zerodB

Wowee! Here are some of the other cool features this unit provides: * Preset EQ/VTP Engine * Plays Audio CDs, MP3 CDs, ATRAC CDs. * Reads CD-Text * Supports HiMD (Audio/Data) & NetMD. Can record in regular MDLP and SP modes! * Sleep timer / record timer. And here is the clincher: * It is possible to transfer Hi-MD recordings made from cassette tape / CD / FM-AM radio back to the PC via SonicStage.

Happy birthday to the both of you - our advisor jadeclaw, and administrator extrodinaire kurisu. Cheers! My hat off to the pair of you!

Case Logic make some excellent MD cases - how about something like this, the MPC2? (Pics & description stolen from minidisco.com - look here: http://www.minidisco.com/mpc2.html)

kurisu, chuck up the skins pack I sent you...

Yes that is correct dex. Type S will encode SP exactly the same as Type R. So whether you get a Type-S or a Type-R unit, the results for SP will sound the same. (LP2 and LP4 are said to sound better on a Type-S unit)

Whoa! You're always on the ball, beta! You should be our official news watchman!

Have you contacted Sony about this? You should. See what they say...

In terms of sound quality - Any unit with type R or type S is your best bet. Type R was introduced into a couple of MDLP recorder just prior to NetMD. These included the R501, R909, and R910 if my memory serves me correctly. Type R was available on all first gen NetMD, Type S on second gen NetMDs and first gen HiMDs.

The real question: what's your maximum budget?

A Hi-MD PC drive would be useful, say if you have a playback-only HI-MD unit. You could use the drive to transfer your music to disc, and then playback on your portable unit.

Hmmm... It seems like she's never heard of NetMD or HiMD... or online etailers like audio cubes for that matter as well. Correct me if i'm mistaken, but wasn't Sony selling more MD units then ever in North America with the introduction of NetMD? And aren't the sales figures increasing steadily with Hi-MD? Sure it's barley enroaching onto ipod territory, but I don't think this article really does justice to the way MD is (slowly) marching foward today.

They look ridgey-didge to me!

I would recommend freeing tracks from SonicStage by converting to WAV (either thru Marc's program, or the built-in wave conveter in SS 3.x) when any editing operations are required - even if they are just simple combine/divide operations. SS has it's funny issues with DRM anyway - and besides - it's just a safer option. Not an ideal solution, I know, but far safer.

The 910 is a fantastic unit - I'm sure you will enjoy it for years to come. Now I'm jealous.

Also the battery level indicators on most Sony portables are poor at best. It may be that the scale is logarithmic, but i don't really know. For me, with a fully charged gumstick on my E630, the scenario is equally strange. After about half a week of use (I use my MDP, say, 1 and a half hours a day), the level indicator jumps from 4/4 bars to 3/4. In a couple of weeks, it will jump down to 1/4 bars, and stay sitting there for a month or so. After that, the battery level indicator flashes empty for a week before dying totally. So don't believe everything your battery meter tells you!

Well, I meant it in the sense that the NH600 is sort of in the same catagory as the 501. They're both low-end, all plastic units powered by a AA battery and feature optical-in. The NH600 however, being Hi-MD, means you'll have the advantages of 1GB discs (= more music) to play with. I would consider a unit like the NH700. It's still backwards compatible, so you'll have the opportunity to record discs that still play nice with your old unit, but has a MIC in - you can do live recording + more. All in all, you probably aren't getting all the features Hi-MD has to offer unless you use it with a PC. Just my humble opinion tho.

Point conceded, Latexxx. (I'd argue tho, that for all intensive purposes, ATRAC3/+ is gapless).

In terms of the sorts of features - I'd say the 600 is exactly the same as your R501. Echoing LowMDs advice: just don't get a "600D"!!!

The purple one is really nice - has a lot of potential I'm sure. With proper tweaking, it could be fantastic/ I like the formatting. The olive one is positively ugly. Just my opinions btw.

All will be revealed in due course... Personally I prefer the idea of an internal HiMD storage drive - but perhaps this can be countered by using a Hi-MD bookshelf in conjuction with your PC? Speculation is that a new Hi-MD bookshelf unit will appear soon...

Well at the moment, it's all speculation, at least as far as Hi-MDs are concerned. We don't even know if the file storage mechanisms are the same for Hi-MD. Though I don't see any reason to believe that Sony wouldn't have employed something similar in their 2nd gen Hi-MDs

Umm... There is no such thing as gapless MP3. MP3 will have gaps by it's very nature. Some DAPs however, are clever and circumvent the gaps by detecting null signals, etc.

Minidisc.org Equipment Browser is your friend! Here is all the info, and links to everything you need to know about your unit: http://www.minidisc.org/part_Sony_MZ-R50.html You can grab the manual there as well: http://www.minidisc.org/manuals/sony/sony_mzr50_manual.pdf

Hey! I got one of those! It's blue! Had it for ages, i've just never used it cos I thought it was ungainly... It's under the bed... Perhaps I should dig it out again...

Sounds interesting... Personally I love the refault theme. And I also LOVE what you've done with the logo: VERY CLASSY! When did that happen...?