L7R

You are very welcome.

Why didn't you tell this at the first place?! Anyways, you know what to do and you'll get perfect quality.

Those are exact ways what we are talking about. Thanks for the summary! I mean complicated if using MD to soundcard=wav and then conversion process and then sonicstage or whatever you want. At first I used to do this way, but later I found this straightforwarded MD-->MD better way, and less time consuming. Nice to know hmph -renderer can convert optical recordings. But then you should use PCM when recording from md to md to avoid unnecessary conversions.

I have never used hi-md Renderer, btw.

Yet another way! There are almost numerous possibilities. As we see the world if minidisc is way too complicated as it should be.

The quality loss of analog recording is very, very small compared to digital if you set recording levels carefully (manually). Check the level meters and try to find optimal volume level, but avoid clipping/distortion. That's what I've been doing for all my old md collection -analog recording between two portable units. You can record them straight to your computer if you have good quality soundcard and recording software (like cool Edit/audacity) but I found this too complicated and time consuming.

Right! I'm sorry to tell but portable MD units doesn't have optical outputs (some very old ones had, though). So, analog copying is only way between two portable units. Heres a pic of the cord what you need between two portables: It's standard 3.5mm-3.5mm connector cord (or 1/8" in U.S) Plug is same than in most earphones. [attachmentid=496] I don't really know. For recordings made by OPTICAL, surely it's possible to burn them to DVD, but for example if you want someday re-install your operating system, I don't know if sonicstage will accept those files again? If somebody know, please tell us.

PT has those slow and melancholic songs little like pink floyd, too (which I like, as a fan of pink floyd) These two are not very good songs and these both songs are NOT nearly like rush. How did you happened to choose these two? I think best connect when compared rush and PT is that both bands members are really good musicians and song intonations are very complicated on both bands. Of course PT members aren't THAT good as Peart or Geddy Lee but in my mind, both bands share some same characteristics. Melodical but complex, in the same time. PT is more melancholic than rush with those quiet and "low spirit" songs, of course. I think porcupine trees two latest albums are more like Rush than their earlier albums. As I'm from Finland and english is not may native language , so I really don't listen lyrics much, so there could be a difference too. I found PT just few months ago, when they released Deadwing. I immediately bought In Absentia and was really surprised that there's another band in the world, who sounds good AND plays good. Like Rush (or Pink Floyd or Yes)! Happy listening! btw. Here are few PT songs which reminds me of Rush. These are from In Absentia: Wedding nails (!) Sound of Muzak (!) .3 The creator has a mastertape (!) Strip the Soul Drown with me Blackest eyes (!) from Deadwing (these are maybe more straightforwarded than songs on "in absentia" or rush songs but good, imho): Shallow Halo Open Car Start of something beautiful Deadwing

With sonicstage 3.2 you can upload recordings made by optical or analog. Could you tell if there's optical out in your md-bookshelf/deck? Or what model it is?

Oh, I didn't remember that at all as here in eu, there's no such a thing.

I suggest you to grab some of these HiMD recorders and use atrac3 (or3+). That way you'll keep the same (or better quality) what you have used to with your previous units. And you can format your old discs to ~300MB size.

Wecome to forum! If your hifi-md has optical out, just plug it to NH600 via optical cable. If not, you can do this with 5$ analog cable. I prefer HiSP(256kbps) so quality still remains good. After that you can transfer them to Sonicstage, if you want and store them in your computer.

This might sound stupid but personally I like old (74&80min) blanks more than new 1GB. There's just too much space for me. I found 300MB perfect size. I can put 4-7 CD's to one disc with very good quality (LP2). I have 12 HiMD discs and barely use them. They are good for compilations, though (or maybe if you want to put whole AC/DC discography to one disc.) In the future I'll buy only standard discs.

Neil Peart is A Drummer God! Maybe you could try Porcupine Tree. It's only band what I know, which came close to Rush. Their two newest albums are really, relly good. In Absentia (2002) & Deadwing (2005). They are really good musicians too, imho. Currently listening Apocalyptica - Reflections. Song called "somewhere around nothing".

I've copied about 60 SP MD's and I can confirm I have combined/divided/deleted some material in all 60 discs (and I use auto track marking). Of couse I've updated TOC many, many times, during this process. All I can say everything's worked flawlessy. At first about 20 albums, I used wav and converted later to HiSP in SS. Now I record straight to HiSP. No difference what so ever. Only little complain is what I've mentioned in my earlier post about titling in SS and how it prevent further editing in unit itself (or SS).

Yes, there are some flaws in the frequency curves, but what I've found there's some ways to make it bearable. Have you read this thread? There's some information about it. http://forums.minidisc.org/index.php?showt...indpost&p=58625 However, Ipod mini's frequency response is nothing near flat, but people doesn't complain it at all. On the contrary, some person even said it sounds more "audiophile" than some flagship MD (kurisu might remember that "head-fier's" poor review?). ...everybody has different ears.

Hi, and welcome to the forum! You have to use Sonicstage to transfer music files to minidisc. First you import your music library to sonicstage and then download to md. Or use a little program called Simpleburner if you only want copy a cd to MD without leaving any files to PC. File transfer to md is very simple because MD unit appears like external drive in My Computer or filebrowser. Then just drag&drop files. You can put music AND datafiles to same disc. I don't have 2nd gen unit but I don't think the mp3 quality is a big disaster, but somebody who knows better can tell you more about it.

Yeah I believe it. I think in 1998 it was very good unit with atrac 4.5. Unfortunately only JA333ES, and JA555ES at first, had 24bit Sigma-Delta ADC / 24bit current-pulse DAC's. They are the same what High-end SACD players had (and probably later models too?). btw. I was surprised how good sounding machine MDS-JB980 really is when I listened it some time ago. I hope future HiMD decks will sound as good. I cannot forgive myself I didn't have money to bought a used JA333ES couple of years ago. It was in real bargain 250€.

I do this all the time and it has worked perfectly, everytime. I have recorded my old SP recordings to my NH1 (analog) and then edited (divided/combined) them before transferred to SS. I Haven't had any problems you described. Only thing what irritates me, is when I connect the unit to PC and do titling in sonicstage, I can't divide/combine those (atrac3+) tracks anymore even with unit itself (or sonicstage). That's weird!? Hope this helps and you can find solution to your problem.

That's true, for atrac3+ there's no quality difference to my ear. Atrac3 is whole different story, at least older sonicstages. I can't really recommend enough using MD deck analog line-outs when listening md's. If you have very, very high quality amp (over 1500$) you could try optical out, though. There are very few cd decks which have even near as good DAC's compared to MD decks. It's like: what MD loses using lossless codec, it wins by build quality and high quality components. I think this might be suprising: Sony decided to use same brilliant DAC's with their High End SACD players, what they used previously in their high-end minidisc decks. Although, there were 6 of them.

Yes, if you don't own PC and want to copy md to md. btw. You cannot copy Md to md through optical out if a md you want to copy has copied with optical out (from cd). DRM you know.

I recorded few albums MD to MD (one 256kbps and one PCM) and upladed them to ss3.2. Sonictage asks after both uploads if I want to convert them to wav. Works like a charm like in 3.1, but now I can delete them afterwards from PC 'cause of infinite uploads.

Gongrats for your purchase! Maybe the reason why they didn't want to include optical line-out is because minidisc decks are known for their high quality digital-to-analog converters. I read that some audiophiles uses their MDS-JA333ES extremely high quality DAC like external DA converter through other source components (yes, this is possible with 333ES). Seems that after HiMD (and sonicstage 3.2) there's no necessarily need for optical line out. Personally I prefer more to md deck's analog line-out and their quality DAC converters than using optical out to AV-receivers DAC (when listening music). And for copying MD's with deck's optical out (withDRM), I don't see any advantage why not use pc and sonicstage 3.2? I really wanted to buy a deck when there's standard 17 inch sized one available... btw. Onkyos new slogan should be: Onkyo; like.no.other

Make sure sonicstage is not running at the same time when drag&drop, then it doesn't work. Hope you like your unit!

Oh, don't know how to deaf ended up mad? I think I'm very much !