etotheix

Just curious what other people's experience has been with 64kbps Hi-LP. Here's mine: For a lot of music, I'm finding Hi-LP sounds unacceptably bad. What Hi-LP absolutely cannot do: 1) Complex, noisy sounds like cymbols or snares. Sounds like these end up very harsh and distorted and the stereo imagaging gets mangled, jumping around or warbling from ear to ear. Just awful. Hurts my ears! 2) Close up, hi-fi vocals. Consonants are a big problem in Hi-LP, I suppose for the same reason things like cymbols and snares are. Not sure if the consonants are the only problem with vocals in Hi-LP though. The amazing thing is that for some recordings, Hi-LP sounds shockingly good. I recorded An American in Paris and was amazed how good it sounded. I had trouble hearing any artifacts at all (except for a few places where some cymbols come in). Same goes for a recording I made of some classical guitar. A plucked guitar, a hammered xylophone or a piano, high strings, low strings--I'm really surprised how good these can sound in Hi-LP. I keep expecting things to sound garbled or grainy or distorted, but this just doesn't seem to happen very much. Also, low-fi mono recordings can often be difficult to tell from the original. I've got some late 1930's Billie Holiday that sounds great in Hi-LP. I keep listening for some grainyness or some hint of crappyness in the sound. Then when I think I hear something, I'll check the original source and I hear it there too! -- Hi-LP is very unlike 66kbps LP4, which seems to maintain fairly consistant level of badness. To my ears, for some material Hi-LP actually approaches Hi-SP in quality. For others, it makes LP4 sound wonderful by comparison. For the most part, when Hi-LP sounds good it sounds very good. When it sounds bad though, it sounds VERRRY bad.

That's a good question. When you use Simple Burner, does the MD player do the encoding, or does the software? Hmmm...

45 hours * 60 min/hour --------------------------- = 675 songs 4 min/song Definitely can't hold 2000 songs

I'm confused kurisu. If you record a CD using SonicStage then transfer to MD, it's a real tranfer isn't it? SonicStage encodes the CD at whatever bitrate and version ATRAC you tell it to, then wraps it in Sony's DMR crap. When you transfer it to MD over USB, the MD recorder isn't doing more encoding. The stuff is already in ATRAC. So, unless I missunderstood the question, you gain nothing by creating an intermediate WAV version first. Campekenobi, you're worried about losing sound quality by doing multiple lossy encodings. Right? Creating a WAV (or losslessly compressed) version *is* a good idea if you won't later have access to the CD but might down the road want to create a version using a different bitrate or codec (mp3 say).

I have an NH900 and love it. But, I find the external AA case a bit awkward to use (though I'm very glad to have the option). Once you screw it on, it feels a little flimsy and it's surprizingly difficult to open when you want to change the battery. I'd worry that the case might break or get lost or something. Seems to me that an NHF800 would be a wonderful option for her: 1) It uses AA's internally (like the NH600). 2) It also has a radio tuner (might be nice to listen to some African radio). 3) It has a mic input (like the NH900). If she's joining the Peace Corps and going off to Africa, it might be really fun to take a mic along to record some of the sounds over there!

There are some tables starting on page 94 of the NH1 manual that detail exactly when you can record in what codecs. It's different depending on your how your disk is formatted and on whether you're recording straight to MD or are using SonicStage. http://www.minidisc.org/manuals/sony/Sony_...tion_manual.pdf (Anyone notice that the max times for ATRAC3 132kbps and 105kbps are listed as being the same? Also the NH900 manual has the same chart but doesn't list the SP rate. Are these misprints?)

Veeeeerrry interesting... You should definitely test that Rayovac when you get a chance. Got my new NH900 yesterday. What fun! I'm glad I went with the 900 too. I was this close to getting the less expensive 800 but the versitility of the 900 won me over. The NH1 wasn't an option for me, but even if it was I'd have gone with the 900. More Battery Questions: 1) While recording, how low can you safely let the battery level get before you need to stop and replace the battery? 2) What happens if you let the battery die while recording? I read somewhere that you're SOL -- the recording won't be accessible. Is that right? 3) Also, when using both batteries, is it possible to safley swap in a new external battery without stopping a recording?

Hmmm... that's interesting mrsoul. So you can't get the HN900 to record with a lone fresh AA NiMH -- have you tried it with a fresh alkaline? I'm still waiting to get my unit (should come tommorow--yay!) but I've looked at the manual and it sure does look like you should be able to record with an external battery alone. That other thing you mentioned--that you have to power down for it to recognize a new external battery--does seem wierd. What happens if you have the gumstick and a AA in to begin with, then *replace* the AA? Do you sill have to power down? I'm wondering if these problems might have something to do with the fact that the NiMH AA's are 1.2V instead of 1.5V like alkalines. The manual indicates that recording and editing are especially power hungry so maybe the way the circuitry is set up, when using a lone external battery, you need 1.5V in order to supply enough current to handle recording. That seems kind of dumb though considering the internal 1.2V gumstick works fine. I'd be curious to know what, if any, of those wierd problems go away if you use an alkaline instead. Hey, thanks for your post mrsoul--very helpful and interesting. Good to know you can use AA NiMH even if they don't seem to work perfectly. Keep experimenting, let us all know what you discover!

That's great mrsoul! 2000 mAh gumsticks? Where would you find those? I've never seen any with that high a capacity. I just bought an NH900 and am planning on doing a lot of PCM recording too. Hey, do you know if you can use a AA NiMH in the external battery case?

I just ordered an NH900 and plan on doing a lot of power hungry PCM live recording. Does anyone here have any experience or know anything about using rechargable AA NiMH with the NH900 (or other recorder with an external battery case)? 1) Is the voltage of NiMH a problem (1.2V vs the 1.5V of regular Alkaline)? 2) Will the NH900 charge a NiMH battery in the external case? 3) How would the life of a high capacity NiMH AA (say 2000+ mAh) compare to an Alkaline? I know you can get a higher capacity gumstick battery than the one that comes with the NH900 -- Does anybody have any other hints for extending battery life (maybe a homemade battery box hooked to DC in...)?