MDfreak

Probably your disks are recorded in LP2 or LP4 mode. These modes are called MDLP. If your friend bought an older MD-player without MDLP it cannot play the LP2 en LP4 tracks and you only hear silence. So to summarize: - the first MD-models had only SP-stereo and SP-mono recording modi. - later MDLP was added (LP2 and LP4). - after that came Hi-MD with numerous recording-modes.

You will not find the DH10P in the shops because Sony does not actively promote the model... but if a dealer askes for it Sony can deliver it to dealers, so the only thing you have to do is contact your prefered dealer and ask them if they can order a DH10P for you.

It is not a spinning GIF but a FLASH-animation because GIF only has 256 colours so that was not a nice animation. FLASH uses JPEG compression with millions of colours. Will I review more units? Maybe! First of all I think most of the reviews on the forums are great so for the most units there is no real need to write yet another review. Furthermore I only fancy to review real special units (and the DH10P is). The last reason why I wrote the review of the DH10P was because we could review it back in March when the unit still was a long way from being available in the shops. As you see on the bottom of all my posts I do not own very special MD-units, just the regular once about which you can find tons of info so reviewing those isn't very satisfying. One thing I can promise you all: if in the future (I say clearly IF) there may be any new units in Europe we will contact the people at Sony Netherlands as soon as possible to arrange a hands on before units will hit the shops. We succeeded in doing that with the prototype DH10P (I could lend for 2 weeks) and the preproduction NH1 (which still had a cradle with USB-connector) so you never know what the future will bring! p.s. if you people are interested in a review of a particular unit I own, please let me know. If there are enough interest I may create another review.

.... and if someone has any comments or questions regarding my review you can contact me (Marck) via this topic.

Recently Richyhu posted a review of his black MZ-DH10P. While talking to some people about it there was renewed interest in my review I made earlier in Dutch. And thanks to Richyhu and some other people there is now a full English translation of the review I made earlier this year. I hope you people think it is useful. I think it will as even Richyhu read the review before buying his black DH10P. Preproduction MZ-DH10P review: http://www.mdcenter.nl/artikelen/sony_spri...0preview_en.php Other DH10P review links: - Original Dutch review: http://www.mdcenter.nl/artikelen/sony_spri...dh10preview.php - Richyhu's review: http://forums.minidisc.org/index.php?showtopic=11621

Yes, it was one of the first reviews. Sadly up till now I still don't have an English translation (partly because it is such a thorough and long review). I just uploaded a (partly) translated English version. Hopefully I'll get the rest translated soon: http://www.mdcenter.nl/artikelen/sony_spri...0preview_en.php

If you live in Echt you probably know the town called Linne as well! Maybe we can meet some time to discuss some more about MD. I made a review about a pre-production DH10P myself once. Sadly it is only in Dutch but that will not be a problem for you: http://www.mdcenter.nl/artikelen/sony_spri...dh10preview.php

The display of my NH700 and RH10 clearly show ATRAC3plus 352 kbps. So no "misuse" of existing bitrates. I think Sony didn't unlock the other bitrates earlier to keep the consumer from getting confused with all the bitrates. For my study I'm kind of into audio/video coding and equipment and I can't think of any "voodoo"-trick that might be used to enable the playback because the music is also identified as 352 kbps by the player itself. If it would state e.g. 256 kbps Hi-SP than Sony would have pulled of a trick to misuse existing bitrates. It is also the easiest way for Sony to make the diffences between first and second generation Hi-MD's: add the mp3-bitrates to the list of "accepted" bitrates for second-generation Hi-MD units. A first-generation can handle a disc with mp3's perfectly although it says "cannot play" because it detects a totally different codec used to create the file and it doesn't have the possibility to decode it. So if my theory is right it would also be possible to "unlock" the mp3-transfer for first-generation Hi-MD's (although they cannot playback the mp3's). In that way I would imagine using my first-gen NH700 to create Hi-MD discs (and permanently hook it up to the computer) and use my RH10 to listen to the mp3-music.

With the introduction of SonicStage 3.3 Sony introduced the 352 kbps ATRAC3plus bitrate for playback on all Hi-MD walkmans. Strangely enough other bitrates introduces with SonicStage 3.2 like 320 kbps or 128 kbps still are converted by SonicStage. So because nothing changed to my MZ-NH700 and RH10 the ability to playback the 352 kbps was available from the beginning in all Hi-MD's. So after debating with some people I've come up with a theory: In all Hi-MD walkmans there is a "general" ATRAC3plus decoder that can decode every available bitrates. The only thing the decoder has to know which bitrate a file is to be able to decode it. So every Hi-MD is able to decode all bitrates as long as it knows which bitrate is used in a file. This is done in most video-codecs where you can freely choose almost every bitrate according to which quality you want. The decoder doesn't have to have a separate decoder for every possible bitrate but has a general decoder that handles every bitrate. So the only thing Sony had to do with SonicStage 3.3 is "unlocking" different bitrates for the users. In SonicStage 3.2 they unlocked 320, 192, 160, 128 and 96 for encoding (but not for transfering). In 3.3 they added 352 and also unlocked the possibility to transfer that bitrate to Hi-MD. So my assumption is that somewhere in the SonicStage code there is a list that tells SonicStage which bitrates and codecs can be transfered to particular devices. E.g. for my NH700 that would (with SonicStage 3.3.) be: - ATRAC3 @ 132 and 66 kbps - ATRAC3plus @ 352, 256, 64, 48 - PCM For my RH10 Mp3 would be added. If this is all true all Hi-MD's are also capable of decoding the other ATRAC3plus bitrates: 320, 256, 192, 160, 128 an 96 kbps but SonicStage doesn't allow this bitrates to be transfered to the Hi-MD's. So now a request to you all: what do you think of my theory? And if it is true, is someone capable of "unlocking" the other ATRAC3plus bitrates for transfering to Hi-MD by "patching" SonicStage??? It would be great to get e.g. a 192 kbps ATRAC3plus file on a Hi-MD to test if it also can be played.

If it still records at 8 KHz samplefrequency (like other iPods do with special iPod mics) it is still pretty useless as it then only can record frequencies up to 4 KHz which is only usefull for limited quality speech-recording. Addition: according to the mentioned article samplefrequency will now be 44,1 KHz: same as MD.

I asked Sony NL and the reason why uploading isn't possible (for old recordings) is that on the old discs there is no DRM so there is no possibility to verify how recordings were made and what the rights are. Now with SS 3.2 now they only make a difference between optical/analog (and no upload-counter) I would say the SCMS on the old discs would be enough protection to allow uploading so who knows what happens with 3th generation Hi-MD's.

Something pink reflects in it's plexiglass surface.

128 = 128 kilobit/sec this is less then LP2 132 kilobit/sec (132 is more than 128) and 160 is of course more than 132 so 160 will use the most disc-space.

The mentioned quote of the Dutch MD-site is also mine (so the same source). As for optical recordings: also unlimited uploads, but still no export to wave (as is possible with analog recordings).

This is not a specific DH10P question but this is also the same for all Hi-MD walkmans.

And if someone understands Dutch and wants to translate it to English please contact me and I will be happy to but that English verion on the site. Furthermore the review contains quite some pictures that also tell a lot.

The battery behave just like with other Sony MD's. The batterylife in the manual is measured according to JEITA standards and is pretty accurate but of course you have to keep in mind that batterylife is very dependant of the use. Generaly speaking the battery is more than good enough to last a day of intensive use. To download about 100 Mb of mp3's it takes as long as current and first generation Hi-MD's to transfer 100 Mb of audio data. I would say about 5 minutes but I did not measure that exactly because transferspeeds are as said as fast as with first generation models (so nothing new about that). Yes there will be a hack because the DH10P also has a service-menu and in the service-manual they describe the regional codes. So yes, the DH10P can be hacked too. Is it worth the money? Personally speaking: NO. Why? The real improvement from the DH10P in comparison to the RH10 is the digital camera and the color display. It takes nice pictures I must say but because I already have a nice digital camera (Fujifilm Finepix S304) I only would use the digital camera only use the digital camera to take snapshots when I'm underway. Also for that purpose I can use my Sony-Ericsson K700i. So to pay 200 euro more for a feature I'm not going to use often is a bit strange. But that's MY opinion. The DH10P is a very proper build and thought over device so I can image that people buy it and have use for the camera. For my personal the RH10 was more than good enough and a lot cheaper. One big plus the DH10P indeed has. He sounds much more natural than the RH10 but probably that is the difference between a Digital Amplifier and a HD Digital Amplifier.

We are working on it but we do not have a lot of time.

You are right concering point 2 but WRONG concerning point 1. There exists NO PC-based SP codec. The only real SP codecs exist in the MD-units themselves. All SP recorded via USB (so via SS) is semi-SP derived from a LP2-track (132 kbps ATRAC3). To be clear: Hi-SP (ATRAC3plus) is a different codec from old SP (ATRAC). Sony never released a PC-based ATRAC (SP) codec because SP is not prepared for DRM and wants to protect their codecs. ATRAC3 and ATRAC3plus do have DRM so the only codecs found on a PC are ATRAC3 and ATRAC3plus codecs. Conclusion: if you want real SP (not Hi-SP) than the only way to get geniune SP (and not derived from LP2) is to record realtime via mic, analog or digital in via an MD-unit in MD-mode. The DRM issue is also the reason why Hi-MD doesn't have the SP codec but the Hi-SP.

I know the unit and wrote a review: http://www.mdcenter.nl/artikelen/sony_spri...dh10preview.php Sadly the review is still in Dutch (working on an English version) but if you have questions I can always try to answer them.

Why not a home recorder? Because from what I know UMD is NOT recordable or rewritable. The discs (with content) come straight from the factory and other than with CD or DVD their is no recordable version (probably also the reason why they introduced a whole new disc-type, because in that way nobody can make illegal copies).

Also mono-mp3's or mp3's with another resolution than 16 bit will create problems. Officially Sony supports 32 kbps till 320 kbps stereo mp3's in CBR or VBR with a resolution of 16 bits and a samplerate of 44100 Hz.. So if one of the parameters of a mp3 do not match these criteria a mp3 shows "can't play". Als some mp3's from the internet contain so much errors that a mp3-player will not recognise it as mp3.

I just want to say that the mp3-decoding isn't crap but that the frequency-response is different from ATRAC3. Índeed this is not nice because you have to change the EQ to adapt for it. Furthermore I wrote an e-mail to the people I know @ Sony NL to ask how it is possible that the mp3's sound different and that the EU model does not have the custom EQ. I agree that mp3-playback should sound the same as mp3's but as I have a RH10 now I'm not going to let it spoil my opinion about the RH10. It is a real nice machine and like every machine it has some drawbacks but I can live with it. Hopefully for future generations this problem will be fixed (or even better: update current models with new software). Now I have a custom EQ for my headphones and I can enjoy my mp3's as much as I would do with their Hi-SP versions.

Mp3's DON'T sound bad. They sound DIFFERENT than the ATRAC3plus. For the standard headphones indeed the mp3 sounds not so good but with certain headphones I have I do like the sound of the RH10 with mp3's better that with Hi-SP. With my Sennheiser MX400 en Sony MDR-G82LP headphones the mp3's sound good without EQ. The Hi-SP has to much highs with those headphones so I have to use the EQ with them. So if mp3's sound good or bad just depends on your personal taste and the headphones you use. The sound itself is not distorted only the frequency-response with mp3's are different from the ATRAC3plus.

About the mp3-license: when encoding audio-CD's to mp3 with SonicStage 3.1 the codec used appears to be the FhG (Fraunhofer) fastenc or mp3enc encoder (according to EncSpot pro: a program that analyses mp3's and can tell you almost always which codec was used during coding). That let's me think that Sony also licenses other mp3-related stuf (like the decoder in MD/CD/Network-equipment) from Fraunhofer.