sfbp

Cute. I had no idea that the documented "retry at x1" behaviour was effected by switching circuits. I have never to my knowledge held a copy-protected CD in my hands. Back in the days when I made copy-protected floppy disks (and I think someone referred recently to copy-protected video) the usual trick was to put a bad sector somewhere. This didn't matter to the application because it would avoid that sector, but the copy software would barf on it and stop. Isn't that what's happening in your case? What happens when you copy by pressing the "normal" button? Does it visibly go back and start again?

I wonder if it can be conditioned? I'm sure someone here has ideas on that. I have had good luck with NiMH, but none with Li (I am thinking of laptops, not MD). Supposedly you should discharge the Li battery as far as possible a number of times. Maybe the units are too conservative and need to discharge them to a lower voltage than they are set to; I actually suggested this (in a post) to Avrin, the expert on firmware, but I don't remember hearing a meaningful (to me) response. Someone could perhaps figure this out and build a DIScharger????? The other explanation to all of this is maybe that these are not fakes, but rejects from the manufacturing process. I'm surprised they get labelled first, but that might be the only really dishonest bit - if they simply pinch the labels (or print some extras) and stick em on the ones that fail testing.

Ah, the Double Ophecleide! Maybe we better send someone to record the Diaphone-Dulzian at Atlantic City, heheh. Liverpool Cathedral's isn't even a real 64 but a stopped (gedackt) 32. Luckily or unluckily for most of us there isn't a general problem with organs. However it raises another issue, IMHO. It seems likely that these very low organ tones can cause *physical* vibrations in their environment. It's known that 7Hz is dangerous to humans, so standing next to the D-D for extended periods is liable to do very bad things to you. So, I wonder how much of your observed distortion was some sort of rattling of something in the vicinity. You can observe this effect for example if you put a plastic container (thin) with some paperclips on top of a bass speaker even on the pathetic little speakers we bought for $50 for the computer (awright I know you didn't but I did). Or sometimes "stuff" that is lying around rattles and quite destroys the sound. I'm not saying this was your distortion, just that it might have been. I have a hunch the problems I had recording organs with older equipment might have been similar. A portable such as the RH1 does get rid of a lot of the sources of noise (and electrical interference too!). I mean there are some pretty big sparks potentially flying around as these stops open and close their mouths, too - so anything wired in (as I was back then) to the same circuit as the organ blower, is going to pick some of it up. Certainly I recall hearing stop changes (electronic click, not the noise of the physical stops changing).

I'll post something shortly for you to have a listen. First sample (about 13 megs) Second sample (also about 13MB) Probably won't be able to leave them there for ever..... Let me know what you think. I was amazed because it was the first time I had ever managed to record an organ without silly problems of one sort or another. Stephen

Interesting. I never even thought of using the analog option. Not sure how you do that. I checked yesterday and there is a small supply of MXD-D400 again on Yahoo Japan. Probably a lot of people didn't bother to auction things over Christmas what with postal delays and suchlike, not to mention having a real life

I like my JE-640. It doesn't give me those annoying "trprotect" messages when I try to work with stuff from SonicStage. Later decks do. The creme de la creme is a JB980 if you can find it, since it does Type-S, the 640 does not - so I don't use for playback through stereo. Muchos denarios is the Onkyo line which plays and records HiMD too. But likely new, and likely in the $400+ range. There are NO Sony decks available new except what you can buy in Japan at auction. Another option is a CD-MD combo deck (discussed already) Another option is to be a true blue audiophile and forget about LP2 for deck. Then there are LOTS of choices and almost anything will do. You may want a pre-MDLP combo (to go quickly from CD to MD) and/or an optical sound card (to go x1 from whatever deck optical out to puter), but you might have said you have one of those. Yeah, try to get a deck that has opti-out. I can see you have got the bug HNY

Understood. My reason for the comment was that in all the sounds that I have watched, none of them "dropped dead" at 16K in the way this did. You're very clever to compare to the original, quite beyond me as I don't listen to that stuff - it could have been from 1998 or 1958 for all I knew.

I had absolutely zero problem with my BMC-2's and church organ. The first time I have ever been able to record that without problems.

Are these by any chance much-edited disks? I suppose it could possibly be because the head is moving a lot on some discs not others. If it disappears after you reformat them and put fresh material on, it might be time to find out if the head lateral movement needs greasing. I bet someone else knows far better, I am just guessing. Another thing I wouldn't clean ANY digital head "regularly". I recall this with floppies and I believe it hasn't changed. Clean if/when you suspect trouble. Hope this helps. Stephen

I don't disagree with anything you say, A440. You're the expert. However I have had good luck with AGC, sensitivity low and music setting. Even for a full orchestra - eg Dream of Gerontius

Is it possible you have been shipped a dud, by accident? Doesn't sound like the mics I know and love. My other questions related to what you did to the sound afterwards. What was the original recording format? Try PCM before you get too exercised, and if you weren't doing Hi-SP before try that next.

I looked at the waveform - it cuts absolutely dead at 16,000 Hz. This doesn't bode well for the sound quality, IMHO. One thing (and I realise this may not be even remotely possible in any sort of contemporary music concert, folk, rock etc etc) is to see what the silence looks like. If it's noticeable (eg some wretched fan - machine not human, of course - in the background), I subtract it out. Perhaps you could enlighten us as to the exact series of steps used **after** the recording was made. I don't understand the reference to Audacity, since I was presuming you did digital upload from the RH1, and then did something to the wave file later, with Audition or Nero Wave Editor or..... I wonder about that attenuator, seems the AGC (Low Sens, Music setting) always did the job for me, maybe try that next time and just the SP mics.

The first piano piece is by Chopin, I think waltz op. posthumous in E minor Second one is sounds a lot like Beethoven, (remember the moonlight sonata?) but he never wrote a sonata in A minor, so I am guessing it is from the same era. Perhaps Clementi, or Burgmuller, or some piece by Beethoven that I don't know of yet. Will advise if I figure out more. Maybe a Bagatelle in A minor?

What I mean is that I noticed all sorts of artifacts when I took a real live commercial purchased CD and made a MD at x4 using LP2. Specifically I noticed the speech of the narrator (it was a children's disk with music) went all hissy. But the result of this and other copied disks sounded lifeless and dull (just playing back on that MD right away). As soon as I coded LP2 using 'puter, or x1 on the D400, no problemo. I note that at least one of the earlier combo decks is documented as NOT doing x4 at all for LP modes. Could it be that Sony realised that the h/w they had didn't quite cut the mustard? Cheers

All portable players made after a certain date have "Type-S" playback which enhances the sound of LP2 and LP4. A few (but only a very few) decks have it too. It doesn't affect SP. To get SP onto your portable: a. use opti-in (forget about line-in, IMO, though it might work just fine) b. get a deck. Both of these are real-time recording solutions. The MXD-D3 would get you x4 though I am not 100% certain you lose nothing on transcoding from CD. I know for sure that the x4 transcoding from CD to LP2 doesn't work properly, at least on my MXD-D400.

There's nothing special or different about mics for Hi or Lo MD. Sound is sound, and microphone ***outputs*** live by their specifications ie how many millivolts do they deliver to the recorder. The reason there's a special microphone input on 50%+ of MD recorders is that microphones deliver much lower signal levels than a radio, or tape deck. I can offer this: if you buy the ECM-DS70P it comes with an extender lead of about 5 feet. This means its easy to put on your lapel, or pinned to a curtain, or wherever he wants to capture a complete soundstage from. The other thing I have done quite successfully is to put the whole MD plus ECM-DS70P (fake or not!) in my shirt or jacket pocket (trying to avoid using the b-word). However, this may be quite poor once he is part of what is being recorded, and better for a passive (ie silent) recordist. It has a hinge which allows you to arrange the twin mics hanging over the edge of the pocket, pointing forwards. It does sound as if the ones you looked at so far are mono. This might give a problem since the input is stereo, not sure whether you get noise, silence, or a duplicate of the signal on the other channel. Once again, others may know better than I do. Watch out you don't buy something with a 1/4" jack, you need 1/8" aka 3.5mm.

That's slightly more than 2x as loud. One observation I would offer is this. The benefit of recording in PCM is as follows: it's not the end of the world if you record a relatively low level, because there are lots of bits of resolution to allow you to amplify (using whatever software) the parts that are inappropriately soft, and mute, quieten or even delete loud applause before normalizing what's left. Whereas if you record in one of the less-bitty formats now there is a danger you've thrown something away. I personally don't even worry about adjusting the mic myself during recording - every time I do it, I end up cursing because now it's harder work still. I don't right now recall what recorder you have, but the RH1's AGC on low sensitivity seems to work just fine for me. YMMV, of course. My previous remarks (previous post, that is) refer to the BMC-2, so they may not apply to your BMC-3's.

Odd. I had excellent results with the SP2. Your report makes me think I should go and check. Certainly the SP2 beat the ECM-DS70P, but that may be because I bought a "cheap" one of those, and it could be fake. One thing that springs to mind is the cabling. As you say, maybe something is being picked up. I recall this from many years ago with an extension cable for a microphone for my Tandberg tape recorder. Fine without the extra long lead. I bet there are lots of microphone guys here who are in a much better position to comment.

Not sure about this: as MDane says, I usually walk across to my deck and stick 'em in that. Assuming it is this silly "TrProtect" thing (you might first try deleting one track at a time), then there is always the Initialize option (well hidden) under Controls->Device/Media->Initialize. Also you might find a format option instead of erase. Acccording to the 610 manual there is only "D: Ers" so if that's what is failing I may be out of ideas.

There's no optical OUT on any portable (that you can easily lay hands on), suggest you invest in a deck which probably is pretty cheap. Check the equipment browser here to see which have optical out. I scanned quickly and found half a dozen on Ebay UK. Now you can record on the 610 (I have one, and you can listen to the radio if you are lucky - mine the radio has been bust from day 1), and "sneakernet" the disk from there to your deck, and play from deck into puter. Sound like hard work? The alternative is Audacity + a lineout to linein cable. Not HiFi, but maybe you don't actually care. In which case ignore my previous paragraph. BTW if you are using OPTICAL in, it simply doesn't matter HOW cheap the soundcard is. That's the magic. If you use (analogue) line in on a cheap card, you get what you pay for, possibly interference of all sorts and a cheap A to D converter. I wish I had been a stranger on THAT shore.... memories of childhood.

Sigh. You cannot use the USB to upload anything with this model. You can play back through the headphone out and capture it in real time, but it's an analog signal) which may be fine for your interviews). Most inmates in the asylum here end up buying multiple units Aside from what I've said above: 1. Any HiMD unit will allow upload of HiMD recordings to Sonic Stage 2. Any Deck that has optical out (check the equipment browser) will allow you to play optically into your computer (you need a sound card with optical in but that's not such a big deal with a desktop - hard with a laptop but still possible). 3. The RH1 ($$$) will allow you to upload the recordings you already made in the legacy modes, as well. It won't recover downloads made onto NetMD, but that's life. Hope this helps.

Everyone agrees here 100% with your observations EXCEPT the part about not buying HiMD. a. you can play any MDLP and SP disks you made in the HiMD, so no loss there - in fact the compression of LP2 gets 4 hours 50 mins on the exact same "standard" disk using HiMD, so you are twice as well off if length counts. b. for live recordings you are "stuck" in the MD format (no way to get to CD or something saveable) unless you buy a deck or the RH1. The latter obviously allows you upload (there's a trick which you need if you use the same Sonic Stage for it and other NetMD machines), the former doesn't use USB, and works with your SP disks. However any HiMD allows you to send HiMD recordings to the computer. c. you don't have to buy HiMD disks, though once you build up a stock they should do you for a while. I am not sure what the MZ-1 S2 is - maybe my ignorance. As I said very early on, welcome to the nuthouse!!!!! Glad you liked the PSYC.... I saw several for under $30 yesterday, maybe it was just a lull, so you could get a backup. But now you see what everyone here is raving about.

Just to add: (and I sent you a PM too) ALL HiMD units can upload recordings made by Mic or Line in, as long as they are made in HiMD format. So not essential to get RH1 unless you want to get into "legacy" (ie SP) recorded formats which are used by older models and all decks (essentially).

Agree. There are THREE of these beasts on Ebay one closing in 2 hours, all under $50. Just search ebay for "mxd-d3"

I think it's fair value. However: 1. None of this equipment has LP modes. (Maybe this is fine for you since you don't have lots of LP stashed). However one of the things I have come to appreciate is one disk (whatever data rate) that holds 140+ minutes of music. The reason is simple - I can fit a whole opera, concert, or large scale work (I listen to classical) in a portable player and go off wherever without extra disks in pocket. Using HiMD I can put 8 hours at 256K on one disk. 2. The deck itself is not as flexible as the purpose built decks. They had to take a lot of functionality (in terms of knobs/buttons) in order to do the CD thing. So some is left to the remote (only) and some is just not there. I cannot give specifics as I don't own this deck, but I do have that line's last incarnation, the MDX-D400, and it is awkward to do editing compared to my JE630 (for example the latter has a PC keyboard connector, the combo decks do not). You might do just as well with a CD player/changer that has optical out. They won't do the x4 CD->MD thing, so that feature (included in the MDX-D3) is really valuable. 3. You will get lots of MD with many deals, and even brand new ones especially if you look around Ebay, are not too expensive. So the included MD's isn't that big of a deal (to me - I just read bobt's comment). 4. The deck doesn't have optical out. If you are serious about vinyl and cleaning up the sound, this won't get the data out to your PC for you - only via analog. The analog is probably fine but you then are relying on the analog side of your PC's sound card. PC's are built for cheapness, not audio quality. The MZ-R37 has IIRC a good reputation as a durable unit. Owners might comment on this for you. Hope this helps Stephen