dex Otaku

Going on hiatus again. If the board is lucky, I will never return.

Sounds like you're encoding to HiSP [256kbps], which gives a usable 7:55 recording time. Using HiMD's own audio format [atrac3plus] you can also encode to: LPCM [uncompressed, 94 minutes] 352kbps [just under 6 hours] 192kbps [just under 11 hours] 64kbps [aka HiLP 64] [around 33 hours] 48kbps [aka HiLP 48] [around 42 hours] What you deem to be the minimum acceptable quality is up to your ears. Check SS's encoding options, try encoding to each bitrate, and see what you prefer. Choose your own compromise between time vs. quality.

http://forums.minidisc.org/index.php?showtopic=14222

Just out of curiosity, have you not switched the menu language to your own [or at least, one of those available that you understand better than Japanese]?

Man I wish I could gets them that cheap here [where they're almost 4x that price].

When you import your MP3s into SS's library, it reads the existing tags. If you keep well-tagged MP3s [unlike most people] then the results it imports, and subsequently tags the same tracks with when they're downloaded to a player, are quite readable. The difference is basically made by whether you keep your tags orderly or not. SS does have limitations relating to the length of individual tag fields [like truncating stupidly long song titles]. There as also a limit to how much text you can send to the player [rather, a specific disc] in tags as well, but I believe that for the 1GB discs this limit is in the tens of thousands, which most users would be hard-pressed to fill just by downloading albums of pop music.

There is very limited support for on-unit playlisting [by using bookmarks]. On the other hand, you can divide the tracks you're downloading into groups [i.e. "for driving", "for chilling out" &c.] using SS. SS has playlist tools [you could make a playlist for driving and download it into a single group called "for driving"], and while they serve a basic purpose SS lacks a few features [like being able to randomise the playlist before downloading] of other library software. SS also lets you import M3U playlists from other software [but has been known to create duplicate entries in its library if the tracks were already there, in the past at least - haven't tried this with 4.0 yet]. I myself rather like using MD80s [reformatted for HiMD] which with 192kbps a3+ audio gives you about 3hrs/disc. This is just around the right amount for me to make single artist compilations and such while still maintaining navigability on the disc without ever having to look at the remote's or unit's display to see what's coming up.

You can already do that, and have been able to for quite some time [since WDM drivers came out with Win98 if I'm not mistaken]. The choice is somewhere between the hands of the programmers and the users - between what the programmers want to stick you with [i.e. progs like SS that have no playback options at all] and what the user wants to use [i.e. foobar2000 and the like with ASIO, DirectSound, "WAVEOUT", kernel streaming, &c.]. I'll note that the DirectSound method [which allows individual control per program] has the added cost [sound-quality wise] of using a mixer that is either software or hardware [depending on your sound adapter and drivers] with multiple layers of processing which adulterate the sound. Some of us find that annoying [because we want the stream getting to the DAC to be exactly what was decoded by the player without any processing or with only the processing we choose].

SS's volume control uses the main control for everything ["Master Volume"] This affects everything coming out of your sound card.. Some programs use a control that is only for the stream they are playing [and won't affect anything else] through DirectSound. Others use the control for the WAVE output [which will affect anything playing back digital audio but nothing else]. Open your system mixer, play with the volume control in various programs, and you should be able to tell [immediately] which one they're using by which slider [if any] follows.

Excellent response, tekdroid. My $0.02 is the a version: The RH1 is a recordist's unit and its interface as well as the additional features others are unlikely to use are optimised for recording use. Anyone who doesn't understand this after even a cursory glance at the unit with the display on deserves to get burned for not buying a player-oriented unit such as the RH10. "My $0.02 is the a version" should read, "My $0.02 is a short version"

What exact format and bitrate [of aa3] were you using?

ren *.aa3 *.oma There ya go. Also, side-issue: the atrac codecs for Sony's pro suite of tools won't open files with DRM on them [or at least, the version I have won't]. This means that any kind of transcoding [of, say, tracks you recorded yourself on your HiMD] must also be stripped of DRM before SF can even open them. I've been using SF since about 1992 or 93. It has its place, to be certain.

Try http://users.pandora.be/satcp/eac-qs-en.htm As for the slight echo - what encoder were you using? I've been using EAC for years and have never had such a problem [not that I don't believe you are, of course].

Doesn't EAC do this properly? I mean, I've used it for such with FLAC and MP3. I just don't recall if the tags were 100% right off the bat because I almost always mass-edit them with MP3BookHelper or Foobar2000 after encoding anyway.

I missed that part. * Thou shalt not reply to forum posts after drinking a whole bottle of grenache-shiraz.