KJ_Palmer

It might be best to change your settings back to the originals (if you can) before sending it in for repair. Sony (and their engineers) aren't likely to take too kindly to any tampering!

Yep, they've kept that on the 980 at least

The recorder can still pick up vibrations if it's on a hard table, and the band is loud, the recording heads are very sensitive to movement. Did you try damping the recorder, eg. in a soft bag or on a towel? That might help as your recorder seems to be functioning correctly.

They probably did it so you buy a deck and a portable, just to make life easier. Same with the optical outs etc. Like they disabled some nice old editing features on the new JB980 deck (name copy, easy track divide), so I'm forced to use my old deck for those operations :x .

The MDS-JB980 has auto pause (not that I use it). They've disabled some other useful features, though, which is annoying... (name copy, AMS track divide).

38. Any more oldies here... :oops:

AVLS limits the output level to the headphone jack. The actual level you will be determined by the properties of your headphones - the unit can't tell whether you've got good or crappy phones. To turn AVLS off, press menu, scroll to AVLS, press enter, scroll to off and press enter again.

I'm not sure if there are any, it would be fairly bulky as pre-amps are usually driven by 9v PP3 batteries. Just a suggestion, but it might be better in the long run to get a 'cheap' MD recorder with a microphone input. I don't know if you can 'upgrade' your N505 to a N707 say, or for example here in the UK you can get a Sharp MD-MT90 for £90 in the shops. That would be better anyway than a Sony for live recording.

The little battery just drives the microphone itself. It doesn't give a line level input to the MD, which is why you need an external battery box or pre-amp. The 'plug in power' on other units has this already built in.