Rumz

Damn straight Just kidding. Honestly I have no attachment to any specific format. I disliked the sound of the NH1 the day I heard it, and that was long before I cared for any iPod. My *opinion* stands in contrast to many who find the NH1 / RH1 to really sound good to them. I could never get it to sound a way that I liked it... fatigued my ears really quickly. My point is not "iPod vs. MD", it's just that, as MD users go, I tend to find that they really prefer the sound of Atrac and/or the sound of Sony's HD amps or other units, and because of this they also tend to make non-objective blanket statements praising the sound quality of their beloved Hi-MD / MD / atrac unit (which is fine) and bashing the iPod (typically people put down other things to make the thing they prefer look better. Why do you think people have to belittle other things to make their point on any subject (not just this one)? It's a little immature if you ask me, and often a sign of some type of insecurity--or maybe they just don't know any better. They also usually fail to mention anything else in the DAP market, though I understand-- nothing else has the market penetration of the iPod and hence they probably haven't tried as many other units.) If you knew me, you'd know I enjoy the RH10 (whereas most MD users tend to NOT like the RH10) much more than the RH1 or NH1 (given I haven't tried any of the other Hi-MD units). You'd also know that I love Atrac Type R and Atrac3plus @ 352kbps-- the latter sounding excellent on my Sony *flash* players. I've used a variety of players in the past-- MD, Sony, Sharp, and then onto the flash / hdd based stuff from Sony, iRiver, Apple, etc., so I'd like to think I'm not completely shooting from the hip on my opinions. You'll also never find me claiming that iPod has the best SQ or this player or that player has the best SQ. It's a purely subjective argument and there's no point in making it. I'll say what I prefer and what I enjoy, but I'll never claim it to be the best. It's just the "best" for *me*. Does this make sense? It's a mentality, an attitude. As you pointed out, there are a lot of variables (in codecs, in different models of both Hi-MD and iPod, etc) to really make an objective argument that "Hi-MD is better sounding than iPod". It really depends on what aspects of sound the user appreciates most, and it's just preference if you like one more than the other. It's one thing to say "yeah I really don't enjoy the iPod but love the sound of my Hi-MD", but another to make a blanket statement as if it's fact that one is the best. There's just no way to prove that one is absolutely better than the other, nor is there any use in doing so. You really need to go with what you enjoy most, not what the majority say is "the best". Unfortunately pretty much everyone has pride/an ego and are set on being right and having their preferences validated. Share what you love, folks, not what you hate. I enjoy my RH10, my 5.5g iPod, and my Sony NW-A608. And I really wish Sony would step up their game in the portable audio market.

Seriously. To come here and see Ray-- gives me warm fuzzies. I've missed ya, Ray

Ehehe. I'm here to offer a differing *opinion*. The RH1 is great if you like lots of treble (and therefore you think "detail".) I personally can't stand it-- much prefer the sound of the RH10, even if I have to bump the treble when playing mp3s. Maybe my ears are a little sensitive to treble and thats why my sound preferences differ... As for the iPod... yeah. To each his own. I'm told the Cowon's sound great, but mostly I think that Minidisc followers and Sony fans in general are biased towards Sony's sound signature and not necessarily "quality". It's kinda like, whatever you're accustomed to hearing, that becomes your reference point. I used to love MD, too. I might still if they had something more than 1gb as a storage option (like I said-- the RH10 is one of my favorites for sound). But I disagree about the iPod-- I don't need an amp (nay, I rarely use an amp with my 5.5g iPod) and it sounds great with the KSC-75 and the Sony EX90. I'll conceed that I do think it sounds boring and uninvolving if I don't use the right headphones... I think Sonys are a little more diverse with how well they pair with headphones. Alas... I don't expect MD / Sony fans to be reasonable about SQ (p.s. yeah I'm not big on the Nano's sound either... I do enjoy the full sized iPod's sound, tho.)

I have just had diagnostics run on it at a local pc shop to be certain of what the problem is. What am I doing next to my PC? CANABALIZING IT, YAY! Ram, Vid Card and CPU gonna have to go up on ebay. The mobo went south— so maybe I’ll sell the XPC SN95G5 as-is on ebay for anyone that wants parts or to try to fix it. Sometimes I hate computers.

Right, well I didn't mean "true" drag and drop (because I know how the format works) but more like the mp3 file manager program that some Sony mp3 players utilize-- instead of using a library like sonic stage, you just drag and drop in the program... not bad

Are you able to play back Hi-MD discs via USB > PC optical out > home stereo? Legacy MD is not an issue for me because decks with optical out exist. They do not exist for Hi-MD.

Hello MZ-RH10. Welcome back to the fold indeed... I might actually enjoy the sound signature of the RH10 more than the RH1, though the jury is still out on mp3 playback (I think it sounds fine so far with EQ, but I'm concerned that songs might end up sounding more processed than I'd like. No EQ on Atrac recordings is just excellent, though). I guess I hate goodbyes All my units stay with me.

I'll have to give this a whirl. Drag and Drop would be slick-- and why is this not on the front page of minidisc.org while a story about some fancy blanks is? Not knocking the blanks, I want some too, but hey-- this actually makes Hi-MD usuable as a music player on Macs!

I'm not sure if any of those formats will preserve the gapless nature of music with any of the programs you're thinking of, though I haven't tried them. I know mp3 is not gapless (though it seems I've heard of a round about way to get them to be gapless, it just seems like it's not worth the effort to me). Personally I like mp3-- simply because it works on everything. Gaps are really the only drawback to the format for me. I have iTunes set up to rip and encode using LAME at a pretty high quality setting (though I'm using a Mac-- you might want to use EAC to rip and encode with LAME on a PC). Most people say if your mp3s are above the 192kbps bitrate that they should survive the transcoding process in sonic stage and still sound pretty good, so perhaps you could use LAME at a quality setting of 1 or 2 (or 0 if you want the highest possible, but the files will be bigger). You could also get a Hi-MD unit that plays mp3s natively

Nabbed a like-new RH10, ordered a game keypad, and getting close to pulling the trigger on a psp+memory stick pro duo (can get the psp 20% off next week). Ah, I hate this thing called patience =P

I'm sure we'll hear about it here first when it becomes available

Very cool stuff, makes me wish I took more time for photography and weren't selling my dslr

Hello MZ-RH1, Hello Hi-MD (again).

That's about on par with my experience. I uploaded a 73 minute long disc yesterday-- actual upload took about 7 minutes, then it took another minute or so to convert to "wav"-- between 8 and 9 minutes overall.

No idea. The Canada Post tracking info only has that the post office received it on June 23. The USPS tracking page only says that it arrived at a local post office at about 5:50am this morning. Almost no tracking information about its progress. Did they send you another one?

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (midnight showing last night)

An update on my end-- got word back from md-canada and they said canada post basically pointed the finger at US postal system for having delays there. I did try the tracking number on USPS again today and it did register, looks like it arrived in my city today (whether it gets delivered today or tomorrow I'm not sure), but it's nice to finally see some progress (2 weeks later). I suppose I was just nervous having never dealt with Canada Post or ordered something from Canada.

Sounds like yours shipped when mine did, though the delivery date for mine is the 10th. But yours having not arrived by the 5th is discouraging. Customs is one thing but I've had stuff delivered from Japan within a few days of when I ordered it-- this is ridiculous. Unless customs trusts our friends in Japan more than our friends up north.

Well having used 1 line remotes in the past I don't think they're bad-- of course I'm not familiar with how this might compare to previous Sony one line remotes. My dad has used one with his old RH900 and he's getting up there in years. The main drawback I see to a 1 line remote is navigation, especially if this has no sort of jog dial. On the 40elk it at least has a jog wheel to scroll through tracks faster. With a 1 line you'll just have to make sure your music is grouped into smaller chunks (this wasn't a problem when albums were only 80-160 minutes).

Wow, that's quite a bit of growth recently. Awesome!

Excellent! I have one pre-recorded MD that I don't have on CD-- I figured I wouldn't be able to upload it. This is great news! Thanks for making me more anxious for my RH1

Really, nothing? I ordered on the 21st from them, wrote the next day to ask when they expected it to ship, and they said they'd ship friday or monday depending on what time their shipment came in, then I recieved notification of shipment from Canada Post on Friday morning. Though no updates have been posted to the tracking status since Friday. They do respond to e-mail relatively quickly-- let me know if you find anything out.

Well the NH1 has an HD Digital amp so it shouldn’t sound much different... But there should be a difference in sound between that and the 505. That said, the amp is only one part of the equation. Having good headphones or even just headphones that pair well with that HD amp helps. Using a certain pair of headphones I can’t stand the way my Nh1 sounds... Using another, it sounds excellent. Mp3 playback and legacy uploading alone make the RH1 worth it to me, though— and I don’t even have mine yet

Ah, I'm of such little faith. I came so close to pre-ordering an RH1 from SP but couldn't pull the trigger without knowing for sure the color. Before they got their shipment in they seemed sure the RH1 would be silver so I went the MDC route... oh well-- just means i wait a few days longer than the rest of you lucky people and don't get the free mic

It's not a mistake, per se. The *CURRENT* Hi-MD uploading software for Mac does have those limitations. I don't know if what was said above about the forthcoming Mac software is accurate or not, but let's hope it is. That would just mean that for now, you won't be able to upload legacy recordings to a Mac, but hopefully with new software we will be able to. But honestly-- I don't know a lot about this forthcoming software other than that it should facilitate transferring music to Hi-MD for playback (rather than just giving it upload functionality).