bri

Argh! Who'd have thought... Well surely ogg still lets you have gapless playback in things like foobar2000, and (although I've yet to try it) this allows for better wav creation if you want to join up an album? I'm asking here as I find you lot noticably more friendly and down to earth

In my case it still costs as much as FLAC and I'd prefer to use the latter. I've just been told on Hydrogen Audio that CBR ogg is inferior to VBR mp3...sheesh! I dunno sometimes if many of the users over there are just too picky! I've just bought a few things in CBR because that's the only way they do OGG files and they sound good to me. Still hate to think I'm buying inferior for the same price.

What DJ Shadow / Chemical Brothers have you got out of interest?

By the way what program do you use to convert Ogg to wav? Or is it just your CD burner converting them for you? I swear that's my last quetsion on the topic!

Does anyone have views on Hi-LP on a portable...BUT with good audiophile headphones - i.e. Shures, etc. Might sound like a bit of a mis-match but I'm not stupidly picky if the tradeoff is worthwhile.

Grand so...Anyone else have any views?

Thanks for that outline. If PCM -> ATRAC via SS is a concern, you could stick the wavs on some media and use simple burn or even optical recording...although you'd want to be sure SS sufficiently decreased PCM quality in transcoding. Regarding every compressed format being altered before ATRAC - that's a really good point. Ogg is superior to mp3 I guess, and with mp3's hogging of MD resources (at least on paper) it would seem easier to just stick everything into ATRAC when it's used with the MD and keep Sony happy I only use sites that offer FLAC or high quality lossy formats - there's no point otherwise. It's just that FLAC/WAV purchases are heavy on the wallet. In summary, keep lossless where possible, ogg where not, and ATRAC where MD-related. Right so! This could take a while! Cheers. P.S. I presume SS doesn't edited any files on my HD if I import them directly...i.e. If it does anything to them it keeps a new copy of the edited file in 'My SS Library'. The importance being I don't have to make a backup copy my music folders before really getting to grips with SS as I've only dabbled to date with a few Hi-MDs... Thanks in advance.

Right thanks for the input. faelnor: Why convert all to ogg? It's a better format than mp3 but what about your MDs? Maybe your prepared to use PCM but I can't be getting that little time my discs! I guess it's mp3 where stuck then. I'd never buy wma but it kind of annoys me not to be able to buy a better lossy format than mp3! Where possible I'll be using FLAC or CD but it's not always. Ok one other way to look at this is from a portable only POV: If mp3s converted to ATRAC 'supposidly' play better in a MD then forget how they play elsewhere...mp3 would be a better purchase than Ogg. Or am I fooling myself?! Is ogg -> wav -> atrac = mp3 -> atrac Arghhh!

Thanks for the help guys.

Quick question: When buying songs online there's usually enough format options (not always my first preference but it happens from time to time) what format is best to purchase keeping the Hi-MD in mind? This is bearing in mind cost, quality and ease of use. FLAC is obviously great but expensive - plus you have to convert it to wav. I can't really afford to buy anything but really precious/important stuff with this. MP3 is (a lot) cheaper but is fairly lossy & has those gaps preventing nice single playback - however moves to the Hi-MD very easily. Annoys me to buy a seriously flawed format when the provider is offering other options...such as: OGG, etc. - Lossy compared to FLAC but a better format for listening on a PC. Can one even convert ogg -> ATRAC or is it OGG -> wav -> ATRAC? Any advice? This is only for purchasing options so no need to bring up DRM or CD-Ripping! Thanks

Seriously slick spoof there.

Can I hop on the band-wagon here and ask: If ATRAC3/132kbps gets your 16 hrs. 30 min. from a Hi-MD disc, is there much loss in quality from ATRAC3plus/256kbps down to that? Also, I never realised just how much time mp3s take off a Hi-MD disc...4 hrs. 30 min.!!! What the hell? Does that mean if you have a higher than 128Kbps mp3 you'll have even less time? Most of mine are 192VBR or higher. Given the idea that copies transcoded into ATRAC are better sounding, with it be worth converting? Sorry for all the questions.

Sorry if this is obvious but how does one clean the lint from a MD? The covers on my disks don't slide down unless they're broken?

I'd say if you want a player...then get neither. Get an iRiver not something that's crippled with locked in terrible batteries and Apple's restrictions. If you want a recorder it's pretty obvious. In my mind it depends more on if your a consumer who's not too pushed and just wants much for commuting, or if your an audio enthusiast. This might help: http://www.pretentiousname.com/mp3players/ Btw, I have both...

If your holding back from Foobar2000 because of the name your missing out. Bummer.

Jurassic 5 - Quality Control. Quality

Excellent thank you...as a fellow FLAC fan this should come in handy. Out of interest, do you keep full copies of your music as a large FLAC with cue sheet ripped from EAC...or do you have another setup?

Thanks for the link; pretty comprehensive! Regarding QT: Do you have a a QT icon in the system tray? If so, turn it off. After that, maybe reinstall the newest standalone version (without iTunes) from: http://www.apple.com/quicktime/download/standalone/ My Firefox works perfectly for saving. Another option would be to open explorer behind firefox. Click and drag the link directly into a folder and it should save it there. Best of luck!

Weird, I don't get any fuzzy sounds when I put in MD-LP disks into my car player. They don't play but I just get text on the display and silence.

Seems like a very good price for the next step up from E2c's. Glad to know they're up to scratch; great line of products. Count yourself lucky you can order the extra sleeves living the U.S.!

Just got my hands on my first set...They're seriously bigger than I thought they would be. No justifiable reason apart from buying new accessories! Btw, less of the CAPS please (here and elsewhere).

Thanks for the advice. Large is <300mgs. SS didn't really like them but after some weird attempts it finally got them in there and let me edit them (with a crash of course!). So I quickly shoved them onto a MD before anything could go wrong! Oh the joys

They'd better be! I just bought 1GB disks from MD Australia and they arrived well packaged and look good so far. Seems like a good seller.

Really? Something as cheap as this? This is a valid solution to recording with a laptop?! Why doesn't everyone have one?! Any particular feature you'd recommend? For instance is a USB2 preferable just for speed or does it somehow affect the quality feed? Thanks.

That's my experience with the laptop to date...don't really have much access to desktops so might do this for the meantime. Hopefully the inputs levels and so forth will be roughly equal so little (to no?!) tweaking will be necessary. If there's something I'm missing here please inform, as after doing the few live MDs I own I've decided it's time to backup my vinyl collection! Thanks.