My Sony MXD-D3 CD Player & MiniDisc Recorder

[MinistryOfSoundOldsk]

Was a fan of MD (97 - 2000). Would have loved to see MD replace the CD and Cassette. But sadly the geeks n nerds took over with MP3 and FLAC.

[BadEditPro]

@MinistryOfSoundOldsk Same here... :) JC

[SlimeAmTheBest]

You've only got that album on MD?

[BadEditPro]

@SlimeAmTheBest I've got it on LP now... No, I never did get a CD of this. :) JC

[SlimeAmTheBest]

@BadEditPro you like it?

[BadEditPro]

@SlimeAmTheBest Yeah, that record is good ear candy. The band on it is the Hooters and it has a live feel to it. :) JC

[Loquetuesperavas]

Really big fan of MD, always been with the technology even though it sort of like got forgotten in time. Like u said, nowadays it's almost impossible to find pre-recorded MD's anywhere outthere, even blank MD's are hard to come by. There's only 1 store in the whole Bronx that sells them still. Great video btw, the day I come across one of these in your video I'll probably buy it since I kno they won't b asking for a whole lot. Good luck

[manicindhouse]

Jus got this player in an estate sale just for fun to play some of my old Cd's.

OMG this turned out to be the best buy the player looks rich it changes the way it plays music mp3 are crap I have not explored the mini disc part of it but i am susre there is more to it but jus lovin it for now!

[BadEditPro]

@manicindhouse SOn y made some really nice players... This one is definitely pro quality. :) JC

[manicindhouse]

Ye i paid $15 it was hardly used & i check on ebay the same goes for around $150 got a bw speakers connected to a krell amp and man what a difference with this player need to get some MD's never used them and i dont know how to record on MD will read the manual and explore.

[gdh75]

I like to record my DVD concerts onto minidisc so I can break up the tracks and then i can burn it onto CD for playing in the car .but if my minidisc stops working I would have to find a new way of doing this as Sony have stop making minidisc players.

Great Video Mate

[BadEditPro]

@gdh75 I just keep one around for playback now... If you really wanted a new one they still make them for professionals but they are very expensive. :) JC

[wendileona]

With other MiniDisc decks, you can actually edit down to the nano-second... I exaggerate, but you can do very, very precise edits. I would record radio shows and edit down perfectly the commercials out. Stuff like that but you can only do that in higher end MD decks from Japan and ES models.

[BadEditPro]

@wendileona Yep, it's amazing what you can do with MD's. :) JC

[wendileona]

@BadEditPro Hi there JC, just discovered you vids, cool stuff, I subscribed!

I use my MiniDisc recorders to record my drum practices where I play electronic drums as practice along with favorite songs, they I take and go and enjoy the music in a new way and at the same time study what I need to improve, great ideas, develop skills and so on.

And of course, just to listen to record LP's, rare tapes, etc. in another format which is another excuse to enjoy even more music!

;o)

[BadEditPro]

@wendileona Thanks! :) JC

[raymondleeleggs]

A minidisc is basicly a small HARD DRIVE!

[Mockingbird5150]

anyone interested in one? I have a fully functional unit and would like to sell it.

[cosmojay]

Thanks for the video. I have the same unit and I still use it. I use it to record my vinly records and make mixed MD. I have a few portables as well. They're fun and not many people here in the US are familiar with it.

[BadEditPro]

@cosmojay They didn't catch on here in the consumer market but radio stations loved them :) JC

[ron2017]

@cosmojay Hello i have also this machine...a question...is on this machine the possibility of autocue minidisc function...so if you play that it stops after a track and then if you push play it goes on with the next track...thks

[ron2017]

@cosmojay hello i have also the same...a question: is there a possibility of autopause after a track...so that it stops automaticly and if you push play it goes on with next track of minidisc

[ron2017]

@cosmojay hi does this one also have a autopause function after every track...and if yes how do you do it

[jrcb72008]

i have one of these. how much are they worth?

[BadEditPro]

@jrcb72008 I have no clue... :) JC

[4everboricua100]

Minidisc are like dinosaurs

[Airboy15]

They have pre-recorded albums on MiniDisc?! Are they really rare in the markets?

[wendileona]

@Airboy15 Pre-recorded MD's can be found on eBay. But I don't know why or WHO has decided in pricing them so high. ATRAC is compressed music, I don't think a Michael Bolton MiniDisc should be $30... cmon. But a Pink Floyd title, any and all plus Michael Jackson MD's, do command higher because of the artist name and collectibility. I can understand even a Rolling Stone MD costing $30 or the rare Doors MD but normally, used MDs should be around 10 - 15, but the market determines the value...

[DvdXploitr]

I love these things! I been using a Portable Minidisc NetMD that connects to the USB port of the computer and copies music (up to 5 hours of music per 80 minute disk!) sure it compresses the audio, but its good for travel, but if i used the 80 minute disk in "standard" play mode, it would sound just like a CD (like yours)…but 54 hours on a single AA disk and 5 hours of music per disk….i RARELY would switch disk when traveling :)

[BadEditPro]

@DvdXploitr I never had a machine with the LP mode but I was told that it didn't sound too bad.  It's all about what you're willing to tolerate as far as quality goes. :) JC

[DvdXploitr]

@BadEditPro I had cheap (Dollar General) headphones at the time, so the quality didn't sound any better on non-LP mode than on LP mode, now with my more expensive headphones, I could probably tell a difference…I have started getting music in FLAC format here recently because it makes a MAJOR difference….but, I have always wanted one of those home stereo MiniDisc players but they were just too expensive and not enough "support" artist-wise

[vafbsgb]

do u have to have the volume on to record like if it was low volume does it record it low?

[BadEditPro]

@vafbsgb The volume has nothing to do with record level. They are two separate controls. :) JC

[chadergeist]

That md is defective. This album has 10 tracks not 9. I got the cd back then and the inserts and on the disc shows 10 tracks but mine when i put the cd in the player reads 9 tracks. I had to send it back for another one and when the replacement came in it finally read 10 tracks. There was a defect in the other cd where He's So Unusual was accidently connected with Yeah Yeah.

[BadEditPro]

@chadergeist Yep... The MD is from that CD master but the audio great :) JC

[chadergeist]

@chadergeist I love minidiscs and still use them full time today! I hate ipods. I need to get 40 blank discs now. Pro-Tape has them cheap. Will have to save up $.

[BadEditPro]

@xxXCalculatorXxx "High" allows you to dump audio from CD at 4x. It's good if you want to rip a whole CD onto MD however it can produce more errors than dubbing at "normal" speed. I only ever used it with pristine CD's. Other than the high speed dub from CD, everything else is at 1 x. :) JC

[Paul68595]

Dude, I bought this same exact Sony/MD Combo like you said about 10 yrs ago. I bought mine back in 01 or 02, and I gave it up cause after awhile, the sound on the mini-disc would start to have occasional sound drop-outs. I thought these were the solution to the Compact Disc. I kept a pre-recorded mini-disc as a souvenir. Also on the side of blank mini-disc I believe on the bottom side of the mini-disc is a little white slider that u can slide back and forth to protect it from being written over.

[BadEditPro]

@Paul68595 Your machine probably needed a good head cleaning. They get dirty after a while. Unlike CD, the magnetic head actually touches the disc when it is recording. :) JC

[Paul68595]

@BadEditPro That's what I thought but I guess I didn't want to take the time to clean it, in which case I bought one of those mini-disc head cleaners, but I know those aren't really the solution to cleaning the heads. I sold if for $200 to a friend. They did give off good sound like a cd. Especially when using the Fiber Optic Cable hookup on the back of the unit. Mine when I bought it was like around $400 dollars at the time. Nice video though.

[civilbeing]

I HAVE THIS BAD - ASS PLAYER BUT MY CD DRIVE STOPPED WORKING :-(

[BadEditPro]

@civilbeing So did mine... I use it for playback of MDs only at the point in time. :)( JC

[civilbeing]

@BadEditPro Shame theres was never a Hi-MD 1-Bit version, Minidiscs rule !

[sheepgoatdogcat]

I wish they had made a HI MD deck like that. None of them play HIMD disks.

[yawroc]

You say this is a CD Player MIni Disc combination. Where as the CD sid eof this machine also has record beneath it in RED.. Now something you demonstrated was that this machine will record perfectly from CD to MD but what about the otherway? Will this machine record from MD to CD. Thankyou

[BadEditPro]

@yawroc This machine does not record CD's... The other record button puts it in a dedicated dubbing mode where you can copy CD to MD at high speed. :) JC

[yawroc]

@BadEditPro

Oh that is a shame i thought i had it cracked to transfer staright from mini disc to CD. I saw one of these machines on Ebay but nope don't think i will bother now. Thanks for the reply

[Swordsage]

This was fun to watch. I'm a minidisc fan myself, and I love researching all the older machines and seeing how well they work. Right now I own three portables (NH1, NH3D, Rh1), and an old deck (MDS-JE520), and all three have been put to work with no complaints from me whatsoever. I do hope to one day get a better deck though.

Anyways, thanks for sharing. :)

[BadEditPro]

@Swordsage You're welcome! MD was quite the thing for a while before CD writers became more affordable. I am down to one machine now because I only use it for playback. :) JC

[lildnycecity]

Hey i have the exact same Minidisc recorder, i put my beats from my ps2 on their, and i want to transfer them to my computer, do you know what cord i need?

[BadEditPro]

@lildnycecity You'll need stereo RCA jack to a single stereo 1/8 inch phone jack to send the audio into line in. Some Sony PC's have TOSLink fiber optic but they are rare.:) JC

[aceyacem]

Question...I've always wondered this: I still deejay with duel m.d players & love them. Is there a way to open them up & tweek the playback speed up just a tiny bit, like upping the pitch? I've seen a Denon duel m.d player for d.j use that has pitch control so I know it can be done. Thanks!!!

[BadEditPro]

@aceyacem As far as I know, you have to have a machine with that feature on it. Otherwise, the speed is fixed at the standard 75 frames per second. :) JC

[spacehelmetforacow]

@BadEditPro you could also look around for a Hi-MD player that lets you do that.

[killcraz]

for me about the only place you can buy blank discs are at best buy!! they are getting a little harder to find not to many stores stock them!! wal-mart did at one time!!

[BadEditPro]

You can order MD's in bulk from professional audio supply houses. I don't use MD much anymore other than to retrieve something I recorded when I was using them all the time. :) JC

[killcraz]

hi i have a mds-je320 model i bought from a freind 10 years ago!! he was a musician like myself & wanted to upgrade to a newer system like yours!!i also got the walkman with it .i collect vinyl records as well i just transfer them to disc!! i play keyboards myself so what ever i'm working on i just record to disc!! this machine is a life saver & amazing!!!

[esbaby213]

i got the same one for sell 280obo normal price is about 400 no remote you can use plan b your hands lolz or buy a remote at your local store's i located in LONG beach ,ca

[chadergeist]

If you pause the video at 2:50 and look closely you can see on back of the disc it shows 10 tracks. I knew it another mishap when the disc was made.

[chadergeist]

Money Changes Everything, Girls Just Want To Have Fun, When You Were Mine, Time After Time, She Bop, All Through The Night, Witness, I'll Kiss You, He's So Unusual, Yeah Yeah

Missing Right Track, Wrong Train, especially on the remastered version as a bonus track like Lay His Head is missing on the album and remastered cd of George Harrison's Cloud Nine.

[BadEditPro]

Must be a later version with a bonus track on it. The LP and original CD had just 9 tracks on it... :) JC

[chadergeist]

I think what may have happened is that He's So Unusual was connected with Yeah Yeah by mistake. I bought this cd from Columbia House and it was 9 tracks and the booklet and cd says 10 and had to send it back for another copy and the other copy has 10 tracks on the cd itself.

[BadEditPro]

I go to thinking about and I believe your right. Those last two songs were spliced together for a dramatic effect and I guess they were just lumped together in one track. :) JC

[chadergeist]

Cool. I'm glad i exchanged my cd at the time cause when it said on the cd player 9tracks i was like "WHAT?" When i got the replacement like i said and it read 10 tracks i was "Not that is better!" LOL

I love minidiscs with passion! I never been in love or have a passion love for a format before till i found MDs and have been a lover of them since the later half of the 90's. Want to get cheap blank MDs go to Pro Tape. They are $1.25 plus + shipping. For a 10 pack S&H can cost about $8 or more.

[chadergeist]

9 Tracks? That is wrong! There is 10 tracks on my cd.

[jupiterscastle]

Vinyl for me, I'm buying new releases on vinyl and CDs , and only rarely download music

[jupiterscastle]

the umd from sony is todays Minidiscs but made for games and movies that only plays on a psp 3000 or playstation portable, so you can sorta say the MD is still around and now called a UMD

[BadEditPro]

Thank for all the nice comments! MD is still popular in radio stations. It's not as readily available to the consumer as it once was but you can order the machines and discs on the web... :) JC

[jdcontrol]

a great video about a great format. good job! just one quick note, when you say that the sound of the MD is ''pretty much exactly'' like CD thats not true. at least on those pre recorded MDs relesed in the 90s. you see, those MDs were recorded in SP mode, wich was 292 kbps, while CDs were and are still at 1,411 kbps. I love my MDs, and I can barely notice the difference between SP mode and PCM. the format is that great! even though mathematically inferior, the ear just can't tell the difference!

[BadEditPro]

Thanks! I have found that the ATRAC 4.5 compression used in the MXD-D3 is mostly inviable on most types of audio...  It all depends on what your recording and at what level it is being recorded. Some things show the artifacts more readily than others... :) JC

[DubUrbano]

another copyright big weapon.................

[bluecrab2u]

Nice vid. I have 7 MD decks (4 of which will do CD>MD). All have LP ability. It's a great format and I wish it hadn't hit a dead end.

[chadergeist]

I love the MD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sony and other brands are idiots for not making the devices anymore and have the blanks hard to fine!

[BadEditPro]

Thanks! A quick search came up with one machine currently available. It's a Tascam professional machine that's going for just under $500...Too bad. This is a great format for recording and editing audio. :) JC

[MOJOMAN54]

Hi Joe a great vid. I have been a fan of Minidiscs for years plus we use them in the studio. Sony should have made the licence to make them free  to all.They were always expensive to buy here in the UK.What killed MD was MP3! I have several MD recorders. Did the MDLP 2 and LP4 catch on over there? Incidentally there was a MD deck that had a 3 disc CD platter as part of it.

Jim

[BadEditPro]

Thanks! The long play MD's were just coming in as I was moving away from the format. I've never heard what they sounded like. MD was not cheap in the US, either... I used to have a nice Sony CD recorder with a 5 CD changer in it... That and the CD burner in the computer have pretty much taken over from everything else. I get Maxell archive quality CD's. We'll see how long they last.! :) JC

[oviwolf]

Cool cd player/MD recorder,and nice presentation! It is interesting why those minidiscs never caught on..... I have heared that they have bettter sound quality than CD's,but if you say they are as good as CD's,i believe you..:-)

As for the long term storage it's hard to make a decision,like All AmericanRadio said. I personally prefer reels of tape.:) Nice video,5/5 for sure!

[BadEditPro]

Thanks!... I have stuff all over the place but I'm slowly moving it to hard drive storage with a mirrored backup. :)  JC

[clydesight]

Very nice presentation. Thanks for showing how this system works. I wonder why MD didn't do better in the market, it seems a very ideal alternative to CD and CD-R. Maybe SONY didn't have the marketing clout or made the licensing of the technology too complicated?

[BadEditPro]

Thanks! I'm not sure why it didn't catch on in America but it took off overseas. There was no real push to get pre-recorded MD material out to the consumer in America. The record companies were pushing CD's for $20 bucks a pop when MD hit the market. Also, the machines can be a bit daunting for the average person to learn how to use. All the editing is done through menus and there are lots of different options to wade through. It takes a bit of practice. :) JC

[vwestlife]

I have a small portable MiniDisc recorder; it works fine but eats batteries for lunch (it runs on 2 AA batteries or an expensive proprietary Sony power supply). I can hear the ATRAC artifacts on it, but Sony had different versions of ATRAC that they used on different machines, and the higher versions were better. I believe the erasing and overwriting is not limitless; the manual on mine says in fine print that you're limited to about 255 overwrites before the Minidisc becomes read-only.

[BadEditPro]

Huh.... Does that apply to overwriting existing tracks or erasing the TOC completely? . We used to use the discs over and over in radio stations and we never had a problem. I gotta check that out. I can hear ATRAC version 3.x and lower but this machine is version 4.5 and I can't here it at all on the first generation. It performs on the same level as mp2 full stereo at 256 kbps and that is quite transparent, as well. mp2/256 is the standard HD storage format for radio these days. :) JC

[vwestlife]

I believe it is a TOC limitation. Once you reach 255 tracks or edits/overwrites of tracks, it will say "Disc Full" even if plenty of recording time is left, and to do any further recording you have to erase the whole disc. ATRAC is transparent on clean digital sources but not so much on noisy analog sources (tape hiss can kill even the best lossy digital compression).

[BadEditPro]

Makes sense... The limit for tracks is 255 so you'd have to blast the TOC out and start fresh. We always did a full erase before using the disc again so that's why I never ran into the problem. :) JC

[1982OWEN]

Great video, reminds me of a video I saw of an SCT-3100 that was well done!

[BadEditPro]

Thanks! I wonder whatever happened to the SCT-3100? LOL :)  JC

[AllAmericanFiveRadio]

Very nice system and nice demo too. It is real difficult trying to decide how to archive, I guess it will always be a moving target.

[BadEditPro]

Thanks! MD's are very tough but the weakest link in the system are the machines. The lasers burn up quick if you do a lot of recording and the Sony machines have those wonky switches on them. Tascam makes a true professional machine that is a bit more rugged than the Sony models. I don't know the life expectancy for MD's but I would imagine that it would outlast a standard CD-R simply because of the recording method. No one really knows. All the existing media is only 15 years old. :) JC