Soundbox

Thanks for that. I will pick up a spare as they can only get more scarce.

Well being an engineer I like a challenge sometimes but in all my MD'ing years the only true faulty one was a new one from Currys (blue R50). Ah yes, the RH1. When they were being discontinued my local Sony Centre was doing them at £190 each. I bought one to use for what its good at and then went back for the rest of the stock - two were left. I have those in storage (not been out the box) but I now worry about the battery going bad in storage. I bought some Hi-MD disks at the same time but at £15 for 2 they were a bit expensive still.

Are optical assemblies still available for this model? I have the same one and wonder whether it is worth getting one to keep as a spare.

Has anyone ever bought an MD portable or deck that was sold cheap as faulty but when you got it it worked fine? What was the 'fault'? I have had a few. An MZ-R50 in as new condition for £5 that 'refused to play' but when I got it all that was up was the HOLD switch was on. After releasing hold it worked fine. Yesterday I had a Sharp MD-MT90 come in the post with remote and in lovely condition. 'Does not play' but all that was wrong was it had an LP4 disk in it which it is not capable of playing. Popping in a standard SP disc soon got the machine spinning happily. So what cheap 'faulty' units have you had that were working perfect?

We all know the different portables have all different headphone output sound - but which one do you like? I am talking about directly powered headphones - not using a seperate amplifier. The nicest to my ears is the Sony MZ-NH700. Without using bass boost or effects it gives a clean and neutral sound that works with all music types. I don't use in-ear headphones but a set of 1990's JVC 'on the ear' larger ones. These give better bass anyway. So what model do you think has the most appealing sound from the headphone socket?

Well a dirty lens will cause problems (especially if the unit has been used in a smokers house) so a lens clean is a first port of call. Nex common thing is a failing laser which causes disk read problems. If the laser is failing, going from the last track back to the first track with the disk playing takes a long time with much skiffing as the lens hunts for focus. But clean the lens first!

I have been using a Digital 8 camcorder for a while and would like to use my computer to edit the clips. I downloaded the 'PMB' for Vista and have linked my camera successfully and I downloaded a clip from the memory card but I am told that I am needing a driver to be able to use the tape transport on the computer and also download the clips. The computer is not seeing the tape. Is there another driver I need? I can't seem to locate this one or know where to locate it. I get this: Description: Windows detected a new device attached to your computer, but could not find the driver software it needs to make the device usable. Each device manufacturer typically includes driver software of a CD that comes with the device, or as a download from its website. The hardware ID of your device is USBVID_054C&PID_00C0&REV_0100&MI_00. Problem signature: Problem Event Name: PnPDriverNotFound Architecture: x86 Hardware Id: USBVID_054C&PID_00C0&REV_0100&MI_00 OS Version: 6.0.6002.2.2.0.768.2 Locale ID: 2057 Thanks for any help on this matter as I am not able to do this on my own. The CD is not Vista compatable so I need a web download.

What about the Sony NWZ-Z1060 32GB Walkman? It is expensive enough but there are some dodgy acronyms which I have never heard of which is always worrying.

Thanks for the lead on those however perhaps a bit steep for me. It seems that the MD system as a whole has gathered an air of collectability and prices reflect that. I miss the days when such goods were easy to get and cheaper too. I add a photo of my disc.

I have used MD as my de-facto portable music storage for 15 years now and it has never let me down so I'm not about to abandon it however manufacturers have done so. I don't like to drop behind too far with technology so would at least like to try a modern portable to at least say I have given it a go and understand it. People offer me MP3's and at the moment I refuse them due to no playback equipment. Perhaps it could alsi be used in places I would not take my MD. However I get the feeling that all the useful things like line in record, nice headphone stage and adjustable record levels are not present on any unit. Perhaps they are but that is not advertised or common? So (maybe as a birthday gift) is there a portable music device that does the biz and works as well as MD? If not it does'nt matter but I value the knowledge here so thought I would ask.

I bought one of these 'back in the day' and it has the same solid composite build as the MA-XG tapes. It is about double the weight of a standard RXG disc and it has a re-writeable lable so you can rub it off. Also the box is oversized. Anyone else got any of these? Are they a higher performance disc or was it just a bit more heft? I was going to stock up on a few more but can't see them for sale on eBay.

Thanks for the input. That Sony camcorder is different indeed and I never knew about them at all - do post about how you find it. I keep looking for in car MD decks but only ever see CD. I do remember Halfords having a whole rack of MD car equipment and I almost bought one - but plumped for tape instead (oh folly). They was a good range and I rember the LP kit but did not understand it back then as I was strictly an SP user. As to eBay bad luck we have all been there I think but fortunately not too often. I am chuffed with the JE780 and it works fine. My remote for the Sony JB980 works it and even the manuals are almost the same.

Perhaps it is the post-Christmas lack of funds but I am seeing quite a few Sony MD recorders and players for sale at the Cash Converters. I was wondering whether anyone here has also found any recent bargains there? Do share your finds. This week I passed by a JE530 (like new but a bit steep at £49). I also saw a player that had a 'rainbow reflective' inset on the to panel (MZ-E60 I think) for £20 with a few discs. There were a Sony and Panasonic '4' way system (MD, CD, TAPE, TUNER) in one which were very nice at £45 each with speakers but I already have a system. They sold fast. I did buy MZ-N710 (boxed with all parts) for £20 and a MDS-JE780 (barely used but missing the remote) for £25. I have the JE780 hooked up now - very nice sound with ATRAC-S doing its work. I asked about the MD recorders and the bloke was very enthusiastic and said that they get at least one in per day and sell them almost straight away so just luck who gets what... So what have you found or bought? Any good bargains?

I have an MZ-RH1 and an analogue amp MZ-NH700. The sound is different in both and which I use depends on the music. For something well encoded / recorded the NH700 does very well and sounds like my tape walkman in a (good) way however if there is some music with a lower than optimum bitrate that can make the NH700 show compression artefacts the RH1 will play these tracks much better. Also the RH1 shines with good headphones where the bass extension shines through. But both are good and the main difference is the uploading with RH1.

Thanks - I have just checked SS and found those options. Trotter, that is optimal I agree and I do it that way normally but you should see the piles of CD's I have accumalated. I keep putting off the real time task due to the nannying needed for the transfers. It depresses me to have so much good music not being listened to... I did ponder on one of those CD ripper boxes but that is worse - non-portable and non-physical.

Yes - I was panicing thinking they had gone for good. Then a MD link on Google worked and all is well again.

Over Christmas I realised that I have too many marginal CD's - ones that I am not playing but like the music on them. Like the Morrissey 'singles' box sets with 19 discs that spoil the music because after 3 tracks I am having to reload the CD player. For ease of use on all my machines and decks I have decided on LP2. After puting them onto MD I will be donating the CD's to charity so want to get the sound as good as possible. Please can you tale a look at my setup: CD into laptop SonicStage - Import a CD (aquire titles) Upload using the 132 Kbps ATRAC LP setting and 'high quality' as opposed to normal/fast Use MZ-N510 and create NetMD 'without conversion' It is then done at a fast speed However I see that it still says 'converting' when creating a MD and the sound on some tracks is not as good as I feel it should be. Is SonicStage the correct tool for this job? Any other comments appreciated. I'm sure this has been gone over in the past so any links to past information that is known to be good would be appreciated. I have so many CD's to do and clear out to make room I could not face doing it all again but for some silly mistake on my behalf.

Amazingly one of these turned up at our Cash Converters with case and charger with a price of £15 and I missed it by 2 minutes. I hope my luck improves this year.

I was wondering which portable has the best microphone input for resistance to overload and general sound quality? I will be facing unpredictable transients of short and medium duration and was wondering what machine to use. I will be using it with a battery powered 'tie clip' microphone, Realistic model 33-1052 which will be placed in a tubular resonator. Thanks, Ian

I use my MD's as much as I ever did. Having a physical disk is important to me and I love that I can edit so easily and precisely without resorting to using a computer. The disks last a long time, they are secure and easy to handle and use. What is not to like? Well, I never had problems with DRM - mainly becase I just made one disk via optical or microphone and listened to it. For what I do I cannot see that MP3 players will add anything to my music enjoyment so I've never had one. I'll be honest and say that I never liked audio tapes very much even when they were the only thing around. The fact that any mistake with the pause button or rough edits were impossible to rectify and recording from the radio gave often poor results when the pause button was used to edit out the DJ's waffle. I still use VCR's as my primary video system and the quality is fine to me (I'm in a PAL area and using a CRT TV) and the Hi-Fi sound still impresses. Grab a tape, stuff it in and hit record - no messing with menus. I keep being told VCR's are 'obsolete' and won't work after the April analogue switch-off but with a digibox they are good to go. Just last night I recorded 'REM at the BBC' on my 1983 Betacord (Sanyo Beta machine) using the timer and a digital converter - and will watch it tonight.

I just uploaded a UK MiniDisc ad from 1997. This was a well know ad back then but it does not seem to be on YouTube so I did it yesterday.

You can tell we like MD in the UK!

In my opinion the JE510 offers the easiest control over editing, fast access to recording level (from analogue) and the most user friendly interface of all the decks I have used. It just feels 'right'. Even the button feel is lovely. They seem to give trouble though sadly. The JB940 is nice too, but it is not so easy to use.

Thanks Stephen. So for copying to CD or another MD I should really set it to 16 bit to save converting?

Yes - it was a very good deal. I have been using it some more today - and was wondering about the 24 and 16 bit selection. Is this for copying to CD or other MD units? The instructions do not say what setting to use for what. The Cash Converters (Watford) also had a JE500 at