Direct play / record in ATRAC3 Lossless

[1kyle]

OK I know we can't have verything at once -- and Sony has come up with a great version of SS SS 3.4 --does almost everything we want.

Why not go the whole hog and allow the MD units to record and play back using ATRAC3 lossless rather than PCM -- this would certainly yield much more playing time on the discs as well.

Transcoding could be done by dedicated hardware chips so you wouldn't notice any delay due to decoding / encoding.

Hardware dedicated processors can be made incredibly fast now days --just look at what Nvidia is doing to its graphic cards --very fast processing on a chip the size of a postage stamp. These chips are going to be used in the next generation of mobile phones with video streaming.

Similarly look at the dedicated processes going on inside top end Professional digital cameras (Canon 1-series for example).

Don't confuse this process with doing it in software i.e on a computer --software is usually a zillion times slower at these type of tasks.

Note if you need PCM for wider distribution SS will convert your ATRAC3 losseless to PCM so no probs there AFAIK.

Cheers

-K

Edited February 18, 2006 by 1kyle

[Roamer]

Sony would need to build new components with low consomption, but this could be interesting. And 1 Gb HiMD would then be the equivalent of almost 2 Gb for lossless recording purpose.

This could be added in the pinned thread that dex Otaku has started on improvements for HiMDs.

[pauljones52]

As lossless has unpredictable file sizes, it might not be that good for recording as it would be hard to estimate the time remaining. However lossless from sonicstage would be useful IMO, along with a VBR atrac.

Edited February 18, 2006 by Matt J

[Qwakrz]

One thing to remember, Minidisc was designed to edit recordings. This is very difficult to do with VBR tracks (which AtracLL is) but very easy on CBR recordings.

I dont think we will see AtracVBR or AtracLL on minidisc for recording purposes any time soon (if at all) as its not practical to edit it using a simple device. There is nothing stopping them allowing transfer from SS to Hi-MD in a similar fashion to the way MP3 is now but this will not happen with current Hi-MD's.

[1kyle]

I never thought about the editing

However in PLAYBACK mode it would make sense -- the unit already plays back in SP/LP2/LP4/HI-MD/HI-LP/PCM/MP3 so why not ATRAC3+.

The ATRAC3+ playback quality should be 100% equal to PCM (It's losseless afterall) and could be loaded to the MD via SS or (wishful thinking here --Drag 'n Drop from a computer).

If one is not interested in editing a recording on the MD but prepared to do it on the computer an ATRAC3+ recording option could still be a decent choice in a lot of situations.

Do many people still edit their recordings actually on the MD device or do they use a computer.

As to the "Disk Time left" problem -- Atrac3+ in the "Worst case" scnario i.e if lossless compression can't compress the PCM very much you get roughly 2 times the amount of a PCM recording on a HI-MD disk -- so you could guarantee a minimum of 2 Hours per disc --- seems to me a reasonable amount.

I'd then set my recording to 2 hour chunks and change discs at the appropriate points. In fact I'd have 2 recorders so I wouldn't miss anything and "Join" the recording or "Merge" it on a computer. This is probably what's done anyway with the 80 min PCM recordings.

Cheers

-K

[dex Otaku]

As to the "Disk Time left" problem -- Atrac3+ in the "Worst case" scnario i.e if lossless compression can't compress the PCM very much you get roughly 2 times the amount of a PCM recording on a HI-MD disk -- so you could guarantee a minimum of 2 Hours per disc --- seems to me a reasonable amount.

With nearly all lossless codecs, 2:1 compression is in fact a BEST case scenario, not worst. Worst-case scenario is 1:1 or slightly below it [as with, say, white noise]. Most lossless packing methods average 1.4 - 1.6:1 compression.

Estimating time left with 2:1 as the ratio would be overly optimistic to say the least.