifications, when the existing software from Sony will work on the platforms for which it was designed, namely all second and third generation units. You are perfectly right, it is possible to read HiMD's on an NH700 with this software. I have done it. The last time I dared to utter encouragement to Mac users, it caused me to get into a huge fight and leave the board (involuntarily) as a moderator for almost a year. So I have stopped posting commercials here until I know that the project is closer to being usable by non-computer-software types. Sounds like that is a couple of months away at least. I myself have undertaken to do some of the work however have been sidetracked by a little project of mine that is rather older in origin. For 99.9% of all the users who come here asking, it's hopeless to add so many qualifications that their heads spin. Most would rather buy an RH1 or RH10/910 than fire up C compilers. The biggest problem with LMD is that you cannot go the other way (to the MD), even with the noted conditions. If you would prefer, we can have this discussion privately. But I would ask that you pursue "truth in advertising" at the present time. Thanks Stephen PS when I wrote that response it was most definitely true. The "fragment" problem was not solved for several months after that response, meaning that the majority of files would not be uploadable anyway.

I can't help with the remote. I looked at the manual and it seems like Yamaha committed a major blunder with this feature. Maybe you should buy a second hand deck (for recording) by Sony - they are pretty cheap these days, especially if you don't even care about MDLP (Long Play) modes. Can you check Ebay for a replacement deck? Welcome to the forums!

I love M-Crew! It does everything I want with my bookshelf unit. Except one thing..... I want to be able to "register" files from the PC that are .oma (or .OMA) in the file section of M-Crew. I can do .WAV, MP3, .MID, .RMI and a couple of others. But .oma is nowhere to be found. Here's the weird part the file selector dialog reads AudioFiles (*.mid;*.mp3;*.rmi;*.wav;*wma) Notice there is no period before the wma. Weird. Anyway I cheated and renamed one oma file to be mp3... and it not only registered with MCrew but played perfectly. So this is entirely about file names. Can anyone help? I looked through the registry and through every ini file I could find for this string (in the brackets) above. No dice. I wonder where the install got it from? And where it put it. Thanks Stephen

Make sure you didn't slide either hold switch (one on remote, one on unit) to "hold". Most of the standard remotes will do *something* in that socket.

That's easy. You probably need to enable digital playback. Or set the correct sound card output.