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Portogram Combi MD/CD Mk2

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kgallen

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@BearBoy and @M1JWR made me do it (buy it).
 

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So what the heck is it?…

 

A customised third-party (or is that second-party?) product that integrates (in a lose sense!) a Sony MDS-JE480 minidisc deck, a Sony CDP-XE370 CD player and a small 1U amplifier into a carpet case.

 

Interesting mods are they have ‘hacked’ both the MD and CD circuits to add vari-speed to both, controlled by speed +/- knobs on the front (RHS of the amp). Vari-speed is not part of the Sony features of either the MD or CD.

 

Horrific at initial looks it’s quite a neat unit. Mechanically both the MD and CD have lost their rear panels which is replaced by the custom rear panel. The CD also loses its lid but the MD lid metalwork is used. Interestingly the 480 normally has optical in and the 370 has optical out, but both have been removed (see photo of rear panel). Internally they’ve wired the analogue outs of the MD and CD into the amp but the usual phono sockets from the machines are still available on the rear panel - they do still work, I was able to record on the MD from the CD using a phono lead. It would have been nice if they had internally connected the optical ports but I guess that would have added cost and mod hassle that would not have been used by intended users. 
 

It worked on arrival. Even the MD belt seems good - and I wouldn’t say it’s been opened before so I guess original. I’ve had it apart to give it a good clean inside and out.

 

The unit also has an Aux input on phono on the rear - I’ve had an MDS-E12 plugged in and it works fine. There is also a mic input on 1/4” Jack on the front. I’ve not tried this.

 

But indeed I now have music in the workshop! 😛

 

For those sad like me, the MD varispeed mod seems to have been implemented by severing X550, the crystal to the DAC (and also the ATRAC decoder) and replacing it with a variable frequency circuit controlled by the front panel knob. 

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Amazing @kgallen 😃

 

It's interesting that there's more to it then simply slapping a couple of Sony decks into a box with an amplifier, which is what I assumed it was when I first saw it.

 

Do you think you might be able to find a use for it in your theatrical productions? Being able to vary the speed of MiniDisc/CD playback could be useful. Do any of your "pro" decks have that functionality?

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17 minutes ago, BearBoy said:

Do you think you might be able to find a use for it in your theatrical productions? Being able to vary the speed of MiniDisc/CD playback could be useful. Do any of your "pro" decks have that functionality?


I’ll mainly stick with my racks of MDS-E12 for normal shows. The most important feature on MD that they removed after the 530 (at least on the low end machines) is Auto Pause which I must have, which cues up the next track automatically ready to play. And yes the E12 also have vari-speed on the front panel as well as multi line display and XLR balanced outputs into my mixer. 
 

In the past when we’ve done a ‘little Christmas concert’ at a local community centre/old folk I’ve taken one of my Tascam MD-CD1 to have both MD and CD in one handy package then used the crappy amp/speakers that were there. This combo might come in nicely for situations like this. I also have some ‘rescue’ speakers it’s playing through right now - and it sounds quite good. I don’t know what the power of the amp is - not much given how little there is inside. Maybe 10W per channel. The lack of Auto Pause is an issue on both the MD and CD in this unit.

 

I think this was probably designed for dance studios and the like. 
 

 

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Must admit I'd never heard of the "Auto Pause" feature. Looking at the operating instructions, it was still present on the MDS-JB940 and MDS-JB980.

 

I can see how you'd need that for your shows so you didn't suddenly get an unwanted crash of thunder after a sound effect of bird song or something 😲

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14 minutes ago, BearBoy said:

Must admit I'd never heard of the "Auto Pause" feature. Looking at the operating instructions, it was still present on the MDS-JB940 and MDS-JB980.

 

I can see how you'd need that for your shows so you didn't suddenly get an unwanted crash of thunder after a sound effect of bird song or something 😲


Exactly!

 

When I lived near Birmingham in the 90’s/2000’s I got my group into MD for the sound. I got a 520 like I had at home. A couple of years later we wanted a second deck and I remember checking the specs for Auto Pause and finding it missing on the decks at the time. I can’t remember what model I bought them in the end. It could have been around the time of a 440. 
 

If I recall, it will be somewhere on here, I think I found with a remote for a 520 I could enable Auto Pause on either 440 or 480 even though it wasn’t in the menu or manual for the deck. I think I’m going to try that now with this 480 in the combo…

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They'd dropped the "A.SPACE" button from the remote control by the time the MDS-JB980 came along (RM-D10E) so you have to go into the Setup menu on the deck to enable Auto Space and Auto Pause.

 

The remote control for my MDS-JB940 (RM-D49M) does still have the "A.SPACE" button and it works with the MDS-JB980. Would be interesting to see if those remotes will enable the feature on decks that supposedly don't have it.

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44 minutes ago, kgallen said:

I don’t know what the power of the amp is - not much given how little there is inside. Maybe 10W per channel.

 

I think this was probably designed for dance studios and the like. 

 

Googling Portogram does seem to indicate that their market was dance studios and the like (although their own website seems to be defunct now). Given that, you'd imagine the amps would have needed to be reasonably powerful?

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2 minutes ago, BearBoy said:

 

Success! That is useful to know. Do have any other decks you can test it on? Have lost track of what you have now 🤣


Doesn’t work on the 440.

 

I don’t have any of the top end consumer decks like you @BearBoy. I know Auto Pause is on the 520 and 530. So by remote it is also on 480 but not 440 I can find so far. E12 and E10 defo have it. Only (!) other Sony I have is a 770 (but y’all know that!). Will try when this wind and rain abates a bit and I can make a run for the house 🙃

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Whilst I’m waffling on, it seems Super Undo works on the 480. With a dirty TOC hold STOP for 10 seconds.

 

With the RM-D15M neither M.SCAN or FADER work on the 440 or 480. 440 and 480 have Fade in and out in the Setup menu but no front panel button (like 520/530 does) so must be a remote function. 

 

CD-SYNC works on the CD and MD but I think we expected that. 

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40 minutes ago, BearBoy said:

 

Is "Super Undo" an official feature @kgallen?

 

What do you mean by a "dirty TOC"? One when you've made changes but haven't ejected the disc/turned off the deck in order to complete the "TOC writing" stage?

 

Yes that’s right, a dirty TOC is one where there are changes held in RAM not yet written to disc.

 

I think I learned about ‘super undo’ from here:


https://www.minidisc.org/cloning_procedure.html


It’s more of a diagnostic feature -  Retry Cause Display mode - but the effect is also to make the machine think the TOC in RAM matches the one on disc. 

 

On some later/upper decks there is an Undo function in the Edit menu. 
 

I was playing with the remote to see what functions did or did not work on the 480/440. Name works but it makes the machine think the TOC is dirty so I tried the super undo key press…

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