highlandsun

record a talk show? I don't understand why MD is any worse than cassette for that. quick ffwd/rew - yeah, I definitely feel this is a weak spot on my current units. I think my MZR50 is pretty good though, and there's no technical reason why they can't scan faster, the way DVD ffwd/rew is done. change while driving - no problem for me, but I usually don't need to. Single slot MD/CD head unit, push eject, pull out old MD, pop in new one. No more fuss than an old cassette head unit. durable player - My MZR50 has fallen from my belt pouch onto concrete floors dozens of times ('cause I'm an idiot) and it still works fine. My MZN10 has been dropped 5-6 times already too, still going strong. battery drain - this is definitely annoying, and there's no excuse for it. All they need to do is add a second internal battery or capacitor to keep the in-memory TOC alive when the main battery dies, so that the TOC update can be done after you put in a fresh main battery. I've been bitten by this many times, and I hate the stupidity of it all.

Sounds like it's choking on a part of the music. If you don't mind, I'd like to get a copy of the file that's causing the problem so I can play with it. In the meantime, I've generated a short WAV file that caused my ATRAC3 encoder to crash. I got around it by editing the WAV file and normalizing the volume to 90%. This tells me there were some samples hitting full volume in the 16 bit samples, and the codec was getting a math overflow error. It's not enough to have a program to convert any other audio format to ATRAC3. I already have that. You also have to store it in OMG format, or figure out the encryption being used in the USB download...

I ordered it from Japan via Japan-Direct. But today I would probably buy some other product instead, because there are two or three similar boxes that are already sold in the US, and with discounts you'll get it cheaper. Check out this Yamaha for example http://www.zzounds.com/item--YAMUW10 My Canopus MD-Port works well enough, but it only supports 44.1khz sample rate. Most other devices on the market are multi-rate (32, 44.1, and 48khz) which can be important if you have DAT or other devices to hook up.

You need an MD deck with digital audio output, and something to bring digital audio into the PC. Some sound cards have digital audio jacks. I use a Canopus MD-Port which converts optical to USB audio.

That's an interesting point. But in that case, since you already have an outboard ADC, you may just want to record on a portable hard drive.

That's "AAC" - Advanced Audio Codec - not "ACC" ... There is no way to go directly from one format to another. You always have to decode to PCM and then re-encode in the target format (ATRAC3 in this case).

The new HiMD supports USB 1.1, not USB 2.0. The available formats are already listed in the published specs. You can choose ATRAC3plus or PCM for uploadable live recordings. PCM would be simplest if you want to edit it directly. Anything else needs to be decoded to PCM format anyway.

You don't. Reformatting a disc means wiping out all of its old content.

I just use NiMH rechargeables, and keep a fast charger with me when I travel...

There can be a sound quality issue. Microphones output very low level signals which need to be amplified before passing to the rest of the system. The MD unit's internal mic amplifiers may be of low quality. In general, they will not be capable of recording a very wide dynamic range because they have very little power to work with. If you use the Line-In, you must use an external mic amp. Going this route, you can use the best quality amp you can afford, you're not stuck with whatever is in the MD unit. An external amp will have its own power supply, probably much more powerful than the MD unit's. So it will be able to handle very wide dynamic range without distortion. Personally I've never had any problem with the audio quality of mic recordings I've made on my MZR50 or MZN10. I also don't go to rock concerts though, and I've never needed to record anything that was ear-splittingly loud. I play fiddle, I go to see acoustic performances, etc., and I don't see much need for more power here.

It should sound the same. When playing back an ATRAC recording, the hardware doesn't make any decisions, it just has to reconstruct the bits as they were encoded. The improvements in ATRAC versions have all been on the encoding side, where the decisions are made about what bits to allocate to what signals. There may be some exceptions because newer hardware may have used higher precision DSPs than older hardware, but in general any recording will playback identically across all ATRAC hardware.

A voltage regulator may be overkill here; they're generally used to drop an unregulated input and produce a regulated output. Here you have a fully regulated 5V input. A single 3V zener diode, or 3 silicon rectifier diodes in series, will be enough. I always choose a simpler component when possible, for greater reliability...

That's odd, I have an adaptaplug from Radio Shack that works with my MZN10. It's a type 'B' adaptaplug. Who makes the FM Modulator you're using? I have one ("irock") that runs on two AAA cells, it's a bit weak on runtime. The only advantage is that it's portable, I've used it indoors when visiting people who have a radio but no stereo system with aux inputs.

If you're so keen on MP3 or other formats, use the HiMD as purely a data drive, hooked up to a separate MP3 player. Like this one from Sandisk: http://pc.watch.impress.co.jp/docs/2004/01...09/sandisk2.htm Since the HiMD units are supposed to adhere to the USB Mass Storage class, anything else can be used to playback whatever data files you store on it.

There's no HiMD logo on it. And it looks like it's only a changer-controller. It would be nice to see some HiMD head units though, definitely. Then I could quit copying commercial audio CDs to CDROM just to put CD-Text on them before loading them up...

I'm betting that uploading is only supported for HiMD ATRAC3plus recordings. Note that HiMD formatted discs have a FAT filesystem, so any PC program (e.g. Windows Explorer) can drag/drop an ATRAC3plus recording onto a PC. Since original MDs use a proprietary disc format (2306 bytes per sector or somesuch, instead of a data drive's 512 bytes per sector) I strongly doubt that any old MDs can be uploaded.

I tried the 3.6V LiIon AA - when I pushed play, the display flashed "Hi DC In" so I took it out again. There's definitely a step-up circuit in the pack!

I'm glad you raised this topic though. It always annoyed me that my MZ-N10 cradle needed both the +6V DC input and the USB connection. I really don't understand why they're drawing +6V, when the internal battery is only a 3.6V LiIon, and the external battery is only a 1.2-1.5V AA cell. I've also wondered what kind of step-up circuitry is in the external pack. If I inserted a 3.6V rechargable LiIon AA cell, would it burn out? (Probably.) Time to go looking for service manuals.....

Yes, the USB specs require a port to provide exactly +5V at a maximum of 500mA to any port. If you know exactly how much current you're drawing, you can find the right resistor value. But since V=IR, if the current draw varies (depending on the MD operation in progress) then so will the voltage. You might do better with a 2V zener diode to drop the voltage down, independent of the current.

I'm getting more suspicious now. The AVland descriptions of these HiMD recorders shows that while they will playback all the existing ATRAC formats, they only record in PCM or ATRAC3plus. Also, they note that the analogue input can only record in 64 or 256kbps, not any of the other "supported" bitrates. This tells me that uploading will only be supported for these ATRAC3plus tracks, and not for any pre-existing ATRAC or ATRAC3 tracks. This means we won't be able to buy a HiMD unit and upload all of our existing MDs. It would be stupid, but it sounds very typical of Sony. hm.... It also means that you cannot create a backward-compatible recording on a HiMD recorder. E.g., if you wanted to make a disc for a friend who only has an older MD unit (original ATRAC, or ATRAC3), you couldn't do it with these HiMD units, at all. In contrast, all current NetMD recorders can still create regular SP ATRAC recordings, which will playback on every MD player ever made. This is a bit unfriendly, I think.

I dumped cassettes 5 years ago, when I adopted plain ol' MD. The fact that MD technology (of any generation) is superior to audio cassette is hardly news.

Part of the HiMD format is a narrower track pitch. Older hardware will not be able to track these narrower lines. Drop the subject, it's pointless.

It's a fine idea, but still, ATRAC (any version) sounds better than MP3 (any bitrate). I personally am looking forward to building an ATRAC music library and junking MP3s...

I agree, but this requires a firmware upgrade in the NetMD devices, not just an upgrade of the SonicStage software. Sony has been known to release firmware upgrades in the past, but you had to (a) know about them and ( go to a Sony Service Center to have the upgrade installed. I don't know why they would bother to release a firmware upgrade for any of their existing NetMD recorders, when they would rather have us all buy new HiMD recorders instead. You never know...

Check this driver out: http://spider.nstu.nsk.su/music/software/eng/vac.html I've used it a lot, it works very well. It takes audio from any set of inputs and routes it to any set of outputs. It installs itself as a virtual audio card. If you have digital audio inputs, it can take the input stream, extract just the audio signal and discard the S/PDIF control info (including SCMS) and route it back to the digital audio output, in realtime. It's extremely handy.