FergusF Posted July 22, 2005 Report Share Posted July 22, 2005 Hi all,I want to buy a mini disk recorder to recorder interviews for my genealogy project. I would use it for music storage as well but I have an mp3 player for that and by the sound of things Sony do not make it easy to download from my pc's music library.I live in Limerick, Ireland and the cheapest mini disk recorder here that has a external mic in connection is the Sony MZ RH910.1. Is this recorder right for what I want to do - mainly voice recordings?2. Is it trus that you can only upload a voice recording once? I find this hard to believe as I cannot see the point in it, even from a security point of view.3. Can you bypass this by recording from the headphone connection?4. Is there a way of downloading a voice file (or any file) to a regular md (non hi-md) in the RH-910?Any help would be appreciated,Regards,Fergus Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meryl Arbing Posted July 22, 2005 Report Share Posted July 22, 2005 (edited) Hi all,I want to buy a mini disk recorder to recorder interviews for my genealogy project. I would use it for music storage as well but I have an mp3 player for that and by the sound of things Sony do not make it easy to download from my pc's music library.I live in Limerick, Ireland and the cheapest mini disk recorder here that has a external mic in connection is the Sony MZ RH910.1. Is this recorder right for what I want to do - mainly voice recordings?2. Is it trus that you can only upload a voice recording once? I find this hard to believe as I cannot see the point in it, even from a security point of view.3. Can you bypass this by recording from the headphone connection?4. Is there a way of downloading a voice file (or any file) to a regular md (non hi-md) in the RH-910?Any help would be appreciated,Regards,Fergus←Hi Fergus,I do a lot of live recording of traditional folk and storytellers so I am frequently in places (outside or places where there is no main power) and so I bought the RH910. Battery life is excellent and it has the dry-cell backup power. I have just finished recording one of our local storytellers for a CD she is producing. The 910 was excellent for the job...small, compact, self-contained and produced excellent results. A good microphone is essential of course.It is true that uploading the recorded material does delete the track from the 910 however, I did not find that to be a problem. For one thing, I wanted the material on my computer to clean up the file...remove background noises...clicks, ess sounds and pops etc, and to have be able to burn the CD after I had mastered the material. The 910 was merely temporary storage until I got the tracks onto my computer and, after that, I didn't need them on the MD anymore.What if I wanted to have an MD copy? After I had produced the master CD, I could simply transfer the cleaned up audio back to the MD from the CD. The transfer from CD to MD is very quick with the 910.This is far and away a much easier process than trying to do the same thing with my older netMD 810 which didn't allow any uploads at all (except real-time re-recording).In answer to your last question. If I wanted to get audio off the HiMD 910 onto my netMD 810, THEn I would go from the headphone jack of the 910 to the mic (or Line In?) of the 810. Of course I can also burn the CD I created onto the 810. Edited July 22, 2005 by Meryl Arbing Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
greenmachine Posted July 22, 2005 Report Share Posted July 22, 2005 Depending on your quality demands, together with a good microphone it might be overkill for speech only (in price and complexity). How important is sound quality for you? Maybe a dictaphone or mp3 player with built-in microphone would fit your needs. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christopher Posted July 22, 2005 Report Share Posted July 22, 2005 I'm not so sure of that, greenmachine. With a lower end first generation Hi-MD unit or even the NH910 like Meryl has described it would be nice to get 34 hours at Hi-LP quality on one disc at the price point Hi-MD offers. You can learn more of this here, Fergus.In regards to question #3 + #4, it's essentially covered here: http://forums.minidisc.org/index.php?showtopic=7070Aren't those flash/mp3 voice recorders not-so-great at ranged recordings, anyway? I'd like to hear if anyone has some actual real-world experience with such devices. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FergusF Posted July 22, 2005 Author Report Share Posted July 22, 2005 Hi Meryl, Greenmachine and Kurisu,thanks for your very helpful and prompt replies. I have a 1gb Creative Labs mp3 player that has a built in mic - the quality is so bad that I would never use it, not even for taking notes. This has put me off going down the mp3 route.Quality is very important to me and so I would be prepared to pay extra for that. I already have a Sony ms907 microphone that I use with my camcorder.I rang Sony's info number and asked about only being able to download a voice track once, the guy said that in sonic stage, there is a setting to leave the track on the md after uploading it, he gave me the impression that it could then be uploaded again if necessary? I am not so sure about that after reading some of the other post on this forum.thanks again for your help; these user to user forums are great places to get honest feedback on products.Regards,Fergus Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Christopher Posted July 22, 2005 Report Share Posted July 22, 2005 If you need quality voice recordings then Hi-MD is surely the way to go. 256kbps ATRAC3plus (aka Hi-SP) would probably be a good codec setting for you to use. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
raintheory Posted July 22, 2005 Report Share Posted July 22, 2005 (edited) Couple of things.. Uploading material from HiMD does not necessarily delete the file from the original HiMD.. You can change this preference in SonicStage.Once the initial recording is uploaded, it can be saved as wav and copied, edited, etc. to your hearts content.Granted, for transferring mp3s and recordings to and from HiMD and such, sonicStage can be a pain sometimes, the majority of the time I have few to no problems with it on a regular basis.EDIT:Also it is possible to record in the HiMD modes (HiSP, HiLP, PCM) onto a normal MD with the RH910. However you cannot record (with the unit itself) in LP2, LP4, SP, Mono.. You can record the LP2, etc. formats with sonicstage and transfer them to a standard MD using the RH910 if you desire.1st generation HiMDs will record in LP2, LP4 etc.. but those formats cannot be uploaded thru sonicstage. Edited July 22, 2005 by raintheory Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arasikan Posted July 22, 2005 Report Share Posted July 22, 2005 1. Is this recorder right for what I want to do - mainly voice recordings?2. Is it trus that you can only upload a voice recording once? I find this hard to believe as I cannot see the point in it, even from a security point of view.3. Can you bypass this by recording from the headphone connection?4. Is there a way of downloading a voice file (or any file) to a regular md (non hi-md) in the RH-910?I purchased the recorder for the same reasons! Recording elderly relatives... music concerts, etc.1- yes, it is right for it.2- yes, you can upload it only once, but why would you want it sitting on the minidisc anyway? what I do is upload it as 'wav', splice it however I want (get rid of the garbage), save, then convert to mp3 in itunes or in my audio editing program (adobe audition)3- that's real-time uploading, where you basically play the file and the computer captures what you're hearing. that's always going to be possible. however, USB offers much faster uploading, but again, you can do that only once. the worst case scenario ever is that you will have to upload in real-time, rather than quickly through USB.4- once you get the 'wav' file, and/or convert it to mp3, just transfer it over to your non hi-md as normal.the major advantage of rh-910 is the usb direct upload basically...you NEED a good microphone to go along with this. i /highly/ recommend the sp-bmc3... best bang for your buck:http://www.minidisco.com/sp-bmc3.htmlorder it from online. you can clip it onto just about anything, and if you're doing surreptitious recording, you can have it underneath your clothing and clip out onto your sleeves... and the quality is stupendous! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
veezhun Posted July 22, 2005 Report Share Posted July 22, 2005 You dont need to use the headphone out of a HI MD to bypass the upload process..Open sonicstage, point to the Hi MD with the recorded tracks, hit play and it will play from your speakers.. Use total recoder or your sound mixer to record in real time digitally.. Total recorder is very good and the sound mixer option is great too.. Headphone out to line in of a computer is analog and will cause some loss..This method works only with HI MDcheers Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FergusF Posted July 22, 2005 Author Report Share Posted July 22, 2005 Hi all,thanks again for all the tips and tricks. My biggest fear is that I will record something very important and that the upload will crash!!! then I will not be able to upload a 2nd time... I am not as worried now as I can see that the worst case scenario is that I will have to upload in real time using one of veezhun or arasikan's tips.From all that I have read on this post, I will be buying the rh910 early next week (it's out of stock till then). I have a feeling that I will be looking for more info once I start using my HiMd machine.Thanks for all your help.Fergus Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
raintheory Posted July 22, 2005 Report Share Posted July 22, 2005 (edited) Very rarely, users have had their recordings crash and trash the disc and the upload.. This was mainly with older versions of SonicStage from what I remember. I've had no problems of this sort.Some good uploading info and tips can be found in this threadEdit - The linked thread is a little dated.. but includes alot of good information, and instructions on how to take a "better safe than sorry" approach to digital uploading. Edited July 22, 2005 by raintheory Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Low Volta Posted July 22, 2005 Report Share Posted July 22, 2005 if you follow the procedure as described in this thread using SS3.1 (or at least >=2.3) you should be safe... it is the best method I've come across until now... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FergusF Posted July 23, 2005 Author Report Share Posted July 23, 2005 Hi Raintheory and Volta,some excellent tips in both these threads, even if I do not fully understand some of the lingo just yet as I am new to the format...Regards,Fergus Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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