skyther

Portable = portable. Home stereo = home stereo. Don't mix up specifications that concern one category for another. Obviously there are differences between CD players - but is the difference related to the difference in THD? I doubt you could really tell. Here we go again, the key word being interpolation. Is interpolated data true to the source? Not all the time. Mind you, many Lite-On drives out in the market now have C2 success rates of over 90%. And just as you said, cheap CDPs aren't the best at error correction, so which is going to produce better results; ripping from EAC or recording from a CDPs playback? Then again, don't mix audio and data CDs up - the former isn't required to be bit perfect, since reading is done in r/t and there's interpolation anyway. In electronics, timing isn't just controlled by your clock. Your current cycle plays a big part in this. With varying currents and the substandard power supplies used in mass market CDPs, a stable clock, you are not getting. There should (normative statement) be a buffer behind every stage, including digital outputs, but most CDPs don't have them. When you're sending 705600 light pulses a second, there is bound to be jitter errors without a dedicated output buffer. Depending on the quality of your cables, there will be occassional jitter. Not as bad as it were reading or writing a disc, but it's present. A PLL isn't going to do much for clock synchronization if the input data has been corrupted by jitter in the first place. Obviously the data latency isn't going to change your sound quality much, but based on the original issue, the MD copy of a CD will be inferior to a copy ripped from a proper EAC install. The thing is, if you record 2 MDs the same way from the same identical sources, you'll end up with different results. It's not bit-for-bit perfect, which isn't what digital is supposed to be about. You'd get much closer results comparing 2 different rips of the same CD.

*nod* ATRAC SP is the best! It's been the best for the last 15 years, and everyone who believes otherwise is naive (can I say extremely stupid?). How can ~128kbps VBR OGG ever compare with 292kbps ATRAC? What fools! Someone ought to tell them that ATRAC SP > PCM, CDDA, SACD and DVD-A! [normal] The comparison was done fair and square. 128kbps OGG/QT AAC/LAME MP3 owned 132kbps ATRAC3/LP2. Obviously 292kbps would be different, but 320kbps OGG/AAC/MP3 would pwn ATRAC-SP likewise. Sheesh.[/normal]

Ah, but THD is THD, see? So what exactly is THD? AFAIK, there aren't even official published THD ratios for MD portables. Please. I can assure the average Joe will definately not be able to tell "hey, my HDP has a THD of 0.5%!" while listening with streetstyles on the back of a bus. There's no point in arguing technical terms - portable devices are designed to be taken out and about, not for careful home listening. My home CDP has a THD of 0.0035% @ 0dB, 1kHz. Whoopa-dee-do! I couldn't even tell a difference in harmonic distortion between it and the line Pod. Oh wait... I'm listening... listening... whoa I can hear clipping at 0.2136189dB from the bass... Well uh, uhm... The quartz clock you're talking about doesn't play any part mechanically. Jitter occurs during disc access, and that depends on your transport, not your electronics. Why do you think you need CIRC and C1/C2 for? C2 isn't perfect either, y'know. I guess you don't understand why people pay 10 grand just for a transport, and obviously a hard drive is immune to the problems faced by optical devices. Jitter errors when reading, jitter errors when writing. If this wasn't the case, I wouldn't have a need for EAC. *edit* and, doh... Not all digital outputs are buffered. Jitter occurs in your cables. Your MD doesn't perfectly sync with your source. Track marks aren't placed absolutely identical to the source. There's processing lag. Writing lag. Yada yada, the list goes on.

Blah. Bad estimate - the NH900 is listed as AUD100 less than the NH1 (AU699 vs 799), so take GST and sales commission, USD50 seemed like a reasonable estimate. Please do excuse me, I'm an ignorant iPod user. Distortion, schmortion. I thought we've been through this already? Manufacturer values can't be trusted, some understate their THD/SNR values while others overstate. http://www.divertech.com/mgheadotl32.html Distortion at 3% baby! Seems like the Zen is pretty good, eh? Unless you use ER-4s or E5s, you're not going to notice a difference between a THD of 0.5% and 0.05%. And uhm, just a side note - tracks ripped with EAC in secure mode and copied into a HDP are cleaner than what you would get from a semi-cheap DVD with a substandard DAC into a MD portable, as well as the fact that HDPs are actually cleaner sources (discounting a portable's DAC/amplification stages) since it's immune to jitter. I actually considered building a PC /w an EMU 1212 as a dedicated audio source, but I guess I just don't have the cash for that yet.

Well after doing a bunch of research I, too, have decided I hate iPod because of the low battery life, high prices and "trendiness". *looks at battery specs of the "MuVo Slim"* Oh, uh... *looks at www.bluetin.com for MD pricing* Sony MZ-NH1 USD393 Sony MZ-NH3D USD362 *estimates that MZ-NH900 will be approx USD340 (take 50 bucks off NH1) 15GB iPod as at apple.com USD299 20GB iPod USD399 OMFGWTF!!!11!!11!11!1 iPods are SOOOOO expensive! Wait, do I hate the iPod? Maybe I don't...! *cough* Keepin' up with trend and technology, baby, you're a rich man!

The output from the Sony adaptor isn't regulated. Under load, it'll drop to around 3V. Could be potentially dangerous.

iRiver is shit in general. Extremely coloured headphone and line-outs. Line-out is far from clean, even without any EQ effects. Sounds like crap with EQ on or off, DSP produces clipping even with gained tracks. Don't go around calling equipment you don't have much experience with shit.

Can you stick to one thread?

Uh, yeah right. Look, the pigs are growing wings already! :laugh:

MD bookshelf, yes, but you're not using the MD part of it. This thing is just a DAC, you play stuff on iTunes, iTunes I assume will then do some funky compression and send it to the Airport, Airport decompresses it and runs it through the DAC, then out it goes through the line out into your amp and speakers. The essential part is iTunes, you need it for the Airport to work. Having SS2 work with it is an absolute no way. There's no chance in hell Apple would give Sony any information on how it could get SS2 to work, and Sony doesn't have a slight interest in this either.

No, forget it. This thing requires a new release of iTunes for it to run, you can forget about using anything else.

Claims that a 'newbie' won't know what a recording head but messes up by introducing nonsense like TOC. Funny. crazey it would help if you learnt to shut (the hell) up once in a while. :happy: TiJei - Majestic is right, it does indeed sound like your rec head is busted. The recording head isn't required for playback, so yes if your unit no longer records, you can still use it for playback. You can either send your unit in to Sony for service/repair or alternatively purchase a new unit.

There is no native support for any other codec other than ATRAC/3/+ or PCM. No MP3 (VBR/CBR), AAC, OGG. And Sony never releases firmware updates to the public. You will require transcoding and this *will* have to be done via SS2. Hope that helps. :happy:

^^ AFAIK, the Chaintech doesn't. It's definately a good soundcard worth a look at.

No, if you plan to stick with regular MDs then stock up on regular discs. :wacky: Kudos to you if you plan on using Hi-MD for storage. At 0.5MB/s, I can think of a thousand better devices to use for storage. Maybe even that $80 thumbdrive that's holding my house keys.

Noooooo... The "HD" in HD Digital Amp would mean the lower noise floor and higher amplification percision as a benefit of the Class-D amplifier employed. The are a few steps which your music has to go through before it comes to your ears: Source (CD/MD) -> Digital Signal Processing (DSP), Digital/Analog Conversion (DAC) -> Amplification -> Your headphones Any one of the above stages can affect your sound quality, either in terms of fidelity or sound colouration. We have to seperate fidelity issues from sound colouration when speaking of sound quality, simply because sound colouration is subjective. The technology behind an amplifier is simple. When the sound signal gets converted by the DAC to an analog representation of a sound wave, the job og the amplifier is to increase the amplitude of the wave while producing as little distortion as possible to the amplified signal. One of the key components necessary for a traditional analog Class-A or Class-B amplifier to work properly is stable voltage, which is obviously not what MD equipment have. Even the best op-amp chips would perform horribly if not given enough voltage. This is where Class-D amplifiers come into play. What if we actually combine the DAC and the amplifier together so that the amplifier 'amplifies' the digital signal instead? Since we're dealing with binary codes instead of waveforms, that might result in amplification with less distortion (a lower noise floor). The amplifier oversamples the amplification procedure to ensure that the resultant amplified signal is closely reproduced from the original source signal. Because of the way these amplifiers work, the power requirements for them are significantly lower than those of traditional amplifiers, hence you address two main issues with portable equipment - power consumption and sound fidelity. Sound colouration is a different issue, dealing mostly with tonal qualities. Different components will affect your sound signature, ie. larger capacitors will give you a smoother sound. It's true, replace the ones in your cheap CD player with Black Gates and you'll notice a major improvement. The quality of your DAC and amplifier will undoubtedly affect this as well, ie. Burr-Brown amplifiers sound different from those of Analog Devices... this comparison doesn't affect portables, of course... since Sony and Sharp use their own amplifiers. The common mistake people make when judging about sound quality is that they mistake colouration with fidelity, ie. using an equalizer in the DSP to increase bass and treble might seem good to you because you're listening to music with more bass, but it significantly lowers fidelity because your DSP is interpolating the increase in bass which you listen to, meaning that it's 'fake' bass. Hope this clears things up. PS. In digital amp'd units, since the amp and the DAC are combined, I doubt the line out of these units are clean. A clean line out should completely bypass the amplification stage, ie. run straight from the DAC.

It was strong, but just a normal ferrite magnet. I dunno, I just stuck the magnet on top of the disc for not more than half a minute and it wouldn't read.

No. The dyes used in CD-RW are amorpheous and will change when burnt (chemical reaction). It is not a new layer. It will lose it's chemical reactivity after a while. I've destroyed data on a MD with a mildly strong magnet from my school's physics lab before. Tossed a magnet over it for a couple of seconds, chucked it back into the DS8 and it wouldn't play.

LOL Damage, I can always count on you for trying out odd things on Hi-MDs Other than the R900, every unit I've had (N10, R90, R70, R55 have had LCD shields that stuck out. The R900 was the only unit with a recessed LCD.

^ doosmac makes more sense than you do. It would help if you tried to type in complete sentences... Anyway, regarding doosmac's question, I doubt it... knowing Sony they'll have some sort of DRM protection applied on the files. Everything is crackable given time, but I doubt anyone would be interested enough to crack .OMG files. So, o' great Hi-MD guru... what happens if you try to format a MD using Windows Explorer?

LOL molt you have your point, but the v4.5 vs 2.1 comparison doesn't make that much sense tho. Apple comes out with a new iTunes every few months, but I think it should be understood that Apple has been in the computer/software related business since eons ago, so as again, while SonicStage sucks, iTunes isn't a fair comparison. SonicStage was designed as an interface between PC and MD, while iTunes has always been a full fledged media player with an added iPod interface. PS. Sometimes it's worthless to worry about the technicalities of things. If it doesn't say in the manual that you can't jog with it, then by all means, do. If it fails, it's claimable by warranty. I'm pretty sure they've had engineers stress-test products for their intended use. I don't really understand how a plane can fly, because I've never seen physics theories of lift with my own eyes, yet science tells me so and I put my trust in it. If it works, it works.

I expect a 4-figure salary from doing this :grin: j/k :happy: I think the 20kB avatar limit isn't enough, I had to reduce it to 100x75 and save it at a quality of 2 using Photoshop in order for it to fit...

Yeah it means it'll convert 48kHz sample rates from whatever optical source you're recording from, which is pretty meaningless since CDs are already at 44.1kHz so no sample rate conversion is needed. 24-bit ATRAC is just the bit width that's employed in the ATRAC DSP. All modern units are 24-bit, only the first generation Sony ATRAC DSPs were 20-bit.

Only 2 more months with a PC... freaky In this case I wouldn't go with an iPod, simply because you're not going to be able to change anything on it at all unless you can get to a PC. You're not talking about SHN are you? I'm not really clear about your situation here, but the iPod can only play WAV/Apple Lossless/AAC/MP3/AIFF/Audible, and if you're using SHN or something you're going to need to convert it to one of these formats. AFAIK you can convert anything to anything unless it's: 1) a proprietory format (ATRAC[sP]) 2) a copyrighted track (iTMS/Connect purchases) I don't really see why you'll have a problem converting anything to ATRAC. If SonicStage won't accept it, simple... just convert it to WAV. dBpoweramp will do a whole album in a matter of seconds.

!! The "insert pause between tracks" plugin has been removed from .8.2! Or maybe I didn't install it Strange. When this plugin is used, foobar will stop it's output, but there's nothing stopping Windows kMixer/DirectSound from sending an output signal. I think this has much more to do with a driver/control issue than with the application.