marksturdy Posted June 18, 2007 Report Share Posted June 18, 2007 I'm trying to find an MD player with an optical output. Can anyone recommend a cheap'n'cheerful model to me? It seems to be quite a rare feature these days. Other features aren't important really - if there's an old model I can pick up on Ebay for a few beans (or even buy from anyone on this forum who wants to sell theirs...) then I'd be more than happy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sparda Posted June 18, 2007 Report Share Posted June 18, 2007 I know that the MZ-1 has optical out. But those are hard to get. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marksturdy Posted June 18, 2007 Author Report Share Posted June 18, 2007 I know that the MZ-1 has optical out. But those are hard to get.Yes, this is the thing. It seems that a lot of the very early MD machines had optical out, but a lot of those are collector's items in their own right. I don't really care about owning a piece of consumer electronics history, I just want something I can plug into the SPDIF on my soundcard!Although both would be pretty cool... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
raintheory Posted June 18, 2007 Report Share Posted June 18, 2007 Here is a tutorial on modifying MD portables to have optical outputs: http://forums.minidisc.org/index.php?showtopic=18416Not sure how helpful that would be though.I believe the MZ-1 may be the only portable with optical out (might be one other of that era that does). Otherwise you may have to look into an MD Deck. There are a few of those that have optical out, just be sure it's MDLP if you need it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KJ_Palmer Posted June 18, 2007 Report Share Posted June 18, 2007 The first MD player MZ-2P also had optical out, they pop up occasional on ebay. In fact I bought one last year very cheaply. Had some trouble reading 80 min discs though, so I sold it on. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
A440 Posted June 19, 2007 Report Share Posted June 19, 2007 The problem is that ALL of the MD units use compressed sound. SP is good but still compressed. For sound quality you are better off with a PCM recording uploaded from a Hi-MD than you are with SP via optical out. And as above, only the very first portables have optical out--after those, you need an MD deck. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sparda Posted June 19, 2007 Report Share Posted June 19, 2007 Even though it is probably unnecessary and would definitely drive the cost up, I wish Sony could just incorporate the optical out to all the portables. It would be very cool. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kino170878 Posted June 19, 2007 Report Share Posted June 19, 2007 Well there is the HHB MDP500. It has coaxial and optical digital I/Os. There is also the Marantz PMD650. Both of these are professional units and are quite expensive. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bluecrab Posted June 19, 2007 Report Share Posted June 19, 2007 I'm trying to find an MD player with an optical output. Can anyone recommend a cheap'n'cheerful model to me? It seems to be quite a rare feature these days. Other features aren't important really - if there's an old model I can pick up on Ebay for a few beans (or even buy from anyone on this forum who wants to sell theirs...) then I'd be more than happy. An MD deck is the simplest way to go for optical out, and many with that feature can be had on Ebay. Some have LP and some do not - the non-LP ones are usually cheaper - you'd have to decide whether you want LP.Non-LP models that should be fairly cheap:Sony MDS-JE5*0 series (the 510 can be flaky, though).Pioneer MJ-D508 (I have one of these from ~1999, a solid machine that I am hanging on to.)You can find others by checking http://www.minidisc.org/equipment_browser.htmlIf SCMS is not a problem, then indeed digital out on an MD is a very valuable feature. Good luck. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marksturdy Posted June 19, 2007 Author Report Share Posted June 19, 2007 Thanks for all the suggestions guys. I now have a couple of units in my sights on Ebay - will let you know how I get on! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marksturdy Posted November 13, 2007 Author Report Share Posted November 13, 2007 Just an update on this - I managed to score a Sharp MD-R1 MKII player from Ebay for about £15, and an Emu 0404 for about £40, and have since been using the setup to optically transfer a huge backlog of minidiscs. The results have been great - there are quite a few recordings that have been brought back from the dead as the original signal was just too quiet and as a result had previously picked up unmanagebale amounts of noise through an analogue transfer.Only problem is that the MD-R1 doesn't seem keen to play LP discs. I'd be interested to hear from anyone who has a solution to this.(Incidentally, as my new soundcard has an optical output but not an analogue mini-jack one, I've been using the Optical In and phone socket on my Sony Net-MD as a makeshift Digital to Analogue converter to link the soundcard up to my amp. Probably not the best use of the technology, but it works!) Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bluecrab Posted November 14, 2007 Report Share Posted November 14, 2007 Only problem is that the MD-R1 doesn't seem keen to play LP discs. I'd be interested to hear from anyone who has a solution to this.The Sharp MD-R1 MKII is not an LP-capable unit. It may recognize, but will not play LP discs.MD units that both play LP and have digital output exist, but can be hard to find and usually command a higher price. If you have a portable MDLP with line out, then perhaps you could go MDportable line out > MDdeck analog in > MDdeck digital out > EMU? This is an awkward process and won't help the signal quality much, but that MD-R1 isn't going to play LP on its own. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
marksturdy Posted November 16, 2007 Author Report Share Posted November 16, 2007 If you have a portable MDLP with line out, then perhaps you could go MDportable line out > MDdeck analog in > MDdeck digital out > EMU? This is an awkward process and won't help the signal quality much, but that MD-R1 isn't going to play LP on its own.Yep, that's just what I'm doing! It sounds OK, probably better than if I'd just gone MDportable line out > analogue line-in on my old soundcard. Obviously the quality of LP recordings isn't so good anyway, so there's less at stake in a way! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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