davidb Posted May 1, 2007 Report Share Posted May 1, 2007 I have just bought an MZ-RH1 and am having problems uploading old MD (i.e. not HiMD or NET MD) recordings. I am using SS 4.0. The MZ-RH1 came with SS 3.4 which I did not install since I already had 4.0. There is no problem with HiMD discs but if I insert a legacy MD SS does not recognise it at all - no track list and after a while the HiMD item in the Transfer drop down list disappears. (Also Windows explorer no longer sees a removable disc which it does with a HiMD inserted - but maybe that's expected)Am I doing something wrong or do I need a different version of SS?I have searched the forums for an answer to this but didn't find anything - it looks like, when using an MZ-RH1, SS should display the tracks of a legacy MD just as with a HiMDMy MD recordings were made on a Sony JB920 deck. My PC is a Sony Vaio FE31Z with XP SP2. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
davidb Posted May 1, 2007 Author Report Share Posted May 1, 2007 Further to my last post I have now installed the SS3.4 that came with my Mz-RH1 on to a different pc with a fresh install of XP SP2 on it. This time SS did recognise the legacy MD - when I inserted the legacy MD Windows reported "new hardware - Net MD" and sucessfully installed it. This never happened with my other pc with SS4.0 so maybe SS4.0 does not include the Net-MD driver?? If so can I just install the driver separately - or is it too late now I've connected the device without the driver installed? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Avrin Posted May 3, 2007 Report Share Posted May 3, 2007 (edited) Try my solution listed for the Walkman Device Detection Issue on this page: http://forums.minidisc.org/index.php?showtopic=8071 1. Drivers for SS42 should work with SS40 (they were not seriously changed from the time of SS34.03). I don't know where to obtain native SS40 drivers now.2. A legacy MD is not shown in Windows Explorer by design.3. Do not start Windows Explorer, or any other file management software, and point it to the minidisc drive before starting SonicStage, or while using it.4. Upgrade to SS42 as soon as you can. This is the most reliable and stable version. Do not forget to remove any traces of SS40 before installing SS42. Edited May 3, 2007 by Avrin Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sunjan Posted August 17, 2007 Report Share Posted August 17, 2007 (edited) Try my solution listed for the Walkman Device Detection Issue on this page: http://forums.minidisc.org/index.php?showtopic=8071 1. Drivers for SS42 should work with SS40 (they were not seriously changed from the time of SS34.03). I don't know where to obtain native SS40 drivers now.2. A legacy MD is not shown in Windows Explorer by design.3. Do not start Windows Explorer, or any other file management software, and point it to the minidisc drive before starting SonicStage, or while using it.4. Upgrade to SS42 as soon as you can. This is the most reliable and stable version. Do not forget to remove any traces of SS40 before installing SS42.Please note that some users have found transfer of legacy MDs with RH1 to be lossy.Read more here:http://taperssection.com/index.php/topic,7...html#msg1025181Ie, for transfer without further losses, realtime upload via optical-out (from a standalone MD deck) would be the safest bet until proven otherwise./Jan Edited August 19, 2007 by sunjan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Avrin Posted August 17, 2007 Report Share Posted August 17, 2007 (edited) Just checked SP to PC transfer with one of my RH1's and Adobe Audition. Found no cutoffs - the transferred file has its full frequency range. Edited August 17, 2007 by Avrin Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
raintheory Posted August 17, 2007 Report Share Posted August 17, 2007 I did a fair amount of testing when comparing LP2 to SP Compatibility mode, and found no such cutoff when importing Legacy SP as PCM. There may be a cutoff when importing SP as Hi-SP, but that makes sense since you are transcoding anyway. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sunjan Posted August 19, 2007 Report Share Posted August 19, 2007 I did a fair amount of testing when comparing LP2 to SP Compatibility mode, and found no such cutoff when importing Legacy SP as PCM. There may be a cutoff when importing SP as Hi-SP, but that makes sense since you are transcoding anyway.Interesting. So what do you think about the theory from the user on taperssection?Is he wrong in assuming that SS is transcoding the incoming ATRAC as ATRAC3???/Jan"The legacyMD>RH1>usb transfers via SonicStage (any version) cut off at around 15kHz - completely, in most cases. The various ATRAC DSP types of stand-alone decks ((Type-S in case of my deck) will get you better quality transfers, in my opinion this is definitely worth the extra time, I found this particularly noticeable with SP recordings and even more so with ones that were done outdoor (don't know why but those just sounded very bad when transferred via the RH1). The spectrum of the WAV is also different even from a quick glimpse.It's not SS that does it... It's Sony's ATRAC codec for the pc. Doesn't matter which program you use, either (HiMD Renderer, etc.). Some moderator on the German minidiscforum said that when you upload to the PC the ATRAC files are converted to ATRAC3+ before they are converted to WAV, might only be applicable to SP uploads but LP2 doesn't look that great to me, either. I don't really care about 'why' it does it, I just know that my deck transfers sound like night and day compared to the USB uploads.I'm not 100% sure on that but I think I read that there is no proper ATRAC codec available for the computer so the re-encoding is Sony's way around that. Even if it were working properly you'd get slightly better results by using a standalone deck that has DSP.Certainly, any transcoding (i.e. ATRAC > ATRAC3) will introduce extra lossiness. Kind of like going wav>mp3>wav>mp3 I would imagine. I wonder if that's what's going on here?The question is, where is the transcoding happening? If it's happening in the player itself before hitting the pc, well there's not a lot you can do about that. If it's happening on the pc, well then perhaps an updat to SS could avoid the transcode, and just decode ATRAC>WAV and we'd all be happy? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
raintheory Posted August 19, 2007 Report Share Posted August 19, 2007 Interesting. So what do you think about the theory from the user on taperssection?Is he wrong in assuming that SS is transcoding the incoming ATRAC as ATRAC3???/JanSee my post here: http://forums.minidisc.org/index.php?s=&am...st&p=125745There is an option in SonicStage regarding how SP tracks are imported. The default is Atrac3+ 256kbps, but you can choose PCM. It is possible that either the taperssection poster was unaware of this setting, or if they imported both ways and failed to delete the 256kbps import (in which case SonicStage may well have used the 256kbps when saving as WAV). Personally, based on my own testing and frequency analysis, I don't believe that SP is converted to Atrac prior to uploading as PCM when the latter is chosen in SonicStage's preferences.-a Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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