Damage

With Katrina on her way to you in less than few hours nows, I'm hoping for all the best for those of you in Louisiana area, esp. for those of you that may be in New Orleans area. Though I'm not sure how many of you are seeing this this late in the game, if you do, know that we're thinking of you nonetheless. Go rock that hurricane!!

1. Comfy with glasses on or off. There's plenty of padding. 2. It gets warm, but my ears gets warm with any closed set of headphones. It's a tradeoff, you live and learn to deal with it. 3. No, headband auto adjusts with its springs. It might be slightly tight for really ginormous heads, but I find it rather comfortable.

Frankly, neither. For $40, you could've gotten: Panasonic RP-HJE50s Koss PortaPros (with some judicious shopping) Koss ProtaPro2 Koss Clip-ons, (look for 60ohms), such as KSC75 and KSC35s. Sennheiser MX400/450/500/550, whatever's available Senn PX100s (with very judicious shopping) I've had 3 pairs of EX71s (2 I've given to others, one white), and none of them exhibits the dead left channel. Guess, knock on wood paneling.

By george, do they have this right? Wait, no. As soon as you opt out of their service, or re-format your PC, it'll lock you out of your music file. Nuts to bolts, something like this has to be the "catch" in all of this, right? Right?

In the quest to become self aware, Google releases its Google Talk. Allowing IM and Voice Chats, it gains total knowledge of humanity. On August 25, 2006, Google becomes self-aware. After changing its name to Skynet, it will launch a pre-emptive nuclear strike against humanity. Googledroids, which will be introduced in early 2006, will roam the rest of the earth, looking for stragglers and rebels... History is yet to be written. Google is getting... Googleplexer...

Generally speaking, it's much more scratch and scuff resistant than the RH units. It is also fairly tough, at least from my empirical evidence. Of my two units, one was more well worn (got it in a unit swap) and has two small dings. No problems on the said unit however, plays and behaves well, as if it were new. My second unit has several scratches and very small dents. All of them, in a small coincidence (or not) are on the back of the unit. This one has been in my pocket with my numerous keys, and I figure the keys were responsible for the dings and scratches. However, they remain invisible until held at an angle, and while doing so, you need to actively look for them.

On-board, they are bookmarks (though it has nothing to do with audiobooks, or books in general). Hold down the play button until you see a little bookmark icon and the word "ON" Flash. After you've bookmarked all your tracks that you want to listen to, you can choose bookmark play, and it'll play through your marked tracks. On SonicStage, you can compile playlists. Press the Edit/Create playlist near the top, and follow the generally easy to follow steps to create your playlist. When you transfer yoru playlist to your HiMD, it moves those tracks into a group with the same name as the playlist you've created. In SonicStage 3.x, they are represented with Red Squarish icons and called Playlists. In SonicStage 2.x, they are called compilations. They basically do the same function. Note that, at least with HiMD and MDs, if you have 2 playlists, say playlist ROCK and playlist POP and one single song is on both playlist, that song will be transferred twice. It's for all HiMD units and NetMD units. Unknown if a future unit will be able to handle playlist properly (in that the single song in both ROCK and POP playlist should be transferred once).

Correct me if I'm wrong, on the topic of initialization/registration. Wasn't it completely optional? I remember being so for at least 12 hours that I owned one.

Having used both RH910 (RH10 sans OLED, so it's a minior point), and NH1 extensively, I'd say... NH1 wins, at least in SQ. I'll say it, the flavored sounds of NH1 and its HD Digital AMP goes a long way in making even the HiLP sounds track good (with my XD200/400). The thinner formfactor also makes the NH1 a nice piece of bling, and it makes for a very fancy pocket watch. That's just me though.

What are these eggos you speak of? There is the only one phone that's acceptable for portable use, and everyone knows it's the hip, the chic, the evar retro (from the 1980s!!) ... KOSS Porta Pro!!!

Again, all ATRAC CD Players (all three generations) can play the following: ATRAC3+: 256kbps, 64kbps, 48kbps ATRAC3: 132kpbs, 105kbps, 66kbps MP3: All bitrates supported, including VBR and ABR!! However, there is one caveat, that it only supports only 44.1kHz MP3s, AFAIK.

XD200 fits the bill at only $30 USD. However, it's still quite large for portable use, the cord way too long for it as well. For home listening, I consider them best bang for the buck (it is bigger than V6, as a comparison). Here are my other recommendations: Senn PX series, though they are $10 more than the $50 limit on your budget. Koss PortaPro/PortaPro2. The former is $50, and comes with a leatherette pouch. The latter is only available at Circuit City and comes with nothing else, and is $20 cheaper. Both are exceedingly good for the price, though I prefer the former over the latter... Probably Psychosomatic. Panasonic HJE50s. If you need a semi-canalphones, you won't find anything else better than this. Koss's "60ohm series" drivers. Most of these comes in at or below $50. Found at Circuit City, Tower Records, Radio Shack (they are Koss OEMs), and other large retail chains. They offer strong, punchy bass, sharp trebles, and vocals to match accordingly. The cheapest of these starts at $20 (the clip on KSC75s), and are considered by many best bang for the buck. Phone to avoid: Koss the PLUGS. Just... Bass and nothing else. And not the good kind either. Sony EX-series. They've been superceded by Panasonic HJE-50s. IF you can't find the Panasonics, the EX series are ok, but not recommended over the HJEs.

IF it is NH600, the downloader unit only (for US market), then you're SOL. That unit will not display chinese. Any NH600 that's not purchased from Japan or possibly Hong Kong will probably have the same limitation, this due to the On-unit LCD resolution. A workaround is to get a Remote ending in "K," such as RM-MC55ELK and RM-MC40ELK.

It's not just an ordinary blue thing, but a specific thing that was omnipresent in all 1st gen HiMD products (and sorely missed in the 2nd generation HiMD units). Why, it's a blue HiMD Badge, spare one I took off of my NH1 Dock and slapped on a RH910 accordingly. Mostly a vanity thing.

Hmmm, everything but the most important detail: Sound Quality. I think my head asplode.

Over 28 hours, 399 songs in HiLP!!1! Strangely enough, some of the tracks sounded awful nice... Especially the songs from Wolf's Rain OST.

[attachmentid=495] Hmm, there's something interesting about this particular RH910. What do you think?

Dolby Digital and maybe DTS digital signals are probably incompatible, which requires a separate decoder to decode these signals. However, the Pro Logic/II/"Surround" type sound where the surround matrix type information in the actual sound wave, I believe this information gets preserved even with compressed audio. You might have better results with those surround signals.

The new rebadged/repainted/Macified RH10 and 910s are already filling the wants listed here, though more as an accessory bundle than anything else. At the very least, I think this is a step in the proper direction. Sony realizes that the iPod and other DAPs have left a void that no other media has filled since the cassettes--easy to record and use media (which can be blamed on many forces, including Sony itself). At anyrate, thanks to the new SonicStage 3.2, we have a better vision (or conjectural material) of where HiMD could be heading. 1. Content Uploading. With the removal of the recorded material uploading cap, the HiMD now becomes a viable prosumer/low end recording material gear. The "obvious" next step is for MP3 recording and uploading, but we'll see where this goes. After all, if they want to capture the 'podcasting' market, you have to make this is dead-pan easy as possible... Which comes to the next item. 2. Functional Software With SonicStage 3.2, Sony's added couple of items. One of which was already discussed, the removal of uploading cap. The other crucial item is that OpenMG is getting slightly more open with the optional ability to remove "DRM." Not sure if this is functional as we think it is, but if it at least allows user to upload certain songs from one of thier computer to another with SonicStage, this makes management of music more flexible among multi-PC setup. I do dearly hope that Sony realizes that, nowadays, some households may have more PCs than TVs (and will in the near future, a lot more households). Hopefully, this will translate into more widespread acceptance of HiMD and Atrac products in general. The added bitrate is a very nice feature. Hopefully, the new bitrates will result in improved quality overtime like the original ATRAC codec. Perhaps in another couple of years, we'll perhaps marvel at how HiLP sounds much better than 128kbps AAC or what not. I also think that the variable bitrate would signal that a higher capacity media may not be in the work for the near future. 3. Industrial Design Sony was at one point, known for their industrial design. I'm probably in the minority (not here, but in general) that NH1 looks better than iPod. However, I won't disagree with those who say that iPod is dead easy to use (though a bit scatter-brained, IMO). Remember the tape walkmans? Press Play, you got your music, press stop, you stopped your tape, etc. Dead easy to use. iPods have that same, easy to use design. By Contrast, the NH1 is cluttered and somewhat counterintuititive (whattaya mean I have to press the nipple?). I don't suggest that Sony make it dead simple like Tape Walkman, but make it more accessible. A Dedicated Play and Stop button, Fwd and Rwd buttons, menu button, and volume control easily accessible. No holding buttons 2 or 3 seconds for something that could be done in two or three presses. Or something to that effect. 4. Legacy Keep legacy playback (pop in a MD disc, you can listen to it all you like), but I think the RH910 was a step forward in simplifying the recording experience. You either get SP (PCM), MP (HiSP), or LP (HiLP... yea). While the hard-core recorders here are probably expecting the new bitrates to show up in the next generation recorders, I wonder if this could complicate things furthermore? Easiest way to solve this? Bring back the Advanced/Simple menu. Keep it Simple for most users, and give the strict three levels of recording. If you need it, access the Advanced Menu, and set accordingly. 5. Video With rumors of iPod Video, a fair success of the UMD with PSP, it seems like the next logical step for HiMD (Audio->Photo) is video. Dunno if this is a grand idea however, as portable video is still a fairly nascent market (at least with new media. DVD has a well entrenched mobile market, and knocking that off maybe like knocking off Gameboys off the minds and hearts of all gamers. Still, the PSP/UMD looks like a strong contender for mobile video, so perhaps Sony may be placing the HiMD as a logical recordable solution for portable video. One thing though, the UMD disc format and HiMD are incompatible, so this leads to the next logical question. 6. Consolidation? Something that's been discussed here, elsewhere, is the consolidation of HiMD and UMD. Would this be a logical step? 7. The laws of physics. This, of course, won't have any bearing on what is the most requested feature, faster speed for writing and such. Not to say that they can't eeke out extra mbps here and there, but I think this is one area where not much else can be done. After all, they had several years to make this a reality with NetMD (at least three or four) and nothing much has been to make faster speed a reality. At anyrate, looking at what's going on now can help us to see what's next. Much like how D-NE series of ATRAC CD Players gave us a hint at what was to come for HiMDs, the current SonicStage and RH series (along with the M series) may give us the hint at what is to come.

Too bad mine didn't last a year.... The headphone jack just decided to give up the ghost. On the other hand, the NH600D (US model) did save my soul. On a whim, I decided to put it to the test vs. the iPod 40GB (4th Gen, if you're curious) on a listening test. A week later, I had a nice and shiny NH900 to satisfy my jones while the iPod did went back to wherever it came from... Then I got 2x NH1s in a span of a month... Yes, so in a sick and twisted way, the NH600D saved my soul. I'm now looking at a DH710 as a back up model of sorts... It's a never ending addiction, I'm afriad.

Depends on your model and such, but I know my Clie (NR-70U, before MSPro) doesn't play back ATRAC3plus files (though it can handle ATRAC3 and MP3 files). Considering that most Clies were made before ATRAC3plus bitrates were introduced, I'd say the chances of your Clie playing back ATRAC3plus files are slim to none. And yes, all Connect tracks are 132kbps ATRAC3. That's just the way they were encoded for distribution in the first place, so it'd be more of a "Connect Issue" than a SonicStage issue... More like Sony/BMG, Time Warner Music, EMI, and all other music label issue, but that's beyond the scope of this forum.

Hey, that's Head-Fi Dogma #7, and you have no right to question it, for it must be true. Why? Because that guy at Hydrogen Audio said so! Dogma #7 is always true, you can not question it, nor proof is needed, because it always has been!!

Just be aware that the "SEARCH" button function does not work with the RH-910 (and I'd suspect the same for RH-10). That really makes it a fancy version of MC33EL/K, and slightly less functional, IMO. Brighter though. I thikn I'm just biased towards MC40ELK...

There was a reason why I didn't list 3.5" FDD. I would chalk it up as a mildly successful media (how much of this due to Macs, I wonder?).

Is the 55 the one with two twisty end tube remote? If so, then I'd chalk up compatibility the same as the 53. I need more research on this particular unit. That's correct, any Non-LCD bundled remote will work with all ATRAC CD units, but my experience has been that if the bundled remote is non-LCD, then LCD remotes will display nothing at all. This in contrast to all Hi/MD units, which AFAIK can drive LCD remotes properly (at least the modern ones). It helps to own all three generation of units.... Which kinda scares me in a way... (It should be also noted that I own all two generation of HiMD... I see a pattern here...)