chatoyer

dura - interesting re: your experiences with the sound quality of the A80X. I'll have to look into that as I am thinking of picking one up merely to replace my HD5. Nothing wrong with the HD5 per se, but just thought I would want to try the A8XX series. Must go check out some reviews on this forum. As for the HD5, I would buy one again in a heartbeat. In fact, I've got a spare battery ready to go when the original one dies, but I suspect the hard drive will fail first as the original battery is still going strong.

I think it's under Initialise System?

Well, that becomes a problem. It becomes a toss-up: SS to work well and lose programs, or keep programs and have trouble with SS.

If the suggestions here don't help, I would probably go with a system re-build. I know that may be a bit overkill, and for me this can literally take days before I get everything back to the way it was, but look at it is an opportunity to flush everything out with a clean install. Maybe wait a few more days to see if any others post suggestions/tips in this thread, though, just in case. Good luck! Do let us know how it works out for you.

Not fun. I've heard SS doesn't play well with those kinds of applications. Your best bet is to do a system restore back to before you installed SS (and thus before you installed Window blinds or whatever it is). If that doesn't work, not sure what else to do...

I would say no. But, it's a different kind of bass. The bass in the PX200, to me, is slightly more muddy than with the E4c. However, by my standards, the bass is in the PX200s is not at all muddy, if that makes any sense. My problem is that I have a hard time putting to words what my ears are hearing. Short answer is that the E4c is not necessarily the pick of the lot if you really want boomy bass, largely because they are not supra-aural phones. By that reason alone, the bass might be termed by some to be noticeably weaker if they, like me, compared them to the PX200s. But, as I say, the bass in the E4c is quite 'tight' and definitely present.

I picked up a pair of E4c IEMs (In Ear Monitors) when I was in Singapore in June of last year ('05). At the time, I was using a NetMD 710, with most discs recorder either in SP or LP2. I had heard quite a bit about them before purchase, but living in New Zealand these kinds of things can be hard to find. I think I paid roughly NZ$500 at a shop at Sim Lim Square. My first impression was they were not terribly comfortable. I was using the soft rubber tips, and I had a bit of trouble getting a good seal. It took a bit of trial and error with the varying sizes of the soft tips, but I managed to find a pair (the small soft rubber tips) that fit well enough. Then the listening began. At first, I was a bit underwhelmed. I was used to using a pair of PX200s from Sennheiser, so I was used to reasonably tight bass. The Shures just didn't seem to have a good amount of bass punch. I figured this was largely due to the 'newness' of the drivers so over the next month, I let them burn in overnight with some soft white noise (usually a mis-tuned FM station on my receiver). Yes, I know the jury is still out on whether any headphone really needs a burn in period, but I figured I would give it a go. Within that month, I picked up my HD5. Slowly, I noticed that the bass response improved quite a bit. In fact, I find the bass even now (after all these months) much more accurate and true to the original recording. Granted, I like my music with a lot of punchy bass (80s Brit Pop: Erasure, Pet Shop Boys, Depeche Mode, etc). Despite this, I have found that the overall sound reproduction on the Shures to be remarkable. A few other variables may have helped, however. First, I've switched to the yellow 'foamie' tips for the Shures. These give an excellent seal and bass response, at least to my ears, is improved. Second, with the HD5, I began encoding at A3+ 192. These two variables, combined with a lengthy usage period, are probably together working to make these Shures an excellent option for fabulous sound. Ironically, I write this as I am wearing my PX200s. Why? I've found that using the Shures means assuring yourself that you won't have a need to take them out for a while. In other words, once they're in, you'll not want to be bothered by someone, meaning you'll have to carefully remove them, have your conversation, and then slowly and correctly insert them again. A final point. I do quite a bit of international travel (two to three 'round the world' trips per year on average) and these beat out the Sony NC-20 noise cancelling headphones I used to use (in fact, those were incredibly bulky and annoying to wear over long periods). The Shures *block* sound as opposed to cancelling it electronically. That's about it. Happy to answer any questions. Can't take any photos right now as my wife has the camera.

Just a few weeks ago, I did a re-build of my Thinkpad and obviously had to re-install SS. I was surprised (and a little nervous) when the online installer grabbed 3.4. Have to say: works quite well (was previously using 3.1 without any problems).

Another update: Well, i found out the hard way that you really should have the AC adapter plugged in whilst doing a transfer. For a while this morning, I serious thought I hosed my computer. The HD5 wasn't being recognised, and what's worse: my little 1.8" portable HDD wasn't being recognised from the same USB port. First I thought it was a hardware issue, but some selective re-booting and swapping around (i.e., removing the USB hub completely when importing CDs and transfering to the HD5), plus a re-read of the quick set up guide for the HD5 confirmed that, basically, I should be reading the f*cking manual (i.e., use the mains when transfering to the HD5). So, the bottom line for me it seems to to basically have my portable CD drive in one USB port (my ultraportable X40 doesn't have an optical drive) and the HD5 directly in the other port. No USB hubs to be used. Seems to work that way. More on the sound quality. As I said above, very impressed. Not unlike MD at all. However, there is a hiss when you use sensitive cans. With my Shure e4c canalphones, you can certainly hear the hiss at low volumes, and even the spinning up of the hard drive when selecting tracks. I have to say, this is disappointing to some extent as there was never a hiss when using MD. I guess, to some extent, it's a trade-off. So, when I was reading other posts around the net that some people could not hear a hiss, I'm convinced it's because their headphones are just not sensitive enough (or their ears aren't). Importing CDs is bloody boring. This will take me months as I just don't have the patience to sit and do my entire collection at once. Have done the playlist thing in SS and transfered to the unit - that's pretty sweet. Don't think i'll be using the bookmarks in the HD5. The problem I was having with a track repeating wasn't a problem at all. Turns out I transfered the same CD twice. Yeah, real smart.

Update: so far so good. I found out the hard way that you can't really transfer that well if the unit is connected to the computer via a USB hub (even a USB2 hub). No major problems with transfering, although some CDs that feature extra 'software' or videos sometimes had trouble in SS, but I can't really blame SS for that. Next step is to print out the manual and really get a feel for playlists and then read through this and other forum to find out: 1. Does a playlist created in SS transfer over to the unit? If so, are the songs in the playlist transfered (thus you have two copies of the song on the unit itself)? 2. Bookmarks - gotta read up on them. 3. Firmware 1.2 - gotta read up on that as well. 4. I don't want my music library on my laptop hard drive, so need to find out how others have removed it but, if need be, moved it back if they needed to reinitialise their unit for whatever reason. 5. Time to read the manual (have gotten by so far): seems to only play 1 track on repeat (even though repeat is "off" and 'normal playback' set). My wife had a listen and admitted it's *heaps* better than her iPoo. Personally, i think the sound quality is absolutely spot-on. Yeesh. I've got a lot of transfering to do (no mp3s, just lots of CDs).

After months and months of looking and watching, I bought an HD5 this morning. It was NZ$550 (not too bad) and I've got it charging at the moment. Time enough to write about some initial thoughts (and this will be ongoing as I use it). First, I've always preferred ATRAC and Sony's MD players. I've an N710 minidisc recorder, and absolutely love it, particularly the sound. About five months ago, I couldn't stand 'not knowing' and picked up a 6GB Ipod Mini. It lasted all of 7 hours in my hands. The sound quality was absolutely awful, in my opinion. I tried numerous codecs and bitrates for it, but reasoned that file quality couldn't help the lacklustre audio circuitry of the Ipod. I did head-to-head comparisons with my N710 and the Ipod just couldn't hold a candle. So, I gave it to my wife, and she's tickled pink (and not at all an audiophile). I should also point out that I use a pair of Shure e4c canalphones that I picked up in June. Before that I had been using a pair of Sennheiser PX200 headphones. Anyway, have studied the new Walkman announcements here on the forums (and on others) and just didn't see the likelihood that, here in NZ, we'll see them anytime soon. Having said, it's probably fair to say that we do get some Japanese stuff before North America, but not a huge amount. I had been watching the discussions around the Net re: the HD5, cracking buttons, flimsy USB cover, problems with Sonic Stage, etc. I used Sonic Stage back when it was on version 2.3, but once I realised the optical recordings direct to the MD from my stereo were simple and, more importantly, reminded me of a time when I used to make mixed cassette tapes (I'm an 80s child), I immediately ditched SS. Before I bought the HD5 this morning, I installed SS3.2 and imported a few CDs in preparation for the eventual purchase. Importing went smoothly and the program itself seemed stable enough. I'm running a little IBM X40 ultraportable with a 1.2Ghz Centrino and 512MB of RAM. It's a pretty barebones machine - running mostly Office programs and a few specialised programmes (for statistics), but I generally keep it fairly clean when it comes to software. Convinced that SS would run well enough on my X40, I went out and picked up the HD5 (Black). Brought it home and started charging it. I immediately noticed the incredibly flimsy USB cover. In fact, it looks as if only one of 'guides' to the cover is actually working. Not sure if this is a concern or not, but it's clear I'm going to have to treat this *very* gently. I understand the design rationale behind the cover, but wonder really whether it could have been reinforced somehow. More to come once charging is complete and I start moving some songs over. That will, of course, be the real test.