BearBoy

Yes, you can see it in this video:

Great news! Really glad you got it working again :-)

I had a similar issue with an MDS-JB980 when I replaced the load belt recently: Are you hearing the relay click twice when you reconnect the power? I'm afraid I don't know what the issue was with mine but removing/reinstalling the drive mechanism and ribbon cables fixed it.

Haha. Yeah, some of Sony's ES components were built like absolute tanks. It's a shame they don't make anything like that anymore.

To say I wasn't really doing a proper comparison is something of a massive understatement. In fact, I think I've got muddled here and have been mentally comparing the inside of one of my MDS-JB980s with the inside of the other (no wonder I thought they looked similar...) I opened my MDS-JB940 up this evening to (finally) replace the loading belt and there is a lot more going on inside the 940 compared to the 980, including, as M1JWR noted, a much beefier power section. I suspect this must go some way to explaining the weight difference between the two machines. Anyway, I've now got all of my decks fully functioning again :-) Next on the maintenance list is a portable that needs some attention.

I'm not sure there is necessarily one right answer to "what is the best deck"? I think it really depends on your individual requirements and set-up. I've got both the MDS-JB980 and MDS-JB940 and, for me and my set up, I favour the 980. Not because of NetMD (I've never used it on the 980) but because it has Type S and because the 940, whilst having MDLP, does not support the Group function. The 940 has more connectivity options (coaxial digital out and an extra optical in) and if you stick to SP then I doubt there is any reason to pay extra for a 980. Interesting that you think the 940 is of a much higher build quality. The two machines look nigh on identical and when I had them open I don't recall noticing any massive differences (I didn't have them open at the same time though and wasn't really doing a proper comparison). I did notice that some of the circuit boards in the 980 are labelled "MDS-JB940" and "MDS-JE780". Looking at the user manuals, the 940 does weigh more than its successor (5.3kg vs 4.5kg). I might open them both up at some point and have a nose around :-)

I don't think it's a MiniDisc player Kevin. Looks like it might be one of these: Either way, your advice re SonicStage should hopefully help :-)

Techmoan's just uploaded a new MiniDisc video, this time about an MZ-E620 he picked up for £10. Great tip about the Brasso...

Oh, one other thing I seem to have discovered: those lens cleaning discs are not as effective as a cotton bud and some isopropyl alcohol!

Well, that was, thankfully, fairly simple to resolve and didn't require me to go messing about in service menus or fiddling with tiny, fragile switches etc. :-) I took the lid off and gave the laser lens a clean with some isopropyl alcohol. Whilst doing so, I noticed a small hair in the disc mechanism near, but not actually touching, the lens so I removed that as well. Hey presto, the deck can now read any disc I put into it. Two things still confuse me somewhat: Why it suddenly stopped reading discs overnight when I had left a disc in it. I hadn't noticed any gradual increase in the time it took to read the TOC leading up to the issue. Why it was able to read the CD disc cleaning disc without any issues but not any MO discs. Anyway, the main thing is my deck is now working again and I can put my search for a cheap donor MDS-JE480 back on hold :-) Thanks for all of your advice and suggestions Kevin and Stephen; they were very much appreciated.

:-) Good to know!

The only CD type disc I have is that lens cleaning disc. I never bothered buying any pre-recorded MiniDisc albums back in the 1990s as it was cheaper to buy the CD and a blank disc. I have looked at a few on eBay more recently but anything I was vaguely interested in seemed to be fairly expensive. I suppose just having anything might be useful for test purposes though. If the Service Menu does tell you what sort of disc is inserted, I'm not sure I'd be able to access it quick enough before the deck ejects the MO discs following the C13 error message? I'll take a look in the Service Manual and see if I can find anything there.

My deck is a slot loading one too. I've just inserted a clear recordable disc (with the record protect tab slid into the protected position) and can see a small blue pin through the small hole in the edge of the disc (i.e. where the tab slides into) and am pretty sure I can see a white pin behind the blue one. Without a disc inserted I can see the white pin but the blue one appears to be obscured by a piece of metal, which I think drops down when the disc is inserted. So it looks like both pins are there and I'm pretty sure they're both poking through the appropriate holes in the recordable disc.

Thanks both. I have located the dimple. Have tried peering through the loading slot but cannot see the pins. Hopefully I'll get a better view when I get inside.

So the deck might be trying to read the MO discs as though they were CD discs and is thus unable to? Kevin mentioned a "dimple" in his earlier post that tells the deck whether the disc is an MO or CD disc. I'll see if I can find out where that is and where the corresponding sensor in the deck is. Might be worth checking that, if I can, when I open the deck up later. Thanks Stephen.

Ha - I thought I had too many MiniDisc machines

Thanks for the suggestion Kevin. I left the machine unplugged from the mains for about 30 minutes but unfortunately it has not made any difference. You're right re your suspicion: the MDS-JB980 has a "soft" power button that puts the machine into a standby mode rather than actually powering it off. My MDS-JE500 has a similar "soft" power button on the front panel but also has a "Main Power" switch located on the back, which does actually appear to switch off the machine completely. They seem to have dropped this feature by the time they made the MDS-JB940 and MDS-JB980.

Thanks Kevin - useful information. I was wondering whether it kept the details of a loaded disc in memory somewhere whilst in standby. Do you know if those batteries ever need replacing? I am 99% sure no C13 error appeared when I first tried to play the disc. From what I can remember, I manually ejected the disc as I could hear it spinning and nothing was happening (no audio and no time counter progressing on the screen - just the track name displayed). Like you suggest, I suspect the deck "knew" about the disc but was unable to actually start playing back the audio.

Yes, that sort of white blur about halfway across the disc is the brush. Absolutely no idea if it actually does any good. Certainly didn't in this case lol I've got another cleaning disc which is a head and lens cleaner. That looks like a standard recordable MiniDisc but does have a brush attached to the underside of the disc too. The topside of the disc has some sort of matt pink coating. You supposedly play it to clean the lens and record on it to clean the head. Again, no idea if it actually does anything useful...

I had been reading your thread about the C13 errors on your MDS-JE530 and how the ribbon cables were the culprit. Was going to reseat them whilst I had the lid off but was just a bit confused as to why my deck could read the cleaning disc without any issues. Good to see you've found your way back too Kevin!

Here's a photograph of this particular one. Not sure how easy it is to see from the photograph but the bottom of the disc is almost completely exposed and it has a small white fluffy brush attached to it. The disc has three tracks on it that play some classical music whilst a lady reads some instructions and then confirms that the cleaning has completed.

Turned on my MDS-JB980 this morning. Screen displays the title of the MiniDisc I had left in the deck overnight. I press play and the name of the first track appears but I can just hear the disc spinning and no audio. After about 10 seconds of this I eject and re-insert the disc at which point I get TOC Reading followed by C13 Read Error. Tried the disc a couple of times with the same results. Try a number of other discs and the same thing happens. The discs all work fine in another deck. I'll disconnect the deck and take the lid off this evening to try cleaning the lens with some isopropyl alcohol but in the meantime I thought I'd try a lens cleaning disc. This worked fine. The deck recognised the disc without any issues and it played fine. Unfortunately it does not appear to have had effect on the deck's ability to play any other discs. I'm guessing that the lens cleaning disc is a pre-recorded/pressed disc. Is there any reason why the deck would recognise and play this without any issues but not play any home recorded discs? Something to do with the required laser power or something?

Ran the same tests but using LP2 mode instead of SP and it was much quicker: 4 x .m4a files - 01:47 5 x .wav files - 01:58 With the m4a files, the "converting" stage seemed to take much longer than the "uploading" stage.

Re the duration question, I just did a test with a four track EP (18:44 in length) and that took 5:22 to record across to an MD in SP mode. The source files were 256kbps .m4a (AAC) files. For comparison I then tried five songs off an album I had stored as .wav files (18:42 in length) and that took 05:56 to record across in SP mode.

Gapless worked fine for me when I tested it.