dex Otaku

I'd be interested in trying, yes. I'm going to work on collecting some soundmarks of this city to begin with. Next perhaps would be Winnipeg. Hopefully at some point I can afford to get a pocket preamp with a lower noise floor than the one on the 700. There are some more clips I made this afternoon - my first real test recordings. I'll pm you with the links for those a bit later.

Dear person at hse-toronto-ppp187899.sympatico.ca: Evidently you either can't follow instructions or don't know how to use a web browser. *DOWNLOAD IT, THEN PLAY IT* means DOWNLOAD IT, THEN PLAY IT. NOT play it in your streaming app 6-7 times in a row, transferring it anew from me each time. Thank you. HINT: if you're on a peecee, right-clicking on the link and selecting "save as.." or "save target as.." is what you want to do.

Recording data: * Captured 2004-08-08, approx. 15:15 near the pedestrian bridge at Brandon, Manitoba's Riverbank pedestrian/cycling corridor. * Recorded on Sony MZ-NH700 Hi-MD in LPCM mode [built-in mic preamp set to high sensitivity] using SP-TFB-2 binaural microphone with windscreens attached. * Transferred into Sonicstage then digitally captured to open WAV format using Total Recorder [lossless all-digital transfer]. * Some wind noise was edited out [cut/crossfaded] and a -12dB 12dB/oct 145Hz low cut applied [so it would sound more normal on speakers]. * The MD's transport seeking during writes is audible at some points. * Encoded to mp3 using lame v3.96 VBR "--alt-preset standard" Sample is available for download here: http://virtual.dyc.edu/~kurisu/2004-08-08-...02-60s_clip.mp3 Please do not play this as a stream from my server. Download it, then listen to it. Abusers will be permanently blocked.

You don't. You use Sonicstage to play the Hi-MD while it's connected. It "plays" digitally over USB and is routed to your sound card [or Total Recorder's driver, in this case]. If you connect the Hi-MD adn go into the "transfer' window in SS, you will notice the play controls about the playlist.

Look for a product called Total Recorder. This is what I'm currently using - it has its own recorder applet, which you can save to .wav from and then edit in the application of your choice. And it doesn't cost much, either!

No. See http://forums.minidisc.org/viewtopic.php?t=4207

I'm not sure what to suggest. Do you have other USB devices than the Hi-MD plugged in? If so, try unplugging them - process of elimination should determine whether one of them is interfering. It also might be background-running software [such as a system tray tool or service] for another USB device that is the problem. Another quick suggestion is to just unplug and plug-in the USB cord to the Hi-MD while SS is open to see if it changes anything. I'd give more tech help here but I have to go fold and staple 250 programs for the folkfest here. Work work work! Cheers

Hmm. What software are you using to record on the PC with?

It's working fine for me. What version of Windoze are you using?

Um. It appears I was thinking of another piece of software I installed around the same time as Sonicstage. My mistake, sorry.

I had a problem similar to this and fixed by by not using the online installer version. After downloading the entire thing as one file, the installer stopped complaining about incorrect versions of the MSI installer and needing to update Installshield.

My MZ-NH700 arrived today. As it's currently hectic work time for the folk festival I'm a board member of, my [subjective] review will likely be postponed until tomorrow at the very least, more likely until next week.

I can't say what the location should be, but the question is pretty much moot anyway - the files you've uploaded from your NH1 are encrypted in Sony's OMG format and can't be used for anything but playing in Sonicstage or putting back on your Hi-MD. Sony has stated that they're releasing a wave convertor util so that users can take audio [recorded from analogue sources] transferred from Hi-MD to Sonicstage and use that audio in an editor of your choice. Release date so far is simply "this fall" but hopefully it will be some time this month. You might benefit from trying out Total Recorder in the meantime.

How are you meaning 'discretely' here, anti?

Good story. But like I said, 100% subjective, and consciously so. Consciously subjective i.e. a personal opinion, including all my biases. I am anything but infallible. Still, I think expressing an opinion helps others in some way.

I know what abx'ing is. No, I didn't use abx. I just compared them directly and knowingly. The purpose of the [100% subjective] test I did wasn't to see if I could pick which was what - it was to listen for the differences, quite deliberately, consciously, and intentionally. Which is not what I see abx as for. Yes, I did repeatedly switch between sources [pcm/256k/etc.]. I think the end result is still reliable in the sense that only the most major differences would stand out by listening this way - and that's what I was looking for. Hope that helps. As for the placebo effect, if there was actually anything in what I said that seemed like a Stereo Review product review - other than how surprised I was at how 'not bad' 64kbps was - please point it out. Cheers.

I spent some time last night ripping tracks with EAC to import in SS2.1 [which though I haven't got my Hi-MD yet, it should arrive tomorrow, I finally downloaded and installed]. 18 tracks in all, including a few Telarc classical CDs, Pink Floyd, Nine Inch Nails, Smashing Pumpkins, Kitchens of Distinction, Enya, VAST, Wynton Marsalis, and Depeche Mode. My choice of tracks was made deliberately for things that I knew were either quite detailed, soundstage-wise [the jazz and classical CDs], or simply hell for codecs [like the multi-layered distorted guitars of Smashing Pumpkins and other sonically dense mixes, Kitchens of Distinctions being one of my faves here since it has such a 'full' high-end]. I encoded all tracks only using atrac3plus modes, as I doubt I'll ever use the atrac codec. First at 256kbps, the 64, then 48. My listening equipment is not optimal, so here's my frame of reference: Revo7.1 analogue -> Logitech z680 controller [using headphone amp output], Sennheiser HD330 headphones c.1996 [$285CAD at that time if that gives any idea as to where they stand]. SRS + Dolby processing turned off, of course, no EQ. To note once again: all material was encoded straight from PCM using Sonicstage 2.1's atrac3plus codec. My results: 256kbps - Almost exactly what I was expecting, with a few .. oddities. Soundstage is excellent, no audible flanging even with the most difficult tracks I selected, though.. Some very minor but still discernable differences in dynamics. Sharp transients seem okay, though transients leading from quiet to loud passages [as in the track I selected from NIN] seem .. anticipated rather than merely encoded. It's not quite something I could put my finger on, but perhaps related to the [still failure] with the [pre-echoing] castanets test mentioned on HeadFi. Certain instruments lose a little air; Wynton's trumpet and the burr in Dave Gahan's voice [of Depeche Mode] in particular go from being clear with PCM to sounding glossed. It's not as though the high end is gone, per sé - just that it seems gently gated in certain parts or smoothed over. So.. end opinion at 256k: the two most obvious artifacts I could discern were a slight loss in dynamics [an almost compressed sound] and a high-end that sounds somewhat smoothed over. Detail is still good, though, and I could sense no discernable flanging or ringing even with material that drives mp3 nuts. 64kbps: Wow! No, really - wow! I am quite surprised by how decent 64kbps atrac3plus sounds. I actually would rate this better than mp3 at 128kbps, but not because it's sonically great by any means. Here the high end is even more glossed over. As I said, I deliberately chose tracks that I know other codecs have difficulty with - atrac3plus here was no exception. Still, given that the bitrate is this low, I'm surprised by .. not how good it sounds, but how .. not bad, it sounds. I'd say that for listening in a car or similarly noisy environment where a lot is masked already anyway, this might be acceptable for general listening. Dynamics sound sort of .. artificial. Almost as though there's expansion being applied. Could be variable lowpass-filtering similar to mp3's VBR modes. There is definite flanging and warbling in most of the tracks I encoded, though it is soft and actually... this may sound strange, but I can only say that unlike mp3, the artifacting taking place here is not as unpleasant to hear. Low-bitrate mp3 sounds like an AM radio playing in a tin can underwater to me; atrac3plus @64kbps by comparison seems more like an FM radio sitting on the beach. The artifacting seems more like waves than blurts and bubbles. End opinion of 64kbps: Pleasantly surprised, though this isn't even remotely audiophile-quality. Suitable for listening in situations where background noise will be masking a significant part of the program anyway. I wouldn't use this for anything serious. Still, I think it's preferable to 128k mp3, but not because there's less artifacting - rather because the artifacting is less obtrusive, gentler even. I'd agree that for low-fi recordings such as voice or AM/shortwave radio, this should do fine. 48kbps: Again, exactly what I expected. How Sony expects any consumer to think that this is listenable, and to prefer using it so they can fit 40+ hours on a disc, I don't know. As Jadeclaw and others have said, this is suitable for voice recordings. Music just sounds like crap through it; the step from 64 down to 48kbps is hugely noticeable in a very bad way. Think warbling, gated highs.. smudged out low-end with no detail at all.. significant flanging distortion that is basically constant. The only good thing I have to say about 48k is that, as with the 64kbps mode, the artifacting is less grating on my ears than that of mp3 [or AAC or even OGG, IMO]. --- Sonicstage, though.. hmm. Well, it's not as bad as I was expecting. The music library system is crap. Having used iTunes since it came out for PC, as well as having used Winamp since pre-1.0 days, Sonicstage seems a huge step.. sideways, if not backwards. The system of organising into albums isn't really that bad. What I don't like about it is that you have to keep clicking back and forth between things in order to get anywhere. There's no way in hell I would use this as my PC-based general music player. Which is kind of rough, because if I want to maintain a library to transfer to and from my Hi-MD, I'll have to be reripping or transcoding things all the time. Please note that my current music library is 25+GB of mostly lame-vbr encoded MP3s; moving this into Sonicstage would take a while, to say the least, and while I find 256kbps atrac3plus stands beside my current encodings rather well, the system SS uses for organising things leaves a lot to be desired. Not much else to say about it until my recorder gets here. Cheers.

An addtion to DrZhivago's answer to the 2nd question: Yes, but REEEEAAAAALLLLLYYY SLOOOWWWWWLLLLLYYY. [re: bootinvg off it]

Hi Lowend, A440's advice is dead on but I would add on one thing: The direction you point the mics in relation to each other changes the phase angle of the two channels in relation to each other. Really simplified: in practise what this amounts to is the "pointing out" [binaural] config works best for headphones, and the pointing forward [or at 90 degrees to each other] works better for speakers.

I find the same with most companies, really. Which is why it pays to be an informed consumer. Which is why places like this are so important for spreading information to people in general.

I agree. Having read a bit of the tech background on atrac3+ [it does have some truly significant advantages in how its processing is done] I'd say that a 128-160kbps mode would have likely been near equivalent to mp3 192kbps [what I consider the minimum acceptable quality - absolutely fine for portable or car use]. Sony is putting too much trust in people gobbling up their lower bitrates as acceptable, but I'm willing to bet that people will just hear crap for crap. Anyone with half a brain can look at those datarates and wonder what Sony were thinking trying to pull the wool over their customers' eyes like that.

You can't play atract3+ on atrac/3/4/R/whatever other than + equipment. Period. So no, there's no way to change that. If you want higher quality on std-MD discs, use standard SP. Don't know about the deleting files part, though. Cheers.

I know this is late in the debate to bring this up, but I have another reason for using EQ - to compensate for known hearing damage [as I have]. Oh yeah, and I know this is off topic, but .. yeah. Funny thing is that I never use the main EQs on PA systems to tailor sound - only to eliminate feedback. It helps that I'm very familiar with the effects of my hearing damage - which can make even $3k electrostatic headphones on studio equipment unbearable if not painful to listen to. Anyhoo.

This sounds like something related to the USB interface, not [just] the NetMD. Do you have any other USB devices plugged in, or software that always runs for devices you only plug in occasionally? Examples would be scanners, tablets, printers, etc. that have their own management software that loads at startup.

Indeed. Bit-pushing is usually done for one purpose and one purpose only: to make the music sound louder. Of course, they do it at the sacrifice of -real- dynamic range. It's the same as why the last stage before transmitting on radio is putting the entire mix through a compressor/limiter - so things sound loud and clear on cheap, shitty equipment. On the other hand, it also means not having to compress so much for playing on the radio; the damping of or outright elimination of some transients that psychoacoustic compression schemes [i.e. mp3, atrac, etc.] have difficulty with; and of course having that average SPL level on output that is much higher than the noise floor of the average person's playback equipment. I hate it, personally. But then, most of the musicians [the non-folk musicians] I've toyed around with recording with always ended up asking, "Can't you make it louder? This doesn't sound as loud as my Radiohead CD." [Of course, some of them change their mind when I open a track of theirs in sound forge and then open a ripped track from radiohead, which just looks like solid clipping from beginning to end]