[Tunster]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sparky191 The idea of HD dap is that you always have what you want with you. Regardless if you change your mind in the middle of your journey. Basically you don't have to plan ahead. How do you loose everything? You have your CD's and you have the library on the computer where you put the track onto your HD in the first place. You'll probably say people delete the tracks once the transfer them. But I don't get that either. You don't copy a CD onto a MD and throw the CD away do you? Or delete it out of SS? Recording and editing, yeah its great. That how I use my MD/HiMD. Be handy if all that functionality was on a HD though

For the majority of iPod users, I gather they download off the internet (illegally and legally), they don't hard copy on CD (thats if they don't back it up) and possiblly just goes straight onto the iPod.

There will be a hard-copy on the computer obviosuly, but that isn't so much as of a hard-copy because HDs in computers go too. With MD, you've got a good carbon copy and its permanent if you want it to be. They last 50 years (slightly god damn longer than HDs that have a life today of about 3 - 7 years). Just depends on how much they're used and abused.

 

[akg_man701]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sparky191 Recording and editing, yeah its great. That how I use my MD/HiMD. Be handy if all that functionality was on a HD though

Bingo. If we had all that, we wouldn't need MDs for anything really. I'm sure it's not too far off to have a DAP with MD/HiMD recording capability.

As for having a DAP backup: keep all the files on your computer HD and then back that up to a USB HD (or second HD in a desktop computer).

All my music comes from CDs anyway (no legal or illegal mp3 downloading), but it's still a pain to re-rip all of them if my DAP HD fails.

 

[Csidinim]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tunster For the majority of iPod users, I gather they download off the internet (illegally and legally), they don't hard copy on CD (thats if they don't back it up) and possiblly just goes straight onto the iPod. There will be a hard-copy on the computer obviosuly, but that isn't so much as of a hard-copy because HDs in computers go too. With MD, you've got a good carbon copy and its permanent if you want it to be. They last 50 years (slightly god damn longer than HDs that have a life today of about 3 - 7 years). Just depends on how much they're used and abused.

Well what is the point of backing it up when either copy, on ipod hdd or computer hdd, serves as the back up to the other already? You think the chances of both your ipod and computer harddrives failing together without warning, so that you can't transfer back from ipod<->computer, is that great? talk about bad luck.

anyway one of the perks of md, before hdd players with versatile menu screens came along, was that you could order the tracks however you wanted on the fly, thus creating some of the earliest on-the-fly playlists possible (with a limited number of tracks). this was huge when most listening was very linear, as in cd or cassette, where you could skip tracks but ultimately had to listen in the way your music was recorded. also, adding songs at whim- re-recordable- to anywhere on the disc.

 

[Sparky191]

You should always back up a computer.

 

[The_Duke_Of_Eli]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Sebastianbf ^ I think that a HiMD (or MD) will last longer than an Ipod , but it really depends. I have had portable minidiscs that were good for 5 years and I have had anothers that had last 1 year and a half (and I really care them).

Maybe so, but are you really going to use it for 5 years? 5 years from now mp3 players will have developed so much, that no one will still regularly use today's players.

 

[bangraman]

Quote:

Originally Posted by BennyBoy I have more than one MD player thats going on 10 years of age and works and sounds as good as new. I'd bet a large sum that an Ipod would never make it to the ripe old age of 10.

Quote:

Originally Posted by BennyBoy Sony has a hard drive player. This may be the best of both worlds! If it worked with my Mac I would have got one instead of an Ipod.

Both the Sony and the iPod will work if treated in the way that your MD player was as long as there are spare batteries available. And the chances of spares available for the iPod are a damned sight more likely than the Sony (let alone the availablility of say a LIP-4WM).


There is a caveat to this though: I can almost guarantee you'll use your DAP, be it Apple, Creative, Sony, etc more than an MD if you are a music enthusiast as opposed to a gadget enthusiast. A DAP will therefore be subject to more wear and tear than your MD was.

 

[Lindinblade]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bangraman Both the Sony and the iPod will work if treated in the way that your MD player was as long as there are spare batteries available. And the chances of spares available for the iPod are a damned sight more likely than the Sony (let alone the availablility of say a LIP-4WM). There is a caveat to this though: I can almost guarantee you'll use your DAP, be it Apple, Creative, Sony, etc more than an MD if you are a music enthusiast as opposed to a gadget enthusiast. A DAP will therefore be subject to more wear and tear than your MD was.

'Gadget enthusiast'? Or need its recording abilities. Perhaps that was outside of the scope of this discussion, though?
As for wear and tear, it's rather relative, since you open the MD portable (more mechanical operation).

"Both the Sony and the iPod will work if treated in the way that your MD player was as long as there are spare batteries available." Nice opinion, but based on my personal experience, I don't share it at all.

 

[bangraman]

I think unless you post your personal experience we won't have any basis of comparison.

 

[Lindinblade]

Will we anyway? Unless there's some sort of objective study done, 'past experiences' will always be coloured by opinion, and be also in other ways subjective.

I've never owned an iPod, or any DAP except MDs, (beginning perhaps 5 years back), but I know of several that have. I've also worked as tech support for Apple for a while.

 

[bangraman]

Ah crap. double post

 

[bangraman]

So what would be your personal experience of DAPs vs MD's that leads you to think otherwise from what I said? Is it the hard disk thing? HDD's can fail but lasers/pickups do just as potentially often in my experience.

 

[Sparky191]

I was like that for me. I use my DAPS much more than my MD/HiMD's. Its just easier.

 

[Lindinblade]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bangraman So what would be your personal experience of DAPs vs MD's that leads you to think otherwise from what I said? Is it the hard disk thing? HDD's can fail but lasers/pickups do just as potentially often in my experience.

It would be the hard disk thing. I've dropped my units a couple of times, and only had lasting damage in one of the cases, where the unit became mostly unable to record, and sometimes had minute-long gaps when attempting to simply read discs.

From what I have heard from friends, and read, most HD based players tend to die from such things, and indeed lesser impacts. Additionally, HDDs have a mean-time-before-failure, or whatnow it is called, but I've never even heard of that term being mentioned when it comes to lasers. Logic dictates that there must be a chart for them as well, but..*shrug*

Of course when experiences are not first-hand it becomes harder to judge, but this is why some sort of study, or statistics, must come into play, not one person's experiences or 29 second-hand experiences.

I guess I argue against flames with flames, but you seem a bit too consistent in your pro-iPod anti-MD texts. (And I suffer from iPod allergics, unfortunately :/ )

Sparky: It depends on what you use them for, as mentioned.

 

[Sparky191]

Lasers failing on MD units is common enough on older units. I've read about it enough on MD forums and have had one unit fail myself. Lasers in CD players fail too. I've had a few of those repaired over the years too.

Only if you record more than you listen. Which I find hard to believe. Why would you record stuff you don't listen too. I only use my HiMD as a recorder. I playback my recordings on a DAP as a first reference.

 

[bangraman]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Lindinblade It would be the hard disk thing. I've dropped my units a couple of times, and only had lasting damage in one of the cases, where the unit became mostly unable to record, and sometimes had minute-long gaps when attempting to simply read discs. From what I have heard from friends, and read, most HD based players tend to die from such things, and indeed lesser impacts. Additionally, HDDs have a mean-time-before-failure, or whatnow it is called, but I've never even heard of that term being mentioned when it comes to lasers. Logic dictates that there must be a chart for them as well, but..*shrug* Of course when experiences are not first-hand it becomes harder to judge, but this is why some sort of study, or statistics, must come into play, not one person's experiences or 29 second-hand experiences. I guess I argue against flames with flames, but you seem a bit too consistent in your pro-iPod anti-MD texts. (And I suffer from iPod allergics, unfortunately :/ ) Sparky: It depends on what you use them for, as mentioned.

The iPod specifically doesn't enter into the argument here. The general DAP-vs-MD advantages apply to all DAPs generally speaking.


The need to flame for many I suppose comes from the fact that that party believes something to be true without actual experience. I have that experience (including head-to-head impact testing of DAPs and Hi-MD units) and I question anything I consider to be unfounded supposition.


"Unable to record" means "unable to load" which makes them somewhat useless. I've dropped a number of MD's and they've come away badly most of the time. Sharps invariably died on the first drop without fail. Sony's it was a 70-30 prospect in favour of it working I'd say, but it could still fail. HDD's can fail on the first drop, however most are fairly resilient... indeed, just as much as MD if not more these days. The difference is that when they die, the HDD DAP takes the media with it... but it is all on the computer of course and it can take less time to re-fill the unit to capacity than it takes for some MD players to record one disc.