Advantages of using minidisc to record

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chessparov

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I come here to praise minidisc, not to bury it!

Advantages for the recording musician/songwriter
1) Easy to use
2) Superior sound quality to cassette-at level of semi-pro reel to reels
3) No need to "back up" recordings like computer recording
(in a practical sense)
4) minidiscs, both Data and consumer stereo type were designed for
archiving 30+ years, and are less sensitive to magnetic fields as
cassette or reel to reel. (although reel to reel is my favorite format)
5) According to Sony, the same minidisc can be used at least a million times
for recording without sonic degradation. Try that with a cassette!

Anybody else with something to add?

Chris

P.S. I've discovered that either an Aphex 107 dual mic pre or an Aphex 109
parametric EQ unit complement the minidisc format very well as far as
compensating for ATRAC "artifacts". The effects of ATRAC, BTW, are far
less than the dbx noise reduction system for semi-pro analog multi-track
recorders.
 
I like MD, as I've said before. The ATRAC doesn't bother me,...

but I'd like to see MD adopt a switchable 16bit, uncompressed format.

The Minidisc itself holds 140Mb of data, and with ATRAC it delivers 74 minutes of stereo, 37 minutes of 4-track rec/play time. My hypothetical 16-bit/uncompressed MD format would reduce recording time of the minidisc.

Anyway, even though MD has introduced more bit-reduced formats for exended play times, it doesn't seem like they're proposing uncompressed data formats for MD. It would probably make the MD very short. Lets do the math:

There's about 10MB/min of data for 16-bit/44.1/stereo, so figure 20mb/min of data in 4-track/16-bit/44.1. By my calculation, a 4-track/16-bit/44.1Khz data format would shorten the 140Mb Minidisc to only 7 minutes of 4-track uncompressed data. That may be too short of a recording time to make uncompressed 16-bit/44.1 data recording practical for a Minidisc Portastudio. I don't know, it's a judgement call.

The Minidisc Data media is a little more expensive than I think it should be, and that's always worked against the MDD format. The price of MDD data is still comparable to a 7" reel of 456, which is acceptable, but CDR's are down to 50c/ea, so that's the way the tide of technology is going. The stereo-only regular Minidisc media is affordable, priced just like cassettes. Like anything in current technology, MD recording was obsoleted very quickly after it was created. It's already an orphaned technology.

Anyway, back to my first point,... I like minidisc, as I've said before, and the ATRAC doesn't bother me. I use MD a moderate amount of time, and I think it sounds good. I have two consumer leve Sony MD recorders, and plenty of regular MD media for stereo recording. I also have the Tascam 564, but only have one data disc so far. I'll continue to use Minidisc occasionally.;)
 
Hi Reel!
Excellent points.
It would have been cool if someone just made a rewritable CD based system
too, especially with CD-RW media costs so cheap now.
I really think having to back up computer (music) files is a PITA!

Chris
 
I think if they added 4 band parametric eq and 250mb zip drive where the minidisc is, and dumped the atrac the things would sell like hotcakes. They tried to bridge md8 users with aw16g, but I really don't like scrolling through menus when mixing.

I use the Md8 and N-track sync'd together. It a great tool, but it shouldn't be your only tool IMO.

SoMm
 
The analog console/digital recorder hybrids have all gone by the wayside,...

like the Yamaha MD-8, Tascam 564, Fostex FD-4 and FD-8,... all obsolete.

All the analog/digital hybrid models [above] have been superseded by all-digital designs, that have a minimum of faders and knobs, and which are basically menu driven, like the 788, several Fostex models, and every other Yamaha and Boss/Roland product. The newest recorders are all-digital, menu-driven designs.

BTW, I think Roland makes a CDR/CDRW based multitracker, the CDX, but it too is an all-digital menu-driven design, not a hybrid.
 
Re: The analoIts really too bad! :eek:

A Reel Person said:
The analog console/digital recorder hybrids have all gone by the wayside,...B]
Click to expand...


And because the sad truth of that statement, Ive been scouring Ebay for decent used analog consoles and 16 track analog machines..I like knobs, I like rewinding, I like it I say. Since Im not having a problem with clients(me) wanting to run Pro Stool I don't need the added expense of tons of converters. When I gt a faster computer I an think about getting a Digi-001 for sync with a 16 track like G-16(SMPTE striped on trk 16) and to 24/96 track transfers if I was desparate. Oh nevermind I was daydreaming again..stupid Matrix!



SoMm
 
The funniest thing is with all the junk-I mean stuff to maximize a
Pro Tools set-up the most economical way to go is just to get an
8 track 1" or a 16 track 2" for absoulute state of the art sound.
Interesting how I see more and more people "rediscovering"
analog!

Must confess...
Just got a Tascam US-224 to start learning editing in Pro Tools,
and maybe Digital Performer or something else.
Not real excited about the latency issues.
As a result this will function as a glorified dat machine for mixing down to.

BTW, Roland's CDX uses (mild) data compression.

Chris

P.S. I LOVE faders and knobs!
(virtually NO latency on analog desks too)
 
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