[Beagle]

Anyone know how or why an MD can erase itself?

On a couple of occasions recently, I would go to resume listening to an MD in my MZ-R50 MD Walkman, hit PLAY and no music would play. I checked the readout and it read 0:00 BLANK DISC. This has happened about three times. The last one was a painstakingly made comp of various tracks from vinyl, and it's gone, I have to do it all over gain.

Is the machine the culprit or do I have faulty discs?

 

[walkingman]

I haven't used MiniDiscs in years, but I do remember that they have built-in write protect tabs (like on old tapes and current SD cards). Try enabling them the next time to prevent the TOC from being accidentally writen over.

 

[jant71]

Probably the machine is starting to have issues. You could know right away if you had another machine to try the disc in.

Start making another comp with just a couple of tracks, then put on the write protect switch. If it ends up saying blank disc with a couple of songs that it could not erase then you know it is the machine.

I remember it happening to me once or twice with one machine. The disc was fine. I either cleaned the heads or adjusted the sled and it never happened again.

 

[Beagle]

Quote:

Originally Posted by walkingman /img/forum/go_quote.gif I haven't used MiniDiscs in years, but I do remember that they have built-in write protect tabs (like on old tapes and current SD cards). Try enabling them the next time to prevent the TOC from being accidentally writen over.

Right. I did that with one of the discs a couple of months ago. I note the current "problem" disc's protection tab is not enabled. I'll redo and slide the tab open and see what happens.

Quote:

Originally Posted by jant71 /img/forum/go_quote.gif Probably the machine is starting to have issues. You could know right away if you had another machine to try the disc in.

I put the disc back in the Sony MD deck it was recorded on and it also read blank. I tried the "undo" feature but to no avail.

I also realize that the discs I had problems with were from a batch I bought used at a pawn shop, with no outer cases. They look a little worse for the wear, may have been dropped or poorly stored.

But thanks for the input guys.

 

[Mr.Sneis]

Wow I never heard of that happening, I wonder if by chance it was erased in-pocket or something such as a pocket call on your cell.

I'm not a MD expert but have enjoyed several different players over the years.

 

[Beagle]

No, each time the disc was in the player and went blank (or I noticed it had gone blank) when I resumed play after stopping earlier on.

It also happened about 10 years ago, erasing a radio broadcast that I could never get again.

The MD unit is usually connected to and sitting on a headphone amp. Could this cause this type of problem?

 

[walkingman]

Well it happened to me once by accident. Not sure what the culprit is (apart from me not sliding the write protect tab), but it could be due to the dirty laser recording head. I cleaned it and the problem never happened again. It was on my MD deck. Never had a problem on my portables as I only ever buy read-only models.

 

[flibottf]

Impossible the erase any data on magneto-optic disc without heating it to the curie point. (check the subject on wikipedia, pretty interesting!) So I would rule out any interference erasing the disc. I would believe it's a faulty machine, or if it was always the same disc, a faulty disc. Remember those discs were meant to be written about a million times before failing. Ahh I miss mines.....

 

[fredman22]

Quote:

Originally Posted by flibottf /img/forum/go_quote.gif Impossible the erase any data on magneto-optic disc without heating it to the curie point. (check the subject on wikipedia, pretty interesting!) So I would rule out any interference erasing the disc. I would believe it's a faulty machine, or if it was always the same disc, a faulty disc. Remember those discs were meant to be written about a million times before failing. Ahh I miss mines.....

I agree with above. I'm no expert but still use my gear extensively as players. Both my RH10 & NH900 exhibited control quirks from day one which would include occaisional 'volume up' commands interpreted as 'edit disk' - so I've always made sure to engage the security tab after recording/transferring. Wiping a disc when attempting to play is catastrophic. Unless you can have the player looked at, I'd be wary about playing rare discs in it. Good luck.

 

[BIGHMW]

I have been using MD since 1998, and I only had this kind of trouble once with an old MDS-JE510. What wuld happen is I put in either an unprotected disc to edit it or record onto one using that unit and after I press 'eject' it goes through its 'TOC Reading' phase and when you insert it again it would read 'Blank Disc'. It really P***ed me off after working so hard on a custom recording, but then I got it repaired and it never came up again.

I would get that deck of yours into a shop right away and don't let the repair man there try to sell the B.S. idea that it is "dead technology and not worth repairing". I myself am getting my old MDX-C5970 car deck (I own two of those as well as a Mobile ES MDX-C8900 I use in my 1999 New Beetle GLS 2.0) repaired after moisture invaded the inside of it.

I also own a ton of portables, as well as car decks, 2 MDX-65 changers and home and pro decks, and never had this issue come up on them though, but I, along with a bunch of my felow users at the Minidisc Community Forums (Powered by Invision Power Board) will never let MD or Hi-MD die on us until the last unit we own goes t**s up on us.

Only then will be 'dead technology', and just because it may be does not make it 'inferior technology', ATRAC, bit-for-bit sounds better than MP3 or AAC at the same bit rate.

 

[originalsnuffy]

Minidiscs were one of my technical blind alleys....right after I gave up on using portable DAT for music playback. Ever try running with a Sony TCD-D7? Pretty lame (it was really big).

The original minidisc players had rotten shock protection. Took three generations to get that going.

Boxed up my player and all the blank discs and sold them on ebay.

Did not look back. Had to dispose of the discs with music though (didn't want to get into copyright problems so I did not include them in the auction).

Now I have fun debating portable mp3 players....!

 

[EFN]

There's absolutely no reason an MD should erase by itself. Sounds like a dud recorder you have there

 

[ILikeMusic]

Quote:

Originally Posted by BIGHMW /img/forum/go_quote.gif ATRAC, bit-for-bit sounds better than MP3 or AAC at the same bit rate.

That's not what any of the testing I've seen indicates, in fact quite the opposite.

In any event... if your player is acting up then it's probably time to move into the current century and get a good DAP.

 

[shigzeo]

no reason to get into sq debates. md fanatics are quoted as saying that md sounds better than cd and that md i better because it is digital. so, let's just not open that lol sort of debate - not when the proof otherwise exists elsewhere.

 

[BIGHMW]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ILikeMusic /img/forum/go_quote.gif In any event... if your player is acting up then it's probably time to move into the current century and get a good DAP.

Actually, I also have several Sony NW-HD5 HDD DAP's, all in silver, 3 that I use (2 N.O.S., U.S. models), one at a time, after the other one dies out and 3 beat-up ones I bought for what they came with as well as possible parts (yes they do fully function), and am listening to a compilation of Rare Earth on my AM Radio Lore playlist/genre on it ([1969-1975], anybody remember them for their hit singles "Get Ready" and "I Just Want To Celebrate"?) as I am writing this.

So I guess that qualifies as having moved on to the current century and millennium, and I just use my MZ-RH1 (I also own 3 of those) to upload my custom MD's to SS 4.2 CP and from there to my HD5.