Finally went for quality over storage

[RobA]

Ever since I've been into hi-md (since october 05) I've been using 48kbps Atrac3+ simply for capacity. I never really noticed anything wrong with the sound quality. Today I tried to play it over some large speakers, what a disaster, constant crackling on loud parts of songs. I had 288 songs on my hi-md disc, all in 48kbps. I decided to put one sample of Hi-LP on it and did. The song sounded much better, all crackling disappeared. I'm no autophile, but I definitely here the difference between 48kbps and 64kbps. Hi-LP sounds great.

But the dilema, 288 songs in 48kbps on my disc. With all of them already in that format, there was no way to increase them to 64kbps. So I grabbed my other hi-md (blue) disc, then re-transfered all 288 songs from my playlist. Took a few good hours, because I had to move all of them around after transfering to be in order (OCD) and change all titles and artist names around to be correct. But it was well worth it, quality of sound is much better now and I think 34 hrs is plently of storage in the long run.

Edited May 14, 2006 by RobA

[dogville]

Ever since I've been into hi-md (since october 05) I've been using 48kbps Atrac3+ simply for capacity. I never really noticed anything wrong with the sound quality. Today I tried to play it over some large speakers, what a disaster, constant crackling on loud parts of songs. I had 288 songs on my hi-md disc, all in 48kbps. I decided to put one sample of Hi-LP on it and did. The song sounded much better, all crackling disappeared. I'm no autophile, but I definitely here the difference between 48kbps and 64kbps. Hi-LP sounds great.

But the dilema, 288 songs in 48kbps on my disc. With all of them already in that format, there was no way to increase them to 64kbps. So I grabbed my other hi-md (blue) disc, then re-transfered all 288 songs from my playlist. Took a few good hours, because I had to move all of them around after transfering to be in order (OCD) and change all titles and artist names around to be correct. But it was well worth it, quality of sound is much better now and I think 34 hrs is plently of storage in the long run.

For me, using 64 kbps is no quality at all (unless you like to listen to heavy metal or things like that . Then 48 is more than enough). If you want to listen to your music as it should be, certainly, the best is no compression at all. As I know this is something impossible if you want to have a certain amount of cd's in it, I should use 256 kbps. I repeat, the main feature of MD for me is the SOUND QUALITY above the capacity.

I guess sony will already be working on MD with more capacity of 1GB; and if not, they should be.

Regards

Edited May 14, 2006 by dogville

[pata2001]

IMO, 48kbps is only usable for voice recording. Using it for music is not really recommended. HiLP is bare minimum for music. Still, I would like to remind people that the beauty of HiMD/MD is removable media. So stop worrying about squeezing all your music into 1 disc. Just get another disc and enjoy better sound quality. 1Gb disc can still hold a LOT of music using LP2.

For those that really want to have all their music in 1 disc, maybe it's time to consider a HDD-based DAP.

[Christopher]

It's funny, actually. Alot of the ATRAC developers use 64-128kbps in their personal units, as a few told me at CES. I laughed and told them I only used 256kbps or beyond when recording. It's funny to know that I (and alot of you) listen to higher bitrates than some of the big ATRAC engineers. Low bitrate ATRAC isn't too bad, I know a few of us have rocked a LP4 track before. Don't lie.

[alexis]

Personally, I always liked the Hi-LP quality. Some honest listening shows that Hi-LP has no heavy artifacts, only some metallic sound sometimes, and loss of volume feeling. I listened to many of my favourites songs in Hi-LP and was never disappointed. For the extra storage it offers, I find Hi-LP unbeatable. I sometimes transfer CDs using Hi-SP, when I really want top quality and full auditive experience.

I can only advise all of you to honestly try Hi-SP and Hi-LP transfers and to think if the little more quality you get by using Hi-SP is worth the loss of the storage capacity (4times) and the battery life. Anyway you can always transfer your favorite tracks in Hi-SP on legacy MDs for almost no money (either you already have plenty of them from your existing MD collection, or you buy them new: you can get a 10pack of 74min MDs for 6.90Euros on netonnet.de).

Anyway I have all my music on CD for quality listening at home. Outside I am only using my transfers on Minidiscs.

Edited May 15, 2006 by storm shadow

[dogville]

It's funny, actually. Alot of the ATRAC developers use 64-128kbps in their personal units, as a few told me at CES. I laughed and told them I only used 256kbps or beyond when recording. It's funny to know that I (and alot of you) listen to higher bitrates than some of the big ATRAC engineers. Low bitrate ATRAC isn't too bad, I know a few of us have rocked a LP4 track before. Don't lie.

It's the most stupid thing an engineer can say

Personally, I always liked the Hi-LP quality. Some honest listening shows that Hi-LP has no heavy artifacts, only some metallic sound sometimes, and loss of volume feeling. I listened to many of my favourites songs in Hi-LP and was never disappointed. For the extra storage it offers, I find Hi-LP unbeatable. I sometimes transfer CDs using Hi-LP, when I really want top quality and full auditive experience.

I can only advise all of you to honestly try Hi-SP and Hi-LP transfers and to think if the little more quality you get by using Hi-SP is worth the loss of the storage capacity (4times) and the battery life. Anyway you can always transfer your favorite tracks in Hi-SP on legacy MDs for almost no money (either you already have plenty of them from your existing MD collection, or you buy them new: you can get a 10pack of 74min MDs for 6.90Euros on netonnet.de).

Anyway I have all my music on CD for quality listening at home. Outside I am only using my transfers on Minidiscs.

I know the question may sound weird to somebody but, Can anybody explain to me the difference between Hi-Sp / Hi-lp /lp2 and so on. Which is the highest atrac audio quality compression?

Thanks in advance

Edited May 14, 2006 by dogville

[RobA]

IMO, 48kbps is only usable for voice recording. Using it for music is not really recommended. HiLP is bare minimum for music. Still, I would like to remind people that the beauty of HiMD/MD is removable media. So stop worrying about squeezing all your music into 1 disc. Just get another disc and enjoy better sound quality. 1Gb disc can still hold a LOT of music using LP2.

For those that really want to have all their music in 1 disc, maybe it's time to consider a HDD-based DAP.

I'm no audiophile, 64Kbps sounds great, especially compared to 48kbps. The bitrates higher than 64 sound no better. So I use 64. I got into MD for removable media, unlimited storage, long battery life, and to avoid a easily-damagable HD. I currently have 3 seperate discs, one more my main music library, another for chritmas songs, and another just for laughs. Removable media is great, but I like to store as much as possible and I'm know I'm not missing anything as far as sound quality because all of the music that I put on my MD is from 128kbps mp3, so putting it into atrac3 or atrac3+ at 128kbps or greater can't make it better, if it wasn't better from the start. I hardly ever rip of CDs. I love the idea of atrac3+, getting over 500 quality songs per gig, instead of 240 in mp3. MD is great format, and I think Hi-LP sounds fantastic with no crackling like in 48kbps, perfect for my needs.

[dogville]

I know the question may sound weird to somebody but, Can anybody explain to me the difference between Hi-Sp / Hi-lp /lp2 and so on. Which is the highest atrac audio quality compression?

Thanks in advance

I've just found the answer. Ty

[Mr_Bass_Man]

IMO, 48kbps is only usable for voice recording. Using it for music is not really recommended. HiLP is bare minimum for music. Still, I would like to remind people that the beauty of HiMD/MD is removable media. So stop worrying about squeezing all your music into 1 disc. Just get another disc and enjoy better sound quality. 1Gb disc can still hold a LOT of music using LP2.

For those that really want to have all their music in 1 disc, maybe it's time to consider a HDD-based DAP.

Paradoxically, I agree with you, and disagree with you at the same time (isn't the ability to debate wonderful?).

I disagree about low bit rates being only "usable for voice" - to my 48-year old ears, one of the main things which separates digital radio (I am talking about the much-debated UK-standard DAB system) from its FM counterpart is its ability, or rather lack of ability to encode speech satisfactorily (I accept the proposer was probably talking about intelligibility, and I am talking about fidelity - not the same thing!).

Wheras I agree wholeheartedly with the comments about removable media. But this I guess is something which either suits or doesn't suit the needs of the individual. "Horses for Courses" as they say here. These days consumers have a wonderful choice, even if some consumers don't really understand the pros and cons of what is available to them ...

Apart from being an MD enthusiast, I also own a very splendid NW-HD3. 20GB or so of storage, and the ability to download and play back in a number of formats, including Hi-SP 256k, which I happen to think is a an acceptable trade-off of quality vs file size.

I am currently ripping the highights of my CD collection into this format on that device knowing that should I go away on vacation, or on a business trip, if I chose to take the HD3 with me, then quite a large proportion of my CD collection goes with me, and I don't have to worry about taking this, that or the other MD with me! If the hard drive crashes, I still have the original CDs of course!

My most-listened-to MDs are in fact either compilations of various genres of music, not to mention some "classic radio comedy", material recorded from the radio, or albums I have downloaded from the net, and which I have never felt the need to buy ...

Edited May 14, 2006 by Mr_Bass_Man

[belletristik]

After losing touch with the MD scene for a few years I decided to upgrade from MDLP to Hi-MD about a year ago (I completely missed that whole NetMD thing). While trying to figure out just what Hi-MD was and how the bitrates compared, I came across this chart. I'm not an audiophile and I couldn't tell you how accurate it is, but it suits my purposes to believe it. Would the group agree that Hi-LP is as good as 1992's SP?

Returning to the topic at hand, my bitrate selection system has evolved as follows:

*Old skool MD: All music in SP and all speech in mono.

*MDLP: Classical music in SP, pop music in LP2 and speech in LP4.

*Hi-MD: Classical music in Hi-SP and both pop music and speech in Hi-LP. Sometimes I downconvert speech from Hi-LP to ATRAC3+ 48Kbps to squeeze all the episodes of a long-running BBC radio series onto a single disc.

[Sparky191]

...I came across this chart....Would the group agree that Hi-LP is as good as 1992's SP?...

You reading it wrong. Sound Quality is better as you go from bottom to the top. Not from left to right. So in that Chart not even HiSP is better then SP. Which is correct.

I'm no audiophile either, but I generally encode all mystuff in HiSP. I think SP and 352kps sound better, but HiSP is much easier to manage. To me the lower bitrates LP2, HiLP don't sound good at all.

[matthewricha]

You reading it wrong. Sound Quality is better as you go from bottom to the top. Not from left to right. So in that Chart not even HiSP is better then SP. Which is correct.

I'm no audiophile either, but I generally encode all mystuff in HiSP. I think SP and 352kps sound better, but HiSP is much easier to manage. To me the lower bitrates LP2, HiLP don't sound good at all.

I think you are both wrong. Quality difference is between the black hashed lines, so quality goes from the bottom left to the top right. According to the chart the newer codec (Atrac3+) gives the same quality at lower bit rate (64kbps) as the older codec (Atrac) at higher bit rate (292kbps). Because as the years go on more cleverer codec’s can achieve a similar sound quality with a lower bit rate.

I somehow don’t go along with this chart! Legacy SP in 1992 say on an MZ-R2 is better quality than 64kbp Atrac3+. The new Atrac3+ is extremely impressive for such a low bit rate and I think is just as good as 128kbps MP3, but I would have a real problem in saying it’s better than the 1992 SP Atrac!

Lion

[Sparky191]

That may have been the intention. But I think if you ignore the time line and read from bottom to top you'll be closer to the reality than the marketing. Basically (SP292) is still better than (HiSP256). It would be on a par with a Lame 320kps MP3.

OK it doesn't make sense for the lower bitrates, but who cares about the lower bitrates.

Edited May 15, 2006 by Sparky191

[belletristik]

You reading it wrong. Sound Quality is better as you go from bottom to the top. Not from left to right. So in that Chart not even HiSP is better then SP. Which is correct.

In the chart the diagonal lines are meant to indicate equivalence. So the chart (authored by Sony when Hi-MD was launched) is indicating that Hi-LP is equivalent in quality to SP 292Kbps ca. 1992 (see here for more details). I'm not saying it's true, but I was wondering what others thought.

Basically (SP292) is still better than (HiSP256). It would be on a par with a Lame 320kps MP3.

If that is the case, why bother to develop ATRAC3+ 256Kbps if it is no better than ATRAC 292Kbps? They might as well have just released ATRAC @ 256Kbps and saved themselves the trouble of developping a new codec, non?

I think there is something to the chart. I think that ATRAC3+ did bring some improved efficiencies to the table. I don't think Hi-LP sounds as good as the SP I was listening to in the late 90s (I wasn't around in 1992), but to my ears I think it sounds as good as ATRAC3 132Kbps (LP2) and Hi-SP sounds at least as good as late 90s SP 292Kbps.

Again, all of this comes with my standard 'I ain't no fancy audiophile or nuthin' disclaimer. :-)

[Rumz]

It's funny, actually. Alot of the ATRAC developers use 64-128kbps in their personal units, as a few told me at CES. I laughed and told them I only used 256kbps or beyond when recording. It's funny to know that I (and alot of you) listen to higher bitrates than some of the big ATRAC engineers. Low bitrate ATRAC isn't too bad, I know a few of us have rocked a LP4 track before. Don't lie.

Yeah I confess that I used Lp4 once to squeeze one last track onto a mix once. I converted it to Mono in another program and then compressed it to LP4... I forgot who gave me the idea but doing so seemed to help it not sound so heinous.

The first post of the thread did crack me up-- I thought it'd be someone ditching hi-lp or something for hi-sp or higher. Here I thought 256kbps was alright until they decided to make 320-352 available... now I'm hooked. I had a very short jaunt with lp2 before I just stuck with quality over quantity. But, quality is relative and we each have our own standards of quality-- man I wish I could get away with 128kbps.

In the chart the diagonal lines are meant to indicate equivalence. So the chart (authored by Sony when Hi-MD was launched) is indicating that Hi-LP is equivalent in quality to SP 292Kbps ca. 1992 (see here for more details). I'm not saying it's true, but I was wondering what others thought.

If that is the case, why bother to develop ATRAC3+ 256Kbps if it is no better than ATRAC 292Kbps? They might as well have just released ATRAC @ 256Kbps and saved themselves the trouble of developping a new codec, non?

I think there is something to the chart. I think that ATRAC3+ did bring some improved efficiencies to the table. I don't think Hi-LP sounds as good as the SP I was listening to in the late 90s (I wasn't around in 1992), but to my ears I think it sounds as good as ATRAC3 132Kbps (LP2) and Hi-SP sounds at least as good as late 90s SP 292Kbps.

Again, all of this comes with my standard 'I ain't no fancy audiophile or nuthin' disclaimer. :-)

"SP" does denote a bitrate (292kbps) but all SPs are not created equal, I can assure you. It wouldn't surprise me one bit if the encoders / chips used in 1992 units encoded a 292kbps file that sounded on par with current Hi-LP-- it was really new technology and from what I've read in the past, didn't sound that awesome either, but I'll have to see if I can find a reference for that.

For my part, I've noticed a difference in encoding quality of various SP encoders in my own use. My R90 has a version of Atrac, then starting with my R900, my sony units encoded in Atrac Type-R. Then there's my Sharp system, where SP recordings have artifacts almost as if it were encoding in LP mode... strange. I can only guess its encoding hardware has an older version of atrac that isn't as clean / good as Type R.

So bitrate is only part of the equation. The encoder has a lot to do with it, even if the resulting file format is a standard (like comparing a generic mp3 encoder to LAME-- there can be a pretty noticable difference in quality at the same bitrate).

Maybe Sony had taken Atrac SP as far as they felt it could or should go, and have focused instead on a more modern version of the codec which they're calling Atrac+...

[atrain]

i'm a sucker for 256a3+ up from LP2 on my mdlp units

[dex Otaku]

Nice to see this ancient debate still taking place.

Personal feelings:

Because I am abnormally sensitive to certain kinds of artefacting [including the kind commonly experienced as warbling sounds with lossy audio, and temporal artefacting of video which makes most digital cable and satellite video unwatchable for me] I know very well where my own thresholds are.

I have two differing policies, one for recording, one for playback.

Playback:

48 and 64kbps a3+ sound pretty much the same to me. I use 64kbps for encoding mono voice recordings such as radio programmes and transcoded podcasts of documentary radio work and the like. Most of these recordings are already bandwidth-restricted with a high cut around 10kHz [or encoded as mp3s with low sampling and bitrates], because they are primarily voice to begin with. In this case, both 48 and 64kbps work fine for me.

For music, 192kbps is my threshold of listenability with both mp3 and a3+. I also find a3+ to be slightly better at 192kbps than mp3 is [primarily because it uses a higher-resolution FFT algorithm than mp3 which makes artefacting less unpleasant even when it's present]. [side note: well-tweaked mp3 can sound good even at 128kbps. I have found exactly one album that does, and it's odd that it does, because the sonic makeup of the music itself does not lend easily to low-bitrate encoding.]

Most of my listening discs are made with 256kbps-encoded tracks. The ones I've made recently are almost exclusively encoded at 192kbps [including transcoded mp3s].. since most of my listening discs are HiMD-formatted MD80s, this means I can get another full album or so on each disc. This makes, for me at least, for near-perfectly sized single-artist compilations - there enough on each disc to make for a good long listen, but there also little enough to make remembering exactly what's there doable.

Quality-wise, 256kbps for portable listening is transparent to me. I have no complaints about it. I have tried 352kbps and the difference isn't enough to justify the loss of capacity, time-wise, per disc. I use 352kbps or PCM for copying things to take to others for auditioning purposes [i.e. "Hey Joel - what do you think of this mix?"] but otherwise I consider them overkill for my own listening purposes.

Whoever made the comment about metal being easily-encoded at low bitrates has obviously never done any codec testing: music with lots of layered, distorted guitars [square waves] mixed with drums, cymbals, and vocals is far more difficult to encode accurately than most other content, because the sheer density of the sound [especially complex harmonics like those making a square wave - and for each element, let alone all of them together] in the mix is higher than with, say, a string or jazz quartet. Note that this is taking into account only the audible artefacting caused by a given codec and bitrate, and not the effects on soundstage and overall timbre [which are related but not exactly the same thing] cause by the same.

Also, the idea that bitrate alone determines quality is completely false. There are a number of variables involved here. For one, higher bitrates do mean less is thrown away, yes - but a newer codec that does higher-resolution analysis [especially of a higher-resolution input stream such as 24/96 LPCM] is bound to do better at lower bitrates than an older codec does. Another is that the maturity of a codec will have a noticeable affect on the efficiency with which it can encode without artefacts; ATRAC SP falls into this category, and at this point I'd say with Type-R it's encoder is probably optimised close to the limits of the format, which explains why a3+ was created in the first place. In the end, the question is nearly moot - since they are different codecs, with different encoding methods used, each has its own profile of what conditions [sound] it will handle [encode] better [without audible artefacts]. Point being - there's no simple answer to this question; SP will do better under certain circumstances than HiSP; HiSP will do better under others. Which you choose to use is up to you and your ears.

I expect that I will be using 192kbps most of the time from now on.

Recording [on-unit]:

256kbps is my absolute lowest baseline.

A 1st-generation recording made in 48 or 64kbps is completely, utterly worthless if you have any plans to edit it and re-encode it in any lossy format later on. I don't even make voice recordings that I know will only be edited and/or listened to on the unit itself at HiLP, because any kind of background noises picked up by the omni mics I'm usually carrying will make the artefacts very distracting and voices nearly unintelligible. Recording voice only with a close directional mic, a high-pass filter, and a pop screen [similar to the conditions in a studio booth] does work well with HiLP, though.

Aside from this, even a reformatted MD80 holds 2:23 at HiSP. Most interviews or similar things don't even run that long, so there's little justification to use lower rates because of time concerns.

My interests when recording are to get the best-quality, clearest, unaffected 1st-generation recording possible. This is part of my rationale for using manual levels as well as LPCM mode. When time concerns force a compromise, I use HiSP. Any "end-product" encoding I hand someone has gone through no more than 2 generations of lossy encoding, and the quality does not suffer as a result.

As with any data-reducing encoding format, there is a "density threshold" for artefacting; in the case of sound recording, the overall [call it aggregate, even] complexity of the sound being recorded determines the artefacting threshold at a given bitrate.

256kbps is high enough that almost everything is transparent, with obvious deficiencies also being relatively well-tested [such as trouble handling transients because of limits in the FFT window size et al].

I am also hard-pressed to tell a difference between SP and HiSP; it's not that one is necessarily all-around better than the other, it's just that they are both transparent under most situations and their artefacting "profiles" are simply different [because of higher-res FFT and differing window sizes and such]. I choose to use HiSP because with the recorders I have, it can be uploaded by digital means. If I had an RH1 I might consider using SP mode for recording, though I'll also point out that the difference in formatted disc capacities [since SP can't be used with HiMD-formatted discs] is large enough [80 mins vs. 2:23] that any possible difference in quality is hard to justify unless the recording itself is expected to fit on a single disc.

That said, If 352kbps was available for on-unit recording, I would use it.

[Sparky191]

....

If that is the case, why bother to develop ATRAC3+ 256Kbps if it is no better than ATRAC 292Kbps? They might as well have just released ATRAC @ 256Kbps and saved themselves the trouble of developping a new codec, non?

I think there is something to the chart. I think that ATRAC3+ did bring some improved efficiencies to the table. I don't think Hi-LP sounds as good as the SP I was listening to in the late 90s (I wasn't around in 1992), but to my ears I think it sounds as good as ATRAC3 132Kbps (LP2) and Hi-SP sounds at least as good as late 90s SP 292Kbps.

Again, all of this comes with my standard 'I ain't no fancy audiophile or nuthin' disclaimer. :-)

No audiophile disclaimer here too

I dunno. Personally think SP sounds a little bit better than HiSP on the units (MD/HiMD portables) I have. HiSP still sounds good though, its almost as good as SP. The real advantage is that HiSP is so much easier to manage in terms of encoding and getting tracks on and off HiSP. Perhaps HiSP is also much smaller than SP. I can't remember. However as has been discussed before, how you encode (portable/SonicStage/Deck) seems to as much a factor as which codec you use.

[MZ-1]

I have used 64K AT3+ as a fun experiment to squeeze about 25 long CD's on to one disk.

In no way will I state that 64k sounds as good as 256K or 352K, but I was quite pleased with the results. It did not sound nearly as bad I had imagined it would. Some tinny sounding distortion artifacts were heard with certain vocals and sometimes the stereo image didn't seem rock steady. Still, for *casual* listening, I could see how someone might enjoy 64K. To me, 64K sounds way, way better than XM radio, for example, which I will not listen to with headphones -- yeech.

So, there it is.

Edited May 15, 2006 by MZ-1

[mmp64]

I have used 64K AT3+ as a fun experiment to squeeze about 25 long CD's on to one disk.

In no way will I state that 64k sounds as good as 256K or 352K, but I was quite pleased with the results. It did not sound nearly as bad I had imagined it would. Some tinny sounding distortion artifacts were heard with certain vocals and sometimes the stereo image didn't seem rock steady. Still, for *casual* listening, I could see how someone might enjoy 64K. To me, 64K sounds way, way better than XM radio, for example, which I will not listen to with headphones -- yeech.

So, there it is.

I totally agree with everything you said. I use HiLP when I playing stuff at low volumes on little portable speakers. I use HiSP for "close" headhpone listening. HiSP on my MZ-NH900 is about as good as it gets for compressed digital audio on a portable device, IMHO.

[Top Cat]

The first post of the thread did crack me up-- I thought it'd be someone ditching hi-lp or something for hi-sp or higher. Here I thought 256kbps was alright until they decided to make 320-352 available... now I'm hooked.

Oh, totally agreed

[nevermore]

I guess it all depends on how you like to hear your music, many people here still listen to fm radio so I guess for them 48 kbps/64 kbps, especially if your headphones are low quality doesn't make any difference at all. To me though 256 kbps mp3s (I like atrac too but the codec doesn't have enough options for my taste and I doubt it's frequently updated) is a bare minimum, a compromise so I can store a little more on a disc.

[Tunster]

Being new to HiMD (not purchased since I got my first NetMD unit 3/4 years ago), A3+ was going to be interesting at the lower bitrates (48/64).

I tried direct recording last night and 64kbps proved to be testing to my ears. There was one side of me saying, this is pretty damn good for 64kbps, but the other saying, its artifacts do wear on me. There are the majority of sound that I want my ears to hear in 64kbps, so I could probably stand listening to it. But I don't think its worth encoding my stuff to it, unless I want to cram as much as possible onto it.

256kbps A3+ is very good! transparent and very on par with ATRAC SP. I would definately use this as my minimum for music recording in real-time. I haven't had a chance to try 192kbps yet with SS4.0. If that proves to be very good, then this will be my likely choice for my 80min discs in HiMD mode.

[Top Cat]

another for chritmas songs,

Do you have half-thousand Christmas songs? That's cool. I only managed to collect some half-hundred

[RobA]

Do you have half-thousand Christmas songs? That's cool. I only managed to collect some half-hundred

No of course not. I actually only have about 40 or 50 xmas songs. I just like it to be on different disc, not all mixed in on my main listening disc.