HOME PLAYERS & RECORDERS MD BLANKS ACCESSORIES STORAGE SOUNDCARD Company Information

WHY MINIDISC?


Minidisc has many advantages over the conventional tapes and CD-R and CD-RW. The most substantial advantage is its ability to record and re-record digitally from original source.

Each minidisc can be played over a million times and re-recorded up to 10,000 times without significant loss in quality. This makes it perfect to store data/music for life. Each Disc capacity has 74-80mins of audio music which can record up to average 18 songs compared with average 14 songs on a 64MB MP3 Player. Sound quality of the minidisc is expectionally good compared to MP3 players. MP3 is only near-CD quality but recently Lab Tests conducted on Minidisc Recording using ATRAC 4.5 exceeds CD-Quality. Each disc is cheaper and more durable than CD-RW disc. With so many advantages, it is not difficult to explain the popularity of minidisc. Have you got one if not it is time to get one. If you got one, you would definitely agree with what I just said.

Meaning of ATRAC


You may ask: how do you squeeze the whole CD into a disc, which is only 1/3 of its size. This is the magic of ATRAC technology used in minidisc recorders. ATRAC basically compress the data using a unique code to another audio format and SONY named this new technology in 1993 "MINIDISC".ATRAC stands for(Adaptive Transform Acoustic Coding).

You may also suspect the audio quality of the sound after it has been compressed. Don't worry. Various test are conducted extensively, through a combination of various techniques including psychoacoustics, sub band coding and transform coding, ATRAC succeeds in coding digital audio with virtually no perceptual degradation in sound quality. Listening tests indicate that the difference between ATRAC sound and the original source are not perceptually annoying nor does it reduce the sound quality.

Furthermore, the system is sufficiently compact to be installed in portable consumer products. Using ATRAC, the MiniDisc provides a practical solution for portable digital audio.

The newest Format: MDLP


There are not many information on MDLP yet as SONY have not officially releases any information on the new format. It is used in the new MZ-R900 and Sharp MT-77. These are a few points to take note about the new Format:

1. Minidisc Long Play. It is a new encoding method for audio on Minidisc that offers two modes: one gives 160 minutes stereo ("LP2"), the second gives 320 minutes stereo ("LP4"). LP2 is stereo encoded (each channel is discrete and independent); LP4 is joint-stereo (both channel is joined).

2. LP recorded minidisc will not be able to be played on normal players. They will be just blank.

3. Audio quality of LP2 is almost similar to ATRAC. LP4 has noticeable defects in recording but can be employed for portable applications.

4. If you wish to compare Minidisc MDLP technology ATRAC 3.0 to Mp3 format:

Listening MD portables on Car


If your car audio system only has tape and you want to listen minidisc over the car boom boxes. There are audiotape converters, which convert signals from your portable minidisc to tape format.

Charging your minidisc on your car is possible with car adaptors. If you have a car adaptor, simply plug into your cigarette lighter and select the required voltage on you can charge your minidisc. We carry the NEWSTAR UNIVERAL CAR KIT. Which is tested to work with most minidisc portables from Sony and sharp.

Converting MP3 to Minidisc


There are many ways to convert mp3 to minidisc and is sub-divided into Digital or Analogue ways.

ANALOGUE Recording

You will need the following stuffs before you can record:

Basically you connect the Cable to the speaker output of the soundcard and connect other end to the "Digital Input" of your minidisc recorder.Press the REC button. Play music with your MP3 decoding software. Thats it!

Invest in a good quality soundcard like the SBLIVE! Value is worth your money in the long run and can be upgraded to Digital Recording Using the Hoontech Digital Bracket.

DIGITAL Recording

You will need the following stuffs before you can start digital recording. Connect the Toslink Cable to the digital Optical output of the soundcard. The other to minidisc recorder and, Remember, press REC before playing the music.

If you have SB LIVE! VALUE or SBLIVE! soundcard, consider investing in one Hoontech DB bracket II/III.
They are easy to install and maintainece free.
DB II both comes with a toslink digital output.
DB III comes with toslink input and output. Good for "SCMS stripping". Just record into computer and record out again. Signal loss is very little.

Or you have lots of money to spend. Just buy a Live! Drive and Sound Blaster Live Platium That would provide an optical output too!

Check out these great Links!


All the way Back please...