Onkyo Hi-md Deck Available To The U.s.

[The Low Volta]

So do either have Optical out?  I need a deck with optical out, i'll only buy one that has it.  More so i will buy almost any Hi-MD unit that has an optical out......do they exist????

nope (as stated earlier in this thread)... no optical out on either one (and as far as I know at the moment there is no HiMD-unit with optical out at all)

[LupinIV]

So do either have Optical out?  I need a deck with optical out, i'll only buy one that has it.  More so i will buy almost any Hi-MD unit that has an optical out......do they exist????

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Also check this link.

http://forums.minidisc.org/index.php?showtopic=11515

Maybe the new Onkyo can be modded to do the same. If there is enough room, you can pretty much get an optical out from any digital player

Cheers

Edited August 8, 2005 by LupinIV

[tommypeters]

It's maybe also possible that they will have optical out in Japan but not in other countries...

[bland10000]

nope (as stated earlier in this thread)... no optical out on either one (and as far as I know at the moment there is no HiMD-unit with optical out at all)

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The two mini-decks don't have optical in/out but the Onkyo shelf systems with hi-md do have optical in/out; I looked for myself today. The shelf models that do have optical in/out are:

fr-n9, x-b8, and x-n7

Edited August 9, 2005 by bland10000

[MDGB2]

Arrgh! When will Sony make a deck? When?!

Just re-brand the Jb940/80 with Hi-MD and I'd be happy......

[MDX-400]

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.

More like SCMS, but I guess that is a form of DRM (funny enough SCMS has to be like the oldest form of DRM!).

As for not being able to copy an MD copied digitally from a CD, that is true if you copied it from a standard home/portable CD player with digital output. If you had recorded it from a computer say, then you'd not have gotten the SCMS information the first time 'round so that disc would be able to be copied digitally (to another MD or to another format on a consumer/home digital recorder conforming to SCMS).

[MDX-400]

Hey, I dunno if anyone has asked/noted this already but I'm not seeing a NetMD logo on either of these decks, nor am I seeing a USB connection on them? Do these Hi-MD units lack NetMD capability or am I just not seeing the USB connector properly in the pictures?

It would be quite strange to have a Hi-MD unit without NetMD!

[MDX-400]

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.

I dunno about that. There were plenty of Sony ES CD players back in the 90s that had very good D/A converters; not to mention offerings from other brands.

Also about using the MD deck's analog line-outs I wouldn't go so far either. I have an MDS-JB920 deck and I connect it via optical cable to my STR-DA4ES receiver. First of all despite the 24-bit Current Pulse D/A on the JB920, I'm sure my DA4ES has better D/A conversion than the JB920 does. Afterall, it does have three 64-bit processors in it and it also contains the amp which is amplifying the sound.

Furthermore, unless I use the "Analog Direct" feature on my receiver, the analog output from the MD deck will be re-converted to digital to be processed/carried inside the receiver using the receiver's A/D converter. Then before amplification (since the DA4ES uses analog amps) it will be reconverted to analog. Obviously unnecessary conversions going on there. This is "solved" by the Analog Direct feature but, in Analog Direct mode, no processing and EQing can take place, and if you have a subwoofer it will be unuseable as well because the receiver won't process the sub information.

Most lower-end receivers, however, don't even offer an Analog Direct mode. Meaning that any analog signals will be converted to digital for signal processing and then back to analog. Any "digital" receiver (meaning pretty much any receiver that does DD/DTS decoding) will do this, meaning you're getting D/A from the MD deck and then A/D in the receiver and then the receiver's D/A again applied (if it is an analog-amp receiver)...

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.

Those "same" high-end D/As you speak of--in the SACD decks that would only be important in playing back standard CDs (or CD layers), correct? Because I was pretty sure that all SACD decoding to analog is handled by proprietary Sony DSD (Direct Stream Digital) decoders.

[Dinko]

Hey, I dunno if anyone has asked/noted this already but I'm not seeing a NetMD logo on either of these decks, nor am I seeing a USB connection on them?  Do these Hi-MD units lack NetMD capability or am I just not seeing the USB connector properly in the pictures?

It would be quite strange to have a Hi-MD unit without NetMD!

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Regarding the Onkyos, there is no USB connection on the 105. You can't connect it to your computer and transfer music to a MD through the USB port. It will however play NetMD discs.

I think one (or more) of the Sony HiMD micro systems are NetMD capable, but I'm not sure.

[Christopher]

I think one (or more) of the Sony HiMD micro systems are NetMD capable, but I'm not sure.

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The only Sony Hi-MD micro system, the CMT-AH10, does have NetMD capabilities.