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Semi related question: Can anyone here comment on the SQ of the ZX2 walkman playing a straight PCM rip of a CD vs the same CD recorded onto a 1GB Hi-MD disc played back on an MZ-RH1? I had an RH1 for a few years and it was the best sounding portable I'd ever owned. Through EX700 IEMs it was bliss playing PCM. I've since gone back to my old standard MD units since selling the RH1 due to job loss a few years ago. I'm now planning/saving to get a superior portable in the next couple of years again..should I go back to the good ol RH1 or will the ZX2 give me equal or greater SQ on PCM? Or is it purely subjective? Hmmm

ah interesting data bluecrab, I didn't actually know the DAC designations before. Yeah I was just basing my configuration on subjective listening, going through the 980 just sounds more refined to me for all sources I've tried so far.

Thanks for your reply Philippe, Yes my CDP-991 redbook CD player isn't a slouch in the DAC department but the 980 is just better so I run optical from it to the 980 then analogue from 980 to amp. Also have my DVD player usually occupying the coax input. Ah yes when I referred to Type S on the 980 I was aware that it includes type R, but wasn't aware that only type R is the active system for SP recordings even on a type S deck. As for re-recording I don't have a lot of the CDs I recorded in the 90s. I was in a Japan club at university in Australia and the Japanese and Australian students pooled their CDs for MD recording. I also joined up at a japanese convenience store in Sydney to rent their CDs and VHS and dubbed a lot of stuff from there.. Since then I have actually acquired the original CDs to a lot of stuff I recorded then (Jpop CDs from the 90s are now dirt cheap in Japan) but now I'm actually more interested in recording live concerts onto MD from laserdisc. I'm happy with the quality of the recordings I made on my R30 and now want to record new and different stuff I guess, just hopefully a little superior on the 980...

I always wanted one of those cool wireless MD keyboards but I actually prefer to do my titling through x-appli and the net MD link, it's the easiest option isn't it?

My current collection, players on the left, accessories on the right. PCDPs include D-E01, D-EJ01, D-777, D515, Tape walkman is WM-RX822, MD units include but not limited to MZ-E75 x 2 (red version is my current EDC), MZ-E10 - dead of course : (, MZ-R30, MZ-R91. Headphones include MDR-D55, MDR-EX700, MDR-V6. Cases are by Sony and Porter

​Me too, my first MD unit was an MZ-R30 in 1997. I tested it out the other day on mains and it still works flawlessly. Wasn't game to test the weird rounded rechargable battery which I still have. I still have all of the hundreds of recordings I did on it from optical on PDCP and they still sound great. Those were great recordings. Definitely a mini deck. Last year after I sold my Hi-MD walkman and discs (ebay prices too good) I bought a mint MDS-JB980 for a good price. I'm still playing with it and as a DAC it is great and I think I can top my R30 recordings with Type S and analogue source from SACD but not by much.

I have a D777 and it subjectively sounds better to me than my D-E01 and D-EJ01s. With ESP turned on, while being carried around. I remember reading various pieces around the internet on ESP, it seems no one really knew for sure what the processing was doing to the data. Some said it just buffered it uncompressed and some said it needed to compress it to achieve this. Then others say it's compressed on early examples of ESP (like the D777) but not on later examples? Or was it ESP vs G-protection? Maybe try searching for that and some articles should come up. One is compressed? My memory is hazy..

Isn't that a myth that freezing batteries actually extends their usable lives?

I sold my mint RH-1 a couple of years back when I lost my job. Still regret it. There is no portable I've ever heard (and I've heard a lot) that sounds as good. With my EX700s and a PCM HiMD recording I was in audio ecstasy every day on the train. I have a minty JB980 now which makes great recordings that I play back on one of my old MZ-E75s..it's not the same though, the gear just can't technically match HiMD no matter how much it's refined, it sounds mostly and honestly muddy in comparison. After all std MD IS a compressed format.. Once you go Hi, it's hard to go back.. One thing you might consider is the Sony X2 DAP, it's getting very good reviews and might be a solution to play back your CD rips uncompressed.. lack of inline stick remote and the price keep me away though..

I picked up this at a pawn store recently along with the VGP-XL1B changer unit. I can't get that to work but that's for another post... Originally the XL100 had Windows 8 installed on it (!?) so I've done a fresh install of Windows XP. Since then I've been messing with drivers and trying to get the various A/V inputs and outputs to function. HDMI works even with no drivers installed. The component video out will not function. I need this to connect it to my main display, a KVHR-36 CRT TV with no HDMI. After messing with settings and drivers (sigmatel audio) for hours I got the coax digital audio to work. However I cannot get the component video to output. I've tried all the drivers on the Sony.co.uk support page as well as Nvidia's drivers. None of them seem to make the video card fully functional. I've thought about a cheap HDMI to composite video converter off ebay but would much prefer the more elegant solution of actually using the machine as intended. Could anyone here offer some advice please? Thank you!

Yes sadly the belief that new always equals better is firmly entrenched in the general public's mind.

Why can't the same thing happen to Minidisc and Laserdisc? Maybe in 30 years..? Is 3D printing our only hope..?

There is no fun in downloading. I'm sick of computers and stuffing around with another link in the chain. Well done on archiving your LPs to the physical media built for sound by people that knew good sound (raw bitrate/depth, isn't everything) I'm having audio problems with my LD player at the moment but soon as I source another one I'm going to start doing a lot of LD recordings. I've just finished transferring over all my out of print downloads on my PC that would otherwise be impossible to get (some only released on cassette tape) to my JB980. Now I'm going back to 1996, uninstalling x-appli, deleting all digital music files, having physical media only and just doing direct recordings, the good ol simple way. I'm not personally interested in vinyl recordings (I'm from the digital era) but I'm sure there are people here that are. I would interested in good MD recordings from live Laserdiscs.

row height: 36mm A, C width: 549mm B, D width: 50mm This leaves a little extra overlap at the end of the spine indent for labels on a disc, more on TDK discs than Sony. I like to cut off the extra after it's stuck on the disc to get a more flush fit. These are nothing fancy of course, I've seen what that guy did with photoshop (has a lot of the same taste in Jpop as me) but I don't have time for that. I like to keep my discs clean too with all the original design and OEM lettering/icons visible. This is for the more mimimalist/purely functional approach to archiving your discs I guess.

That's a key thing imo. Even if you blu-tooth up your mobile as a remote for your DAP you have to look at the screen to pause it. I never have to look down, I can just reach for the remote and feel the stop or pause buttons if I need to. Whenever I walk into stores I like to pause it if I need to talk to staff.

Sorry the screen grab didn't come out very well. I've just adjusted row height and column width to match MD spines. Columns B and and D are there so I could easily put in short borders as a cutting guide without having a border all the way around the label that would be inconsistently cut.

Sorry I gave it a go but got the following message: "You aren't permitted to upload this kind of file"

Thanks, Yeah I'm old too. I used to just copy everything I liked that my friends had at university in the late 90s. I was in a Japan club and they had a pool of jpop CDs where most of those recordings came from, all done on optical from a discman to an MZ-R30 which still operates flawlessly today. The recordings still sound great with that MD "kick".. some of the recordings came from renting from a Japanese convenience store in Sydney then too and from a couple of trips to Japan and rentals from Tsutaya in the early 2000s..this was when I loved Japanese pop music (among many other genres) but was too poor to pay what CDs cost back then, especially import Japanese domestic stuff (would run $50-$70 AUD when ordered through Australian music stores). I just printed onto mailing labels and cut them up so they're self adhesive. Hey how can I upload a file here?

ha that's cool. Might be a future project for me. Meanwhile I've been redoing the labels on my old MDs using MS Excel, an inkjet printer and a stanley knife. This is after BOTH of the MDP-1 label printers I got off Yahoo Japan auctions failed to power up despite being in pristine exterior condition in their original boxes : ( Before: After:

That's pretty damn cool but is it normal for 3D printers to produce that kind of odd texture on flat surfaces like on the top of your units? I guess if you were going to use one as a master there would some sanding involved before you made molds?

We need a Sony time machine. It would look like an Aibo and ask you when you want to go to. Anywhen from 1979 to 1999.

That's right, MD requires a higher plane of consciousness. You must remove your remote before your backpack my son. Go in peace.

The remotes are part of the experience imo. They were a status symbol back in the 90s. You had that backlit beacon on your jacket or shirt.. Useful too imo, Just today I was buying beer and didn't have to remove my IEMs to complete the transaction, didn't have to do an awkward cable removal which seems to be the only remote way to pause a modern DAP. just tapped my RM MZ2s which was securely on my backpack strap. I don't have any problem with cable lengths, most Sony head/earphones designed for portables have a basic shorter length designed for use with remotes and then an extender cable for direct from unit use. I mostly use D55 eggphones and MDR-EX700 in ear units.. btw I'm after a black RM MZ2s currently and found apparantly unlimited mint condition ones on Tao Bao! Are these for real? Fakes?! Might order one through a proxy and see what happens? http://item.taobao.com/item.htm?spm=a230r.1.14.6.kTmis0&id=2432754144&ns=1&abbucket=0#detail

A minty black MDS-JB980 from Dutch ebay seller specialproductsholland (recommended). A red MZ-E75 from Yahoo auctions (seller sent a bonus silver E75 but didn't include the pictured black remote which I wanted, sent a skeleton remote instead : ( 8 x Sony ES blanks from Yahoo auctions to add to the stash. 2 x Sony MZP-1 MD label printers from Yahoo auctions - both appear mint condition but DOA, no power up : ( Neotech Origin connects Now the DAC on the 980 is damn great, it's improved the sound from my entry level SCD-XE800 SACD player a lot, got coax into the 980 for redbook and analogue in for SACD. I've been making some recordings from laserdisc over optical, namely Eric Clapton in Hyde Park and a Mariah Carey disk. I'd previously recorded these in PCM on to my Hi MD unit that I sold when I was out of work. Now I wish I'd never heard my MZ-RH1 because it makes standard MD recordings of the same source so disappointing! I might just have to save up for another RH1 but at least the 980 gives me a kick ass DAC and who knows I might be able to tweak it for some kick ass redbook recordings in the future..I'd prefer to stick to standard MD from now on because of the nostalgia but also because of the amount of peripherals and replacement units still available..

Hi, sorry for the late reply, I rarely check these forums but I should change that. I've been studying my Sony black boxes for you. I've looked at every surface inside and out and the only printing I can find is the Sony logo on the left of the top drawer and ABS printed on the underside. Not even a sticker or a serial number in sight! It's really kinda bizarre, even my Sony mobile stand has a model number. Even my Sony cable adaptors have model numbers! Sorry I couldn't help. I've only ever seen these on the ebay auction I bought them from. Seller said he bought them in a store in Australia and they had been special imported from Japan, ie not world wide product. All I can suggest is scour Yahoo Japan auctions. Good luck, they look so bad ass on the desk next to my new JB980!