A440

When it was introduced, the Mac compatibility raised the price by something like $100. Do you need Mac compatibility? http://www.minidisc.org/part_Sony_MZ-M100+RH10.html Those Browser pages have good information on all units. But many people were extremely disappointed with the RH10. http://forums.minidisc.org/index.php?showtopic=16703 It is extremely unlikely that units before the RH1 will ever be able to upload legacy MD formats. Sony always claimed it was a hardware limitation, not something that could be remedied with software. Certainly the SonicStage 3.4 and 4.x software that allow the RH1 to upload the old MD formats do not allow that uploading with other units. You don't need the MZ-M200. Unlike the M100 vs. the RH10, the only difference between the M200 and the RH1 is that there's a mediocre Sony microphone (DS70P) in the bundle. The RH1 is already Mac compatible. Of course, if there's an MZ-M200 at a price lower than the RH1, grab it, and you can sell the mic.

Welcome, Gillano. If you could post a recording of those Rode NT3s to the Gallery, a lot of people would love to hear it.

I hope you do. There have been a couple of queries here lately about uploading NetMD downloads, and if this is a solution, then that's good to know. Hi-MD won't be omnipotent until it's drag-and-drop. Then...watch out! In the meantime, given all the goofy ways people mess up their MD's--saving the .hma files on a hard drive, wiping original copies off the PC--the more information we have, the better. One person's weird, slow workaround might just be another's lifesaver.

Keep a copy outside SonicStage in .wav format (or .flac to save space)--on your hard drive, on CD, on DVD, etc. You can do anything you want with a .wav file. The copy you download to another disc can't be uploaded again from that disc. But you can import the .wav file to SonicStage and download it to MDs--uncompressed (PCM) or compressed--as many times as you want. You must have SonicStage 3.2 or above--the earlier ones were junk anyway.

Well, I was trying to be fair-minded about the Edirol R09, and all the early reviews were excited about it, but if opinion is that sharply divided, I'd steer clear. I don't think you'll find anyone who hates the RH1. And since you already know MD--and all its old quirks--the MZ-RH1 is going to seem like heaven. Especially since you can upload your existing recordings.

With greenmachine's mics you should be able to record amplified music through line-in with a battery module.

Left channel only usually means you're putting a mono plug into a stereo jack. Does that 1/8" miniplug have two circles around it (like your headphone plug or the one in my avatar) or just one? One is mono. Also, the XLR to 1/4" might be mono. You've got to split the mono signal from the mic into stereo--it should be pretty easy to find an adaptor that does that.

No idea why the NWA1000 works. But if you're having the same problem with other USB devices, it may be a Windows problem rather than SonicStage. Try Start/Run.../sfc /scannow to repair Windows files. That's sfc SPACE SLASH scannow. It's explained here: http://www.compphix.com/windowsfileprotection.html

It's not that scary. It's only saying that if you take the file off your hard drive....then it's not on the hard drive. Your standard delete message, garbled by Sony. The thing about restoring means restoring from the minidisc. You can't download the track from My Library to a disc as a NetMD track, delete it from the computer, and then upload the NetMD track back from the disc. The lame-brained idea is to prevent music copying. Which can be accomplished much more easily with any CD burner anyway. If it's your own recording on the disc--not a NetMD download--you can always upload it (since SS 3.2, I think). And if you own the CD, you can always import the track. SonicStage doesn't remember and doesn't care.

For your purposes, any Hi-MD recorder will do the job. There aren't that many: MZ-NH700, MZ-NHF800 (NH700 plus radio remote), MZ-NH900, MZ-RH910, MZ-RH10, MZ-RH1. The MZ-M** units are Mac compatible, and you pay a premium for that; otherwise, MZ-M100 is the MZ-RH10, MZ-M10 is the MZ-RH910 and MZ-M200 is the MZ-RH1 (which is already Mac compatible) plus a mediocre Sony DS70P microphone. The NH* units can record (realtime, mic-in or line-in) to old MD formats SP, LP2 or LP4. They can't upload those formats--only the Hi-MD formats Hi-SP, Hi-LP or PCM--but they could record them if you wanted something backwards compatible with an old MD. The first RH* units--not the RH1, which does everything--got rid of legacy format recording and, instead, added mp3 playback. Before, to play back an .mp3 file it had to be converted to ATRAC. This would have been a useful improvement EXCEPT that the mp3 playback didn't sound so good--the top end was cut off, though it could be helped a bit by changing the Sound settings for EQ. For recording, they are the same as the NH* units. The RH1 can record in all formats, MD or Hi-MD, and upload all formats. It also has un-crippled mp3 playback. Prior to the RH1, I prefer the NH700 because of the easily replaceable battery instead of the rechargeable gumstick (though the RH910 also has an outboard battery pod, like the NH900), and because I have a separate mp3 player for mp3s. The RH10 had a fancy display and lots of problems. The RH710 and NH600 only have line-in jacks; the DH10P and NH600D only accept USB input, for downloading music from the computer. (Strangely enough, the MZ-NH600D will upload Hi-MD recordings as well, though you'd have to make the recordings on a different unit.) You can find more details in the browser.

It's all here in the browser: http://www.minidisc.org/part_Sony_MZ-NH900.html If you get a really good price on it, go for it. It has some musician-friendly features like pitch control on playback. But it also has some down sides. Most important, for some people the buttons get screwy and start to control the wrong functions. Send a message to the seller and ask for a guarantee that there are no button problems. Also make sure it includes accessories like the outboard battery pod, AC adapter (which plugs in to recharge the rechargeable battery) and remote. None of those is a deal-breaker--you can find replacements--but it would be nice to have them all, and you should pay less if they're not included. Also, some smaller design drawbacks: The battery latch can come open and the gumstick can pop out--you have to tape it shut. The display is unlit and behind smoky plastic, so it's not that easy to read. Pause and Stop are on the same button, so you have to be careful that you're only pausing the recording if you want to pause. It will still do the most important thing, which is recording and uploading. But I owned one for a while and, frankly, I prefer the NH700/NHF800.

Can you upload a copy of the player software?

parilla: How quiet will the classical music be that you are recording? I ask because the RH1 does make an occasional whirring noise while spinning up the disc, and if you are recording a solo instrument in a quiet recital room, etc., you may hear it on the recording. At a rock or jazz concert, it is well masked by the ambient noise, and I haven't heard it in orchestral recordings I have made, but it is a possibility. For that reason you might want to look more closely at the flash recorders. I don't like the bulk or obviousness of the built-in mics on the Edirol or the Zoom, but if you don't have to be stealthy they might serve you well. You shouldn't use any kind of mic that sits on a minidisc unit, because then you'll definitely hear the whirring noise. A few feet away on a cord makes a lot of difference. Low Volta is correct about the MS907. You might not need those low frequencies for a string quartet, but you would want to capture them with an orchestra or a piano (bottom A=27.5 Hz). -------------- Karl P, here's a place to buy windscreens. They have some small ones. http://www.pro-sound.com/Catalog/MICACCSS/1.htm You might also try http://www.bhphoto.com

If you're used to MD then Hi-MD might be just the ticket. Get the MZ-RH1, and you can upload all your old SP recordings--no more realtime. It's got Line-in and mic-in. With Hi-MD you can do 90 minutes of PCM or 8 hours of Hi-SP (equivalent to your old-school deck) on the 1GB disks. (They're not backward compatible with your deck, though.) A Hi-MD unit is palm-sized and you could limit vibration by putting it on something soft. It's probably more shockproof than a deck anyway since it's made for portable use. If vibration is a problem, then you might not want a hard-drive recorder. Flash recorders like the Edirol should also do the job, though you would want to look at its recording interface--the MD would be more familiar, and Sony has long since figured out on-unit editing, track marks, etc. I've never tried the Edirol R09, but its users seem to be happy with it. Personally I don't need the built-in mics, and I've already got the MD habit.

If I were you, I'd stick to the Sharp. The T20 does have auto gain control, it says here: http://www.ciao.co.uk/IRiver_T20_MP3_playe...6#productdetail It looks to me like a unit similar to the T30 with a rechargeable battery instead of a AAA. And the Sharp MD is using compressed files, too: ATRAC instead of mp3. But the crucial factor is the analog-to-digital converter: the processor that converts sound to numbers. And in my experience, it's just much better with minidisc--maybe it's faster, maybe it's bigger, but it gives much better sounding results. I tried using my T30 for music with the same mics and battery module I usually plug into my MD unit's line-in, at the same show, and it was nowhere near the quality of the MD recording. As RBR says, you also have far less control during the recording. A full preamp would be about the size of your MD unit, so you're actually adding bulk and extra connections to your setup; a battery module, which only gives the signal a slight boost that's usually enough for recording amplified concerts, is smaller, of course. The ECM 719 is a low-sensitivity microphone, which means that even with a battery module the results could be quiet. I haven't used one, so I don't know how much quieter it is. If it does need a full preamp, you'd be better off buying a more sensitive mic. A battery module would be a good investment for show taping anyway, however. You can use it through Line-in with the minidisc unit and probably get better recordings of loud music than you do through the mic jack. You can build one with Greenmachine's instructions, http://forums.minidisc.org/index.php?showtopic=11254 or get one like this: http://www.microphonemadness.com/products/mmcbmminminc.htm and try it with both the Sharp MD and the T20 and see what you think. You might call Mic Madness and ask them how the battery module works with the ECM 719, and whether they'll let you try it out and return it if it doesn't work well. Maybe the T20 will work better for you than my T30 does for me, and you'll get good mp3 recordings you can easily upload. But I think you'll be disappointed in the sound quality. Use the T20 as a voice recorder and a portable player--it's great for that.

It depends on what you are recording. For speech or quiet sounds you're going to need a preamp. For anything amplified you can usually get away with using a battery module--I do all my non-classical concert recording through line-jn with little mics (Sound Professionals BMC-2) and this battery module: http://www.microphonemadness.com/products/mmcbmminminc.htm You could also build Greenmachine's battery box, as above. But note: That's not a preamp. It gives some extra power to the mics, and boosts their signal slightly, but unamplified sounds will come through very quiet. Given the prices of older units on Ebay now, you might as well bite the bullet and get an MD with a mic jack--it will be cheaper than a separate preamp, with nothing else to plug in (although mic-->battery module-->Line-in is still the way to go with music). You're looking for something like this, I guess: http://cgi.ebay.com/PROFESSIONAL-ELECTRET-...8QQcmdZViewItem but that would be a mono microphone geared for speech, probably low-fidelity and who knows how noisy. Hard to tell whether it's actually preamplified or just battery-powered, too. Seriously, think about getting a mic-in unit. You'll be happier with the recordings and you'll have less electronics to carry around. If all you need is a voice recorder, you could also check out Ebay for the now-discontinued iRiver IFP-795 (512 MB) or IFP-799 (1GB) or the 1GB (red) T30, which I've used for surprisingly good speech recordings with their built-in mics. They record in .mp3 and you can drag-and-drop the recordings from the unit to PC or Mac (with Iriver software for the IFPs, directly through USB with the T30) . Recordings on a NetMD unit are stuck on the disc--the only way to copy them is to record them in realtime from the headphone jack, unless you know someone with the MZ-RH1 who can upload them.

I have the blue model and the blue zone isn't blue plastic, but is under a clear lacquer. The painted labels (like MARK) on top of the lacquer wear off, but otherwise it's fine. So maybe it's better than the silver version. There's some paint wear on the corners too. But this is after two years of very constant use, and I think it's minimal.

I don't know about SimpleBurner but my guess is that if SonicStage has your drivers, you can use it. Why not just get it from Downloads and try it? Decks won't upload. You need the MZ-RH1, which uploads all formats (SP, LP2, LP4, Hi-LP, Hi-SP, PCM) EXCEPT songs you downloaded from CD to computer through SonicStage onto NetMD units.

Jen and Dan, you were the lucky recipients of my crankiness overload. Don't worry, it only happens about once every 20 minutes. Jen, I agree completely with your larger point about proprietary formats and proprietary software. Generally I hate them, and so does the marketplace--they rarely last (except of course for Windows and .wma, which survives because it's a near-monopoly bullying the software market). Same thing with DRM audio. If they don't trust me, they're not getting my business--I won't buy DRM files, period, and yes, that includes iTunes. The reason I tolerate the proprietary format of minidisc is simply because the hardware is so useful. When I got my first MD unit, it was a huge leap upward from cassette recorders: digital quality! random access! track marks! titling! And while I'll probably switch to a flash recorder when someone makes one with quality and convenience similar to MD or better--the technology is available, and I don't know what companies are waiting for--at the moment I still find my Hi-MD units to be little wonders. What I was saying was that NetMDs, like turntables and cassette players, don't upload, were never made to upload, can't upload and never promised they would upload. They didn't have this capability only to have Sony remove it--they never had it. [stanton, Denon and Numark now make turntables with digital outputs. I don't hold it against them that my old Denon doesn't have a digital output. ] It's a measure of Sony's general idiocy regarding minidiscs--and probably stupid lawyer paranoia about music copying--that NetMD wasn't made two-way to begin with. That choice has been generally disastrous for minidisc as a format. But it has been three years since Sony made its last NetMDs, so to me that's ample time for people to figure out what they do and what they don't do. Personally I think the absoute best bit of pressure placed on Sony came from Marcnet with Hi-MD Renderer. When Hi-MD first appeared, Sony trumpeted that you could finally get the recordings off Hi-MD and into Sonicstage--where, it seemed, Sony was ready to leave them. Marcnet wrote Hi-MD Renderer, which (to my limited technical knowledge) didn't illegally crack Sony's encryption, but played tracks back via SonicStage's DirectX filters in the computer at high speed to "record" them and then convert them. [someone correct me if I've mis-explained that.] Lo and behold, after Hi-MD Renderer appeared, Sony offered .wav converter and you could finally get usable, unencrypted files of your recordings. We'll never know if Sony was ever going to offer that feature otherwise.

Since it's brand new I suggest you just uninstall and reinstall SonicStage--either 4.2 or the disc with the unit (3.4 ?) But FIRST run the Backup Tool if there's anything in My Library, just in case. Also think about the usual culprits for this: antivirus and firewall software. But maybe there was just something a little off in the 4.2 installation.

The ECM-MS957 is already a directional microphone with two adjustable pickup angles: 90 degrees or 120 degrees. http://www.epinions.com/pr-Microphones_Son...lay_~full_specs You might try switching it to the narrower angle. Also tell the people behind you to shut the &$#$ up. That mic may also sound overly bright (unlike the people talking behind you) because its bass response only goes down to 50 Hz and is losing the lowest 1 1/2 octaves of bass, from 20-50 Hz. Human hearing is 20-20,000 Hz.

raintheory is right--I was living in the past, with my own happy memories of the MZ-R700. A used-to-near-death unit is not a bargain. And as the old units get older, they're just getting more wear. There's nothing special about the MZ-R700 and its ribbon cable; I seem to remember other units like the MZ-N10 having even more problems with that. But if you buy a NetMD unit (MZ-N, not MZ-NH), you are definitely getting something older. I suggest you save up a bit and get a new MZ-NH700. It will do CD-quality recording and upload it, and in my experience it is a very hard unit to kill. The older units, which only record compressed formats, sound very good UNTIL you hear the Hi-MD units. If you really can't scrape up the extra $80, then be sensible on eBay. What you hope for on eBay is the left-in-the-closet unit: the one somebody bought, never really warmed to, and set aside. Minidisc is such an unconventional and quirky format that some people never bothered with the learning curve. But as time passes, there are fewer and fewer mint-condition units around. Hi-MD was introduced in 2004. Anything before that is already a minimum of two or three years old. By the way, you can look at every model here: http://www.minidisc.org/equipment_browser.html If you buy on eBay, you need at minimum: An in-focus pic of the actual unit--not a stock photo. Look to see if paint is worn off around buttons or the jog dial. If it is, you know that it's gotten a lot of use and could be on its last legs. Good feedback over 95%. Many people don't leave bad feedback for fear of retaliation, so you should take a serious look at any bad feedback. There are two regular sellers of Hi-MD units on eBay, Pramit and Digitallimits (2000 and something, I forget). For all I know they're the same seller--both in the same town if I remember right. They sell new units and they have been around for a while. You might be able to grab an NH700 for $150-$160 from them, but you're probably never going to get it under $100.

The MZ-NH700 is the best recorder for your purposes, but it is going to set you back $180 or so. http://www.minidiscaccess.com Is it important to you to be able to upload the file to your computer? Or are you content to leave the recording on the minidisc? If you really, truly, definitely don't care about being able to upload the recording, then you can get an under-$100 bargain with a NetMD recorder or an even older recorder. I have gotten excellent use from the MZ-N707 and the MZ-R700. The only way to get recordings out of those units is to record in realtime from the headphone jack. Don't be deceived by the USB connection on the MZ-N707 (or any other MZ-N unit). Only NH* or RH* units will upload recordings.

My experience is like Greenmachine's. I carry it in a pocket without the case, so yes, after two years some of the lettering--MARK in MARK/REC and the raised SONY logo--is worn off. Probably where I grip it with my acidic fingers. By then you should know where the buttons are anyway, and who manufactured it.... There's what seems to be a clear lacquer coating on that part of the unit--the smaller square that covers most of the front--so it's not like paint is flaking off the case, just that the painted lettering on top of the lacquer has been worn away. If you have problems with the battery latch, you can always tape it shut, but it's not a problem for me. I often slip the unit in or out of a pocket and I just grip it by the battery bulge, so it doesn't open. In a case you should have no problem at all. Even if it were to open, this is not like the old battery latch problems with the R900 or RH900, where the gumstick would pop out. Even if the battery latch opens, the battery stays connected. The main reasons to get the RH1 are the legacy MD uploading (a big reason, if you need it) and the fact that it holds recording settings (a small convenience). Otherwise you're just as well off with the MZ-NH700 and, using the money you saved, the backlit RM-MC40ELK remote.

There is a way: the MZ-RH1. Get one before you get another deck, since it does everything the deck does--plus uploading and higher-quality recording--except take up shelf space. And I've got a problem, too: my toaster won't play satellite radio broadcasts, and I'm very upset about it....