Two Steps Back, One Step Forwards

[bangraman]

They still haven't bothered to pick up my iPod. (bangraman official "will-he-keep-the-iPod-ometer" is currently at "extremely pissed off" or 3/10) Anyway, I picked up an MZ-E900 MD player in preparation for this iPod deprivation. I compared 320K MP3's to the E900 SP playback and there is practically no difference. (so Sony MD < Sony NZ90). However, I picked up a Sharp MD-MT170 today, totally new from a shop for one-third of the typical selling price of the MZ-E10. I can only find one word to say about this recorder.


Awesome.


It's one of the few (and we are probably talking in the low single digits) portable players of any type out there which can probably power a DT770 unamped. The sound quality (with SP recordings) is also great.


It has no remote, ships with only the most basic of accessories and is huge compared to any current MD player but I never regarded MD as a particularly portable medium anyway (I typically took around 6-10 MD's around with me, which with even the MD case sized E10 took up as much space as two cans of coke). If the MT170's amp was wedded to a flash or HDD MP3 player, it would be heaven. Unfortunately it is a minidisc, with all the problems associated with that medium, but I'm happy for now. The MT170 is available from ASK in London for £69.99 including VAT. It's not fashionable but as a true head-fi member it's highly recommended, especially if you are into MD.

 

[PodMan]

the mt170 has one of the highest amp ratings for a minidisc unit, something like 10mw@32ohms. how does the sound compare to previous minidisc portables you've tried?

so do you think you will be returning to Minidisc? I actually moved from ipod to minidisc earlier this year. I might return to an ipod when they boost the battery life a little more and make it more scratch resistant. For now I am happy with minidisc, but I have spent more money on minidisc and related items than on an ipod alone. And it took me a lot of tries to find the minidisc portables that are suitable for me.

 

[bangraman]

The sound is very good, with one exception: I'm trying to work out if the slight iRiver-like hissing is coming from the amp or the minidiscs I've used so far.
However, having heard one last week the output of a non Europe limited iPod still I think edges ahead of the MT170 for volume. Once my iPod troubles are sorted out, I can fairly compare the two.


I won't be returning permanently to Minidisc. I think it's had it's day and MP3/AAC players are a far better solution. I've had a few MD portables too (including the MZ-E10) but I just find it too bulky. With the iPod/Zen/whatever, you just have the unit. With MD, you have the discs (and getting the music onto those discs, not to mention finding the music you want when you're going out) to worry about.

 

[Dweebgal]

with regards to the ipod...

have you phoned apple about it?

they "forgot" to request the pick up from DHL both times i returned mine, requiring me to phone up and "remind" them

 

[Mystyler]

Stop trying to waste my money, bangraman.

The MT1x0 models are all to often neglected. Nice to see another person enjoying them, even if MD doesn't exactly float their boat.

 

[leon]

Ga ga, reminds me how far I'm moving away from MD... the main reason I haven't really posted in so long.

I'm slowly but surely using the iPod more and more. No real complaints except that the surfaces scratch way too easily for anything portable, and that the price of Belkin's emergency charger will feed me for 10 days.

Music on the Clie: It seems that bangraman's NZ90 sounds much, much better than my NX80V, which to my ears is too boombastic. The quality is good, but it seems to come with low and high frequencies already boosted, mids recessed by comparison, and since Sony doesn't use the official Palm OS API for the audio player, nobody can write a third-party MP3 player for the Clies. And no ATRAC3 because, on top of all the perils, Sony wants us to pay for a plugin to move SonicStage files to the Clie

 

[bangraman]

Quote:

Originally posted by Mystyler Stop trying to waste my money, bangraman. The MT1x0 models are all to often neglected. Nice to see another person enjoying them, even if MD doesn't exactly float their boat.

Oh for the price, there's nothing around to beat it. £70 for a quality player and recorder with a decent non Europe limited amp? Bargain.


Regarding the NZ90, it may sound good (and it does) but it doesn't like LAME and VBR frequently sends it into muteness.
I prepared a test MP3/CD/MD to compare the output from the hardware (as opposed to an absolute quality comparison, I wanted to see how different hardware behaved given exactly the same quality base music. So the CD/MD was recorded digitally from MP3's) and the NZ played barely over half the test tracks. So it's not THAT good.


And leon...

Just what do you eat???

 

[leon]

Does it not like LAME in CBR either?

It just turned out that I haven't spent much time on audio or music lately

 

[PodMan]

hey leon,

a little off topic, but i just noticed you have the ex51 and ex71 in your profile. any noticeable difference between them? how do they sound out of your sharp recorders, mainly the dr7 and the mt770? the ex70 that i had had too much bass connected to these units and i couldn't lower the bass level. just wondering if the ex51/71 are the same.

i am kinda wishing sharp recorders have a setting to lower the bass level. they are fine with most phones except for some that have too much bass to begin with.

 

[bangraman]

Quote:

Originally posted by leon Does it not like LAME in CBR either?

Can't explain it but yes... A CBR file done in LAME which is one of the test tracks gets skipped by the NZ90. CBR file at the same bitrate by Musicmatch plays fine.