sonyslave

He He, I've just gone back to recording my discs in SP. Why is it better than HiSP at 256 or 352kbps? Well I can't really say one way or another, I haven't done any comparitive testing. The old SP codec sounds very good to my battered old ears. No my reason was two fold: 1. Compatability. I can use SP with all my units, including most importantly my so called portable ZS-M50 with resorting to using a line-in. 2. It is much easier to find the album(s). With HiMDs I was always trying to remember which albums were on which disc and I often carried around 2 or more HiMD discs because the albums were on different discs. So in the end I decided that SP was probably the way to go. P.S. Most of my portable listening is done with the Sony HD-5 these days, so my 20 or so 1gb discs, will be used to back up the files from SonicStage now that I am allowed to transfer my music back from HiMDs at least.

Well lets see... I shall continue to use the minidisc format, along side other DAPs until the last of breaks and I can not find a any second hand units. You see, I am not a recorder of music, but a listener. When I have to move on to other DAPs the only thing I shall regret is that I will be tied to the computer again! My only problem with DAPs is that I am tied to a computer. Perhaps I am old fashioned, but I have never lost any music that was recorded on minidisc, I wish I could say the same for music recorded/downloaded on to my computer, or even CDRs come to think of it.

Well it looks lke the MD is dead. Am I sad, angry disapointed... well for my own view please read on: I got into minidiscs to replace the dreaded cassettes. Back then the MD unit was bigger than the cassette player, a good deal heavier and had a dreadful battery life. But it didn't chew up tapes. The other major problem was a shortage of recordable MDs. In the end only about 20 of my favourite tapes got transfered to MD, and I bit the bullet and replaced the others with CDs and a portable CD player, which I never really used as a portable unit because of its size. In the end I ended up recording the CDs to tape and using a portable cassette player, go figure! Then came the NetMD and a quicker way of transfering CDs to MDs, along with a better supply of blank MDs (you could actually buy them in department stores!) So I used the MD as a portable device again! Then the dreaded Mp3 players came on to the market, and as a gaget freak I had to try them. And I used them along side the MD as a portable player, even though they were not very practical back in the those days. Now, was it only 2 years ago the HiMD came out. Great, the answer to my prayers. Now I could put my CDs on MD easily, the progress of technology. Of course at about the same time the Pocket Vaio came out, I had to have it (gagets again). I managed to hold off the HD1 and HD3 though! So this year I got the HD5 and NW407 players and the HiMD has sat on the shelf most of the time. But here is my problem - I now have over 40gb of music (just under 400 albums) encoded at 256kbps ATRAC3, on my computer. I don't trust them, computers that is! Every time I upgraded I have ended up re-ripping my music, not a problem at the beginning it was small, but now! So I hope you see why in a roundabout way I like the MD format! I don't have to use a computer or be dependent on it! Oh and here is another reason, you remember I said I had just under 400 CDs on my computer, well I have another 400 odd that aren't. They are classical recordings so I don't want to listen to them on the move, but I want them on MD. I don't listen to CDs any more I rip them on to my ATRAC device or MD, then they go into storage or is it an archive! The HiMD is perfect for this! So I am not a musician, I don't do live recording although I did get a mike (never used), but I do like the format, because it frees me from my computer! So Sony please don't kill off the MD!!! Pleeeeease! I hope these ramblings make some sense, David

I have both, although I prefer the 900 in all things except the screen. Now if only they had put an OLED screen on the 900. Heaven

Thanks Low Volta. I chose Sonyslave because after converting my Cds to ATRAC I can't use anything but Sony equipment!!! Having said that I wouldn't want to use anything else now that Sony do flash players, HD players as well as the minidic of course.

You can make a group though, say with the name of artist as the title, then add individual songs from albums by this artist (use multiple select). Then you have a group with all the songs from one artist. On the HiMD you can use the Album mode to play individual albums or shuffle through all songs in the Group mode. So in a sense you can put an album within an album should you wish.

Hi having the problem. Can see hex values with no way to adjust that I can see

No it may not be mp3 as we know it. ie drag and play. Yes you need to use Sonicstage to transfere the files to the player. The big advantage is that now you do not need to transcode the files. This means no loss of quality and increased speed when transfering. Of course you also get Sony's DRM so you cannot transfere the music tracks to another computer.