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NO MORE iPOD TOPICS!

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Jermz

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Why is it people think they can come into a MINIDISC forum and start ranting about iPod's? We all know the iPod is just a glorified plug in and play hard drive. It has a battery life equivalent to my cell phone battery (we all know how reliable those are). Sure its sleek and trendy, but so are XM radio receivers. Generally when your talking to someone about iPod's or someone brings up an iPod topic its because they are a simple Mac user. They cant grasp the complexity or potential of MiniDisc. There must be something that brainwashes users of Mac's, I swear, they are the only users more fanatical than MiniDisc users that I know of. Ideally I would love to see the moderators ban more posts that create these mudslinging arguments about iPod vs. MD. Let me rap this up before I really get on a rant. I have owned 4 solid state hard drive MP3 players. Nothing AND I MEAN NOTHING compares to the quality of sound my MZ-N505 puts out (even in LP2 mode). There isn’t a player out there that offers as much flexibility, reliability, and cost effectiveness as the most current MD units. I don't see why people are willing to drop $500 USD on an iPod (especially non-Mac users) when MD units that offer more than the iPod could dream of offering are available for $200 USD or less. Sure it has its catches, like no direct audio uploading, and the fact that you have to use a few work a rounds to really utilize MD to its full potential, but if your not a Mac user you have to do that anyway with an iPod, and as a gentle reminder... most PC's aren't equipped with a FireWire port, so if your not the technical type your just asking for trouble going with an iPod as a PC user. SO PLEASE no more iPod posting... its making me ill!

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Jermz...

I agree that the iPod is crap, but don't go making claims about other HDD players' poor quality.

If you encode a bad MP3, nothing, and I mean NOTHING, will make it sound good.

That's Minidisc's advantage over MP3 - although Sony's ATRAC encoder isn't quite as good as the best MP3 encoders, it's the only ATRAC encoder around, so the quality is consistent.

That all having been said, again I totally agree about iPod and Mac stuff...

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I am certainly guilty of having many MD vs. iPod discussions; I own both. Let me put what I think is a more pro-MD spin on the whole comparison...

I didn't get into MiniDisc until last year; I've had my iPod for over two years. Both serve their purpose for me very well.

The iPod is the most convenient way to hear my CDs on the go. The whole integration w/ iTunes is simply amazing. It's great for all of those CDs I own...but what about records, tapes, borrowed music, live recording, etc...? Enter the MiniDisc.

Before MD came into my life, I was burning CD-Rs left and right. Yeah, it was much faster than recording MDs in realtime (which I feel is the only option for high quality recordings), but I was totally oblivious to the fact that I was spending more time burning CDs than LISTENING to them!

Not only are MiniDiscs more fun to make, but they have reintroduced me to my whole music catalog! Taking all of those bland CD-Rs out of my collection have made CDs stand out that I haven't listened to in years. I haven't enjoyed listening to my collection this much since the cassette era.

I decided I wanted to archive my vinyl and cassette collection (I have a ton of both) for when I move next year (so I can leave the records & tapes in storage). I am so glad I ended up choosing MiniDisc as the recording format. I'm having so much fun with it!

As much as I love both (and will continue to use them....MiniDiscs on the go = Sharp DR7, CDs on the go = iPod), I am now at the point where I would choose MDs over the iPod if I HAD to choose one. My portable use is mainly for working out, so the portability factor is NOT that important. So, MiniDisc is perfect for me. Not only do I enjoy playing MDs on my pro deck, CDs on my pro CDR deck, but I love listening to MDs on my Kenwood KMD-44 car unit (as well as CDs through the changer).

If someone never had a reason to do any recordings (from records, tapes, or borrowed CDs), I would suggest going the iPod route. Otherwise, it's got to be MD all the way---especially since I don't look at MiniDisc as mainly being a "portable" format, rather, the ultimate recording and hi-fi player---the replacement to the cassette: what it was intended to be. It's very sad that it didn't become this in the U.S. (surprisingly, there has never been a replacement---people just aren't recording anymore, only burning CD-Rs at rapid rates...yawn)...but as long as it continues to thrive in radio and Asia---and Kenwood and Sony produce MD car decks---I don't care what U.S. consumers do. I can continue to have my MiniDisc!!!

Rock on.

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I will also add that my MD recordings of vinyl & cassettes come out great; the pops, clicks, and hiss are taken off, EQ is added, and the MD is recorded---all in real time! Here's the chain:

Technics 1200 (or Sony 3-Head Tape Deck)--->A/D---->AudioSource 10-band EQ---->MOTU 828 Firewire I/O--->iMac--->MOTU828---->Sony MDS-E10 Pro MiniDisc Deck

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Thank you Bazirker for understanding what I was saying here. NRen2k5 I can say what I will about the quality of MP3 because I have used almost every encoder out there and the result was the same on all of the HDD players I have owned. I have been using MP3 technology before it was mainstream, before Winamp, and way before anyone knew it was going to destroy the record industry. I have used every commecial encoder and underground dev project trying to find something that still sounded like a quality recording... but If you ask me MP3 sucks the soul out of music regardless of how you go about encoding it. So when I do my transfers to MD I usually go directly to the CD. The ATRAC encoder does a better job than any MP3 encoder out there in MY opinion. Finally, if we went into an iPod forum, I can almost guarantee we would be banned and the post would be delete before you could get outta the forum :twisted:.

8... you're a pure user man! MD was made for people like you and me!

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