dex Otaku

Um. Amplify a line input to line level? Chances are, if you used the record level control for the line-in on your sound card the problem would be fixed. AC97 itself is only a standard to ensure that the sound device supports certain functions. It isn't [AFAIK] an assurance of quality. In this sense, it may make sense to upgrade to a higher-quality sound card. kurisu often recommends the Chaintech AV710, which is inexpensive, supports true 24-bit sound, and has an optical output to boot. Still, using the level controls might fix your problem until you decide that updating your hardware is worth it.

Forgetfulness is the mother of, uh, self-reminders.

First: look at the new version of the HiMD upload FAQ. Second: regarding gapless playback between tracks, this has nothing to do with what is used to convert it. If you go the analogue route and split your files, you're just as likely to get glitches or gaps as you are by any of the digital routes. The ONLY way to ensure gapless playback on your CDs is to use one long file for all the tracks that run together and add trackmarks in your CD authoring program [Nero, among other progs, allows this]. The reason for this is that CD depends on things being a certain framerate; if your tracks are not the length of an exact number of frames, it pads the end of the track out to fill the last frame, causing the glitch. This imposes a limitation on where track boundaries can be, which is why on CDs where everything runs together, tracks do not always end or start at the exact drumshot or note where you think it should begin. It has to be somewhere on a division of exactly 75 fps.

No one has made any that I'm aware of. Sony does not publish the means by which to make completely new skins, so the limit of what you can change is basically editing the graphic files that make up the current SS skin. Also: update your SS to version 2.3. It will improve your overall experience with your player/recorder.

While many people use MD or HiMD for storage, I only use it as intermediary storage as you're saying. Basically, record with it, copy it to your computer, back up to CDR, erase the original, and produce as many CDRs as you like. It is well-suited for this purpose and still less expensive than any other medium currently offering uncompressed [PCM] recording and digital transfer to computers. As for archiving in a preservable manner, the only completely-trusted medium in use by actual archivists is 1/4 open-reel tape. CDR should suit your purposes, though.

That should be HiMD, not MD. MD has no data storage capabilities [MD-Data does, yes]. I haven't tried doing much with my HiMD in terms of data storage or transport, because it's simply too slow. While technically the read speed with Hi-MD media [around 10Mbps peak] is enough for video use, I couldn't see it be more practical than CDR or DVDR, really. Reason being [and I've used this example before, but I'll give it a go again]: With 700MB of data - I could walk down the street, buy a pack of CDRs, walk back, prep things to burn, burn at 40x, and copy the contents of the disc to another computer all in less time than it would take the HiMD just to write the 700MB. In any case, yes, the bandwidth is enough to video playback of files that aren't too high in resolution or quality.

Excellent point, and no, I don't think the LED would take more power than the amp. Of course there was, but only by a minority. I've never actually met anyone who uses digital interconnects on their stereo system. Not even audio professionals. The 'audiophiles' I have known with $20,000 systems all use analogue interconnects. I have also never met a broadcaster who uses digital interconnects. Keep in mind that relatively speaking, I live in the boonies, though I've seen people systems literally from coast to coast in Canada. In the end, I think it's less of a battle between sp/dif coax and optical and more of a battle to convince consumers that there's any advantage whatsoever in using digital connections. For the vast majority of users [probably greater than 85%] the difference is either completely unnoticeable or not enough to warrant using it. If people in general don't use it, they won't ask for it. If they don't ask for it, equipment manufacturers won't care about including it.

People just love my .sig now, don't they.

This makes sense to me, in the context of "workout." Workout probably means constant jarring and vibration, which means the player has to constantly seek and reseek the same points to fill the buffer consistently and without error. Constant use of the anti shock memory takes more power, basically. I have experienced battery life for playback in excess of 26 hours with non-name AA alkaline batteries in my NH700. If I do a lot of walking with the unit, it falls to around 20 hours. And indeed - everything about HiMD takes more power, really. You have a higher-resolution servo positioning the optical block [and magnetic head when recording], a higher power laser, and a larger antishock buffer to begin with. Those three alone consume more power than their equivalents in any MD.

It's good to hear of your positive experience, both on the board and with your new rig. Welcome to the board.

I'm thinking that it's just this setting.. that there is no difference whatsoever in the actual hardware. When I set mine to eurocrippled it acted as eurocrippled; likewise, if you set the eurocrippled unit to one of the other codes, it will no longer be eurocrippled.

I'm installing this on my father's notebook. It needs it. Heh. Will provide further commentary if there's really anything to say.

I haven't, for multiple reasons: * They aren't available where I live yet * I do not have any means by which to order online * Until very recently, HiMD 1GB discs cost more per MB than MD80s, so there was little point * I do not use any MD media for permanent storage, so as long as the one that came with my player stays working, I'll just reuse it * I haven't the money in any case

/Failing video card fan = overheat followed by my coming home to find puter not working [now thinking the video card is dead actually] .. followed by my shutting the puter off, turning back on, PSU blowing fuse. I'll be around now. After struggling with this ancient Debian install I'm finally sort of running, I can at least use mozilla [firebird won't even install, yay] .. my doG, this OS is almost completely unusable. I can't remember how to do most things from the shell, and the system defaults to KDE, which I'm just trying to not screw with .. but it's next to impossible to do anything. My father's bringing over a notebook with CD writer for me to download a newer version of .. something .. with .. I'm refusing to bother with Windows on this old machine. Problem is my having forgotten 95% of linux/unix stuff, having not used it heavily since, oh, 1997. Things have changed a lot since then of course, but from what I'm looking at right now [knoppix based on debian 2.something] they haven't improved - they've gotten way, way worse. It took an hour just to add a dvorak right-hand keyboard layout to this bloody thing. If anyone can recommend a better version of linux, please do. This is on an ancient machine: K6/2-350, 160MB RAM, 6.4GB hdd, ATI mach64-based PCI video, D-Link DFE530TX NIC [i think, it's some version of dlink in the 528-530 range] .. This is utterly painful, but I can at least get to the bloody web. BTW, all images linked to my server are naturally down as a consequence of this. Will be noting that on the most recent post with such.

Due to a hardware failure I will likely not be around for several days. I hastily reassembled my K6-2/350 and .. well, I knew there was a reason I kept that old knoppix disc. Trying to install it in a few minutes [booted off cd right now] can't wait for the hundreds of emails I'll have waiting for me in a few days. yay.

It's possible that they left it out for power saving reasons. It's also possible that they left it out to prevent the billions of users who have recorders with optical inputs from copying their MDs digitally. Only problem with that theory is that almost no one I know, from the average user to audio professionals, uses optical connections for any of their equipment. Except perhaps for their main home system, in which the optical connections never end up going to recorders. My sarcastic theory is that they leave it out to peeve the thousands of recordists that use their equipment by requiring them to buy a deck, i.e. it's a money-making ploy. In all honesty, they probably leave it out for the power reason and to save a few cents on build complexity. Putting an optical out in the headphone output might likely make the jack more fragile [think of the thousands of insertion/removal cycles that happen in a player's lifetime].

If levels were low enough for that in that situation - all you're doing by using the RS attenuator is adding noise to your recording by forcing yourself to turn up the recording levels. Also, using 'high sens' adds quite a bit of preamp noise even if you are using low manual-set levels. While I have not yet found any situation that might need attenuation [other than recording sounds loud enough to seriously damage hearing if they were sustained], if I were ever using passive attenuation I'd try going without first, then with after. This wouldn't be appropriate for every situation [especially if stealthing] but that's what I'd do when possible. edit: It's also useful to think of the fact that when you're using the passive attenuator, you're causing a drop not only in the signal level from the mic, but also in the bias voltage from the MD - meaning you're actually decreasing the total dynamic range [maximum SPL sans distortion] of the mic if you're using the MD to power it. It would probably only be a few dB, but if you're using the attenuator to compensate for really loud levels to begin with, you're basically just causing more problems in this case than solving any. On the other hand, it's a cheap solution - and if you're using a battery box, self-powered mic, or dynamic mic [which requires no power] then you're not really doing any harm. In all of these cases, though, it might be simpler to bypass attenuation and just use the line-in if levels are that high to begin with.

No recording HiMDs suffer from the need to pause to change levels.

Indeed. I'll fit my gripe in here though: the CD jewel case is a prime example of one of the worst consumer/industrial designs EVER. It speaks volumes when the case is 100x more fragile than the medium is.

I find that there are situations [mostly dueto specific acoustic conditions] where mono works better in the end. In any case, I always record in stereo when possible, and try a mono mix after for comparison's sake. I almost never end up doing folddowns, but I am open to the option. Also, if equipment limitations force it on me, I run with what's available [such as mono off a sound board that I'm not running myself].

This is likely a simple mechanical failure. It's highly unlikely that there's anything wrong with the amp. Usually this happens because headphone jack's solder becomes detached from the logic board from stress through repeated use. Other possibilities are that the logic board may have nearly-invisible stress cracks on it for the same reason, or that the pins inside the headphone jack are simply bent to the point that they no matter make full contact with the connector when it's inserted. It's also possible that the pins may just be dirty or corroded, but if you're getting a "cancellation" effect, this is usually from physical damage between the jack's pins and the logic board. The only actual solution to this is to replace either the headphone jack or the entire logic board inside the unit, depending on the extent of damage.

If by "good quality" you mean [as I would] lossless-packed and without DRM, there's all kinds of music out there that is perfectly legal to download. It's just not major label pop music.

Anything encoded by hardware LSI is better than anything encoded by SS's codecs. In the case of HiSP, the difference is pretty minute as Michael1980 said, but in bitrates lower than this, the difference becomes steadily more obvious as the bitrate goes down. I still find LP2 from SS to be completely unaccepable for general use [fine for in the car though, say]. Comparing LP2 from a hardware encode to LP2 from SS is like .. comparing seashells to garbage cans.

Something better like: Sell lossless-packed tracks with no DRM. When they start doing this, I'll start buying music online. Otherwise, my money goes to the pressed aluminum and silicate polysubstrate, thank you.

This is a matter of personal opinion, and as such my answer to it isn't definitive in any way. Neither would yours be. Still: properly-encoded MP3 does have certain advantages over ATRAC in basically all of its variations, including SP. In a measurable sense, MP3 has fewer problems with ringing and pre-echo, which all ATRAC versions have difficulty with due to limitations imposed on it [related in part to ATRAC's requirements of editing and gapless playback - features I think offset the issue in a way that almost cancels it out]. ATRAC SP [v3.5 and newer, I believe] has the advantage of higher apparent bit-depth on decoding, so it would probably have a higher measurable dynamic range from the right source material. [Note that as transform-related formats, neither has a bit-depth in any conventional, PCM-related sense]. I consider MP3 at 320kbps transparent with most material in the same way that ATRAC is. If forced to choose between the ATRAC SP and MP3@256 or 320kbps, I would choose MP3 100% of the time simply because of its wide compatibility. ATRAC is a closed system that is not supported outside of a limited range of dedicated hardware, making it next to useless in a true portability sense. Evidently you really have something again the MPEG. Really though, this is no different than Head-Fi dogma #7, or saying that "ATRAC sucks because it was made by Sony." It may be your opinion, but it doesn't amount to anything more than that [just as my and anyone else's opinion doesn't, either]. Also, again: please consider using the EDIT feature to add to your posts. Also, please consider shortening your signature, or at least removing the photo from it. Every one-liner you post is huge in screenlength.