hey all i am looking at buying a mini disk player. i have around $500 to spend. please advise me on what model and make i shoudl get and where to get them from.

I have done a little research and want at least the following features:

40 second buffer
mdlp - long play
in line remote
at least a 10 hour battery

Thanx

what about em.

i have a SONY mz-r70

they own

SONY is the only way to go, my friend got the sharp one, and his literally fell apart at skool. for 100 dorrah more, u get a helluva lot more, and, they are soooooo small

kewl i want a good brand, i don't want crap

If your going to buy one new, i suggest you buy it from an OS site, or better yet, get you/someone you know to buy one OS, my walkman is a panasonic MJ-70 and i paid about $400 for it in hongkong about 3 or 3 years ago when it was the smallest in the world, this was when the sony mz e40 (mine is much better than that) was top of range over here, and it cost around $600.
So yeah, id recomend sharp. Sony are good, but a bit overpriced i think.

the new mzr500's are good, but dont have a remote. look at the mzr700 and 900 models, they rock, and weight like 98 grams. they all have those features, try to buy duty free or overseas if you can.

well, i got mine about 6 months ago, and it cost 530...

so, it should fit yur budget , and they are hella loud!!

My Sony mz-r70 seems damn near indestructible, and works good too :)

A mate at school had a Sharp one and he dropped it (not very far) and now it no worky :( Heh, its costing him about as much to get it fixed as it did to buy it.

I've dropped my mz-r70 a heap and it doesn't even miss a beat :D

So yeah, Sony is the way to go if you're even slightly clumsy ;)

Wat size storage do they all hold????????..cuz like 32 meg is just f***en not worth it

disregard my post..i thought you were talking about mp3 players :(

By K|nDreD

sorry all those models i mentioned are sonys.. i got a MZR30 ages ago(old school) for $300AUD in singapore.. its still going strong(although a little chunky ;)

getting a new 700 or 900 hopefully in june

hay capt0, see if you can get your hands on a american one, we've got two of em and they rawk.

you'll need a plug converter tho

From the man who knows

Get the sony mzr-90 they are the BEST

40 sec anti shock
20 hour battlife
12 hour recoding battlife
this things got all the little features you could possibly want on a minidisc including a cable remote with backlit LCD pannel :)

and it all fits in the palm of your hand

Yep Capto...

i've got an MZR 90 and it's heaps good...

only problem is... the LCD screen is delicate... I dropped mine at skool and now it's costed heaps to fix... but other than that, it's the best value for money MD to get...

btw, i got mine last last December from Hong Kong and it was only $350... but u gotta know where to go to get it that cheap

I bought mine in the states bout 2 years ago...

MZR55 with Rad little remote..

It is pretty good but the new models s*** all over it.. : (

I got it for under 300 was a good price : ) (AUS)

Chod.

How much do discs cost for these little thingies?

Yep Capt0 with hardware etc, go SONY its your best quality, Although sometimes steep in price, its well worth it for the quality and productivity

trog: about $5 a disc.

with MD players (not sure about recorders) there is no noticible difference in design and construction of the players once you get to the high quality (sony, sharp and panasonic) I have had a sony and it was excellent, i now have a panasonic (playback only) and it is excellent (except when the dog chewed on remote), a friend has had a sharp and he swears by it.

I think it comes down to the remote, all of the top range models have the same player/record specs, but some dont have LCD on the remote, letalone a backlight. Some of the sonys dont have a lcd on the remote, but i think US$50 fixes that.

However, if buying from OS tho, i recomend pay a bit more and go sony, i think they have the best international support, when i broke mine (something with laser). I just went to chermside radio with a recipt written in chinese and they fixed it no probs.

Hope this helps

ive got an mz-r900
sif it aint the best
cost me bout $600 to get it shipped from singapore that was back in march though when the dollar was at a freakin low lvl

i love it...50 something hrs playtime...freakin last for the whole week at uni without me recharging

The mzr900 isn't as good as it may seem though... the 4 times longplay comes at a cost as the quality is a little reduced and costs twice as much...

i have an mzr90 and a e700 player

btw the mzr90 does not have MDLP. so if you really want that. give the mzr90 a miss and go for the mzr900.

but yeh. the mzr90 really is tough. dropped mine from 2 stories (dont ask) and it still started, but the lens was out of allignment and it has a big dint in it :(. but once you have a recorder, go for players. because they are so much more yummy. mm

you want a recorder? go mzr-700 or 900 as 500 doesn't come with remote, in fact the mzr-500 doesn't even come with a jack that you can plug another remote into, all it has is a headphone jack, which s***s me off no end, as a remote is awesome. i spose the 500 is only $429 which is heaps cheap for a recorded. you want a player go mze-500, thats about $500, and it looks cool. not sure about the mze-700, its not in Oz last time i knew. but ya can import it i guess
i was checking them out at sony central last sunday, and got a few prices. one that looks good to come, is the mzg-750, which is basically a mzr-700 but it comes with FM/AM radio. go into sony central on edward st and get this awesome catalogue of what they sell there. its good.

Would you guys recommend a player and a recording deck or a recorder/player in one?

if it was me, a recorder and player in one, as its just so much easier to take your recorder/player anywhere, and if you want to record of a mates cd, just plug them together and start recording. for me its just easier because of the portability of it....i wouldn't ever buy a recording deck, unless i bought a stereo with the damn thing.

I would be inclined to agree,
Just wondering though, how much do you actually find yourself recording from a friends cd etc.?

with mdlp, its a choice of whether you want to record at standard (80mins, best sound quality), lp2 (160 mins, from what i gather, and slightly less sound quality) or lp4 (320 mins, and the lowest sound quality of the 3, which still isn't that bad) and thats all on the one minidisc. while i more inclined to use standard or lp2 as i would never have 320minutes of music i want on one minidisc

well, a mate of mine has heaps of cds, and is constantly buying more, so i will record heaps of singular songs of his cds. at the moment i don't, as my use my brothers mzr-30(heaps old) and its battery doesn't allow for long recording times. at the moment, i mostly record of the computer, mp3's and the like.
as soon as i get a newer one, i will start recording heaps more

with mdlp it halves the bitrate with each further setting..ie lp1 (normal) records at something like 264 kbps, lp2 records are 132kbps (which in turn doubles play time), and lp4 records at 66kbps (and doubles play time again)...

and on md's, id say that so long as the unit has the features you're looking for, the only other thing to look at is the remote. imho, i really dont like any of the previous sony remotes until the latest r900 ones, and the only other remote ive experienced is the old sharp ones (i have a 821), which i reckon are pretty good as well.

otherwise really as kindred says it really goes on how you like your remote designs...some like sony stick design, others like panasonic rectangles, and others sharps weird thing...

Do you just stick a cable from your line out of your sound card to your MD to record off the computer? Is there a quicker way of recording?

And did Sony release a MD drive for computers, I swear I remember seeing one somewhere..

If you can afford an extra $300, sony have a pack that includes a player (MZ-E33 when I got mine), a home recorder/player deck, street headphones, a whole bunch of blank MD's and a car kit. I haven't had any problems with mine, it rocks hard.

If anyone has any info on the PC MD drives, post it here...I'd be interested in seeing what they are like

if you have a md hifi you can do 2x recording and the like from cd's (not quite sure how high it goes up to). dont know if theres any way to record faster than real time on a pc...

and yes sony released an md drive but they dont make them anymore

im probably going to get a player/recorder when my mum goes to japan in the june/july hols, it will most probably be a mzr-700 if i get a recorder of a mze500 if i get just a player, i'd get the mzr-900 but i don't have the money :( the 900's look so awesome

900s r damn nice

maybe im close to deaf but i cant hear any diff between lp1 and lp2..so the double time of lp2 makes it sooo much sweeter

also $600 imported isnt that much compared to the $800+ u have to pay for it if u buy it from australia. i can also guarantee its worth importing it..the money u save can be spent on accessories or other crap..

yeah the mzr-900 is $799 from sony central, but its so damn awesome. its still like $649 duty free even.

right now most online retailers have the r900's for around 280USD (~540AUD) not including postage and whatever

mine was 300USD back in march or was it feb...nfi

then it was like 18USD for shipping although i paid an extra 9USD to get it express shipped

http://www.minidisc.20m.com/

I still don't understand why people opt to buy both a recorder and a player??

Cause if you have a stereo with an MD in it, its pointless spending extra $$ on a recordable walkman, also, playback walkmans are, or atleast used to be, much smaller and lighter.

Is a recordable minidisk player (ie, a small one not a system) just something that you plug into a CD player or something so you can copy CDs? What sort of interface does it have to copy music too (ie, analog or digital, what sort of plugs, etc).

They use standard stereo jacks, except the socket can recieve standard analogue throught the metal contacts, OR, it can recieve digital stuff, fibre optically, using the same stereo jack. In addition, you can now get cables for your pc that run from your USB port on your pc, makeing it easier to copy mps onto MD

USB would be good. If you could get the data to the minidisc digitally, that would be cool. Maybe I should be looking at MD players instead of mp3 players, at least until someone like Sony can make an mp3 player that I'm not going to worry about breaking.

sif i dont have the best minidisk player in the world :D

MZ-R900...it ownz j00...5hrs worth of music squished on 1 md f*** yer

thats 4 mos cds on one disk :D
i you are good i might let you touch it
its a sony :D

oh and i got it for $450...new

http://www.walkman.sony.co.jp/prod/md_rec/r900.html

sorry i dont know how to do the a=href or whatevah

so how do you guys that have them get the music onto them?

you can either just run a straight analog 3.5mm audio cable between your speaker/line out straight into the line in on the MD, or you can use digital out on SB Live! cards and such, but as far as i know theres no simple way of 'dubbing' cd's and stuff, basically you just have to play them as a winamp playlist, and leave your MD recording

so there's no md burner as such?

sif you wouldnt just get an mp3 player

i think you could probably buy one if you threw enough cash around, but as far as i know you cant transfer stuff digitally to them but lain/bah feel free to correct me

mp3 players are lame

no optical goodness at all

if u got a sony discman with optical out the sound si really crisp...thru sony headfones

you can really hear the difference from earphones between mp3s and dubbed off the cd with optical line.

mmmm sony makes me wet

I am just wondering wether to get a lighter, smaller player and a recording deck.

OR

a play/recorder on one.

Also recorind onto either one would be tedious, if it was quicker..

people get a recorder and a player because most likely they bought the recorder and then only a while later bought the player because they are much smaller than recorders...like id be in the market for a nice player if i had the money...sadly no moolah :(

but yeah if i did have the cash id get myself a nice 5 disc changer md hifi, stick it next to my pc, and nab myself a slim player...something to the tune of a sony e700, or maybe a sharp st77 or aiwa aw-hx100

who wants to donate?

I got a similar sorta setup at the mo. My stereo is a sony MD-515, the 3md-3cd one with the detatchable control, as a walkman i got a panasonic sj-mj70 and its awesome. The good thing about the stereo is you can put 3 cds in with 3 blank cds, press one button, and it digitally records it all by itself, also adding the track names if cd-text is enabled.

havnt been bothered to read much above, but you must get better earphones than the standard ones that come with the md's. they are decent. but getting the 848 sony earphones sound so much better, and you'll notice things you'v never heard of before o_O. or you can go the whole way and get some 888's. tad more expensive ;)

yeh you can transfer digitally. if you have an SBlive value etc without the big front bay thingy with all the knobs and stuff, you can get an digital addon going out the back for about $60 if i recall correctly. but if your not too picky, analogue works great with good soundcards.

btw. stay away from videopro for buying 848's as you can get them $5 cheaper pretty much anywhere, and they took about 5 minutes to print out my damn docket :\.

$130 for some buds.. are they prepped to survive a nuclear blast or something?

theyr pretty fragile. but you'd look cool with your shiny (even) new buds even in an nuclear blast ;)

i think the million or so degree nuclear blast will play havoc on your md disc.....heat effects them..u will look kewl..but then u will look stupid listing to something that doesnt work

I got a SONY MD RZ-50 off a mate who went overseas (for $150 too, it wasn't stolen either!!)

You can get recordables for about $470 that have 32hrs battery life (battery life was a bitch with mine only 6hrs)

and their really small.
You can get Ultra small ones (the size of two md's on top of each other) that have 40hrs batt life with one AA battery (sweet huh)

Sony is the best, the only bitch is recording (its real time) unless you get those ones that can just record really fast or something, no idea how it works.

All of them will have a remote I'm sure.
Sony is your best, they've got best internal battery power (apparently).

Later

trog there's no way Sony are going to be making mp3 players for a while yet. Sony records vs Napster.

How much do you trust buying overseas then getting it sent back?
Is the warranty still covered here?

Scythe: Sony already have 2 mp3 players. They use another format , well one does anyway, but same thing, all digital. Trog was pointing out the fact they are really small. like really.

yeah, they make a mp3 player for your car, it also plays vcds aswell.