Ezra4no1

I actuially have a NAS device set up in my home. I bought Nintendo Wii's from ebay for about 35 to 45 bucks which CDDVD drive were broken. Each comes with built in Wifi, an SD card slot, and a USB slot. From a Wii hacking forum I was able to re-flash the Wiis and turn them into a Multimedia device that will stream my movies from my NAS as well as Netflix to my TVs in my home. Or If I wanted to I could connect a USB HDD to the Wii and use that to stream movies if I didn't have a NAS set in my home. Only downside, is the Wii can only do 720P but I figured it was good enough for the time and the money I saved Still with all that, there is no simplicitic way for me to take any of the recordings to a friend's house to watch on their TV. ( Are YOU LiSTENING SONY??)

Thanks for the response. There will always be people who will be completely happy and even fans of older static technology, such as old LPs and record players, laserdisc video players, reel to reel audio recorder and players, projection TVs, VCRs, and so on. For those people it doesn't matter what the latest technology is. I agree that old cassette tapes had horrible quality, but they were extremely cheap, extremely simple to use (play - record), allowed you to store and save what you recorded, and they worked everywhere - just about every office, car, and home, had a cassette player allowing you to listen to your music everywhere. Why couldn't Sony re-gear these as a modern day digital equivalent to the audio cassette? They could license the technology and get china companies to pump these things out cheap - 50 bucks or less for a standard no frills shoe-box recorder and player (cooler designs would come later). I think the market would welcome such a device like this and one like a VCR since there is no such device now that does this with simplicity. A USB to connect to a computer would be great to move you non DRM media around, but the point of the device is that you don’t need a computer to record, play, and then store your audio and video recordings. It’s not like re-inventing the wheel. Sony already owns the technology to do this and personally I think the physical minidiscs have proven themselves as an extremely reliable storage media that's not subjected to scratches and damages like CDs and DVDs are, and can be recorded, erased, and recorded over and over again with no ill-effects.

For me there were tons of reasons why to use the minidisc format as an audio recorder and player through out the 90's. In fact I've been a big fan of the format and used it faithfully up until about 5 or 6 years ago when HDD and flash based memory recorders and players began to be cheaper than owning the minidisc format all together. That with their smaller size, higher audio quality, lack of DRM (no sonic stage) finally pushed me away from the minidisc format. Personally I don't see any reason why I would want to use the Minidisc format if i had a choice today to buy an audio playerrecorder besides the novelity of it... Except for one.. I miss being able to completely manage my audio collection with out the use of a computer. It's not that I hate computers, I am a systems administrator and have been doing this for near 20 years, but I miss being able to go to my CD or Tape collection (back in the day) pulling out what I wanted to hear and listening to it on my home stereo, my car stereo, my audio player at work, at my friends house, and my portable player, with out ever needing to worry about DRM, file transfers, file formats, and or needing to download from the cloud. With the massive success of the MP3 File format, the iPod, and everything else that makes the digital world move, nothing was as easy as pulling a tape or cd from your collection and listening it to on anything you wanted to and sharing it with anyone you wanted to - and the same can be said about video tapes in the VCR days with regards to DVRs. I can't imagine I'm totally alone with this. The blank VCR tape market was huge through out the 80's and 90's and the same was true for blank audio cassettes. It would almost make sense to me that sony would take their exisiting technology of HI-MDs and tweek it a bit so it could become the modern day equivalent of the VCR. Minidiscs wouldn't suffer from degradation from over-writing, storage, or scratches as CDs and DVDs do. By also doing this I believe this could re-introduce MDs for what they were ment to be in the 90's - to re-place audio cassetts (if they could be simply priced cheaply).Of course the damage is already done. Even if Sony did do something like this audio MD's will never become the next "walkman" or "iPod", but I can see these as a cheap replacement for the common audio cassette in a new digital age that will allow you to store you'r audio outside of a computer - again if priced very cheaply. Just wondering what anyone's thoughts on this might be. Below is post I posted on a Sony's forum a while ago, which I will repost here. "Anyone else miss VCRs (not their quality) but being able to easily record a show, save it to tape, than taking the tape and watching it at a friends house or family members house? That's something you can't easily do with current DVRs, or anything else since the VCR. Why doesn't Sony make a modern VCR and use Hi-MD technology to let consumers easily record tv shows? There was a massive vcr market of people recording shows and saving them - just because everything has gone to flash-based memory and hard drives, doesn't mean people still wouldn't want the simplicity of a VCR to record and store their videos and use the Minidisc media to re-write over with out degradation to the media. The Secrete for it's success? No Crazy proprietary format, nor God awful drm schemes, and keeping it reasonably priced."

Dude.... what whole do you live in? Look around you.. Everything from TV to Radio is going digital. Who cares about 3rd world countries when they don't even have running water or electricity in their homes. Do you Think for a moment that BMW or Mercedes Benz gives a damn about what technology will exist in 100 years or what 3rd world country can reproduce a technology when they decide to put a CD player verses a tape deck in one of their cars? That's the same point I am getting at. Who give's cow's @$$ if CD players will never make absolete the audio cassette, as long as every place else sells CD players at a reasonable price in 1st world countries, (granted if you live in one of those countries - If not than keep saving to get your tape deck, because that will have no effect here where I live). With the Buzz of everything going Digital - from cable TV, to satalite, radio, TV sets, digital downloads, and so on, Sony could create a market for themselves selling a Digital Replacement for the Audio Cassete by selling low end and simple to use MiniDiscs. If Sony would pull their thumbs out of their @$$ and license their technology out inexpensively and use corporate partners they could push the MiniDisc in this market and make a killing off of the royalties. I mean imagine what royalties would of been from blank audio cassettes, or blank CDs if existed. But again.. just my thoughts.

Exactly, and thanks for proving my point about the 8-track. Doesn't matter that you still use it, but does matter that it is a dead technology. If Sony ends the MiniDisc, I'm sure there will scores of people around the world that will keep using the absolete technology for years and probably decades. And if MD technology keeps working for them, much like those people who use vintage 8-tracks, LPs, in 45s and 78s, or let it be the betamax or Laserdisc than go ahead. I never suggessted that it all needed to go away - just that it is or would be a dead technolgy, much like the Sony Clies and if you have to ask if MDs are worth sticking with, than perhaps it's not, because you are going to love MDs for what they are or you going to hate them for what they are not. And truth is... for the same price of a decent Hi-MD player, they do have Mp3 Playes that can record from all sources, optical, lines in and out, and live..and the fact that all it takes it plugging them to your computer through your USB and worry about no conversions because you already have the Wav file really is a big Plus.

It really isn't that simple and I think you are missing the point. If I hear him correctly I think what he may be really asking is, "Should I keep digging a deeper whole or bale out?" I had a few thousand dollars in MD equipment and became discourage by Sony's actions. Of course all of that MD equipment could of still have been used today and worked fine, but truth is, Do you really want to keep building and investing your time and money in an 8-track collection if 8-track is bound to fail? Well that is what MD is today. Why invest yor time in recording on to another 200 minidiscs only to see Sony leave the technology 1 or 2 years from now? For me.. it was too much of a gamble, so I baled and sold all my equipment and am happier with my Mp3 Player. I gave Sony a chance and it was too little, too late. Even now with all the improvements with Hi-MDs there are still rumors that Sony my just drop the whole thing.

I have long left the MD world for the simplicity which other audio Hard Drive recorder/players offers in the way of simple drag and drop and little to no DRM restriction. Still...I just recently picked up an eleven year old MZ-B3 in excellent condition for under a hundred dollars on eBay for the sole purpose to replace an audio cassette recorder. Audio Cassettes are fragile, poor sound quality, degrade over time, prone to breakage with usage, but are very cheap. In all these areas but price MDs is superior format. Sony could push to have MDs replace audio cassetts. The way I see it, audio cassetts currently still fills a need and are the only options which non technical people have to record audio or live events, such as lectures, simple music, and the such. If Sony would market an inexpensive no frills MD for under 50 or 60 dollars, used good marketing as well as licensees and partners with other companies tohelp push and carry these MDs, they could have greate success since MDs could replace audio cassetts and fill that need. The MD recorder would need to be redesigned to be a bit more rugged, and to be as simple as a tape recorder (much like the MZ-B3 with an internal Mic, and speaker). Though this MD wouldn't need to be Hi-MD specs to keep cost low, but the SP recordings would need to be compatable with all the downloading features of Hi-MD so if people upgraded to the more expensive models they would still beable to keep their recordings. Anyway, just my thoughts. I see no reason why MDs couldn't replace audio cassetts all together. there is still a large markethere ands Sony could re-introduce MDs at a Budget Price for everyone else. This could bring alot of life back into the format and lead to High fedality MD players and recorders in car stereos, home systems, and boom boxes again. Also.. with the new Hi-MDs Gen2 I couldn't see why Sony couldn't market MDs as a perfect way to archive and save your Mp3 files without possibile losing them from your computer.

Well I use to be heavily into the MiniDisc world some years ago, but sold everything because of my frustrations with Sony's DRM restrictions. When many of the HDD Mp3 playes came with literally no restrictions and ease of drag and drop, that just seemed like a better way to go. Well.... Here I am years later and I am hearing about Sony's 2nd Gen Hi-MDs and the new SS 3.4 which seems to be big improvement from the ways of the older MDs and I just so happen to be in the market to buy a new Audio Recorder/Player. My questions.... After looking through the message boards, I have failed to find anyone give a good description of this. I am aware of the quality of Sony's ATRAC, but was wondering how well does HI-MDs play Mp3s? I have a very large collection of mp3s and don't want to have to convert them over to ATRAC and from what I am gaterhing, 2nd Gen Hi-MDs can play Mp3s directly without converting them to ATRAC..Is this correct? If so, also heard that playing Mp3s on the 2nd Gen Hi-Mds leaves alot to be desired.. Can anyone give their opinion of this? Of course ATRAC will be better depending how it was recorded, but do Mp3s sound any worse on HI-Mds or are they the same as an MP3 being played on any other Mp3 Player? Also... How can I tell the difference between 2nd Gen HI-MDs and 1st Gen Hi-MDs? I would like to use Hi-Mds for music listening and for Live recordings.. Thanks for any info.