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macman88 · Mar 27, 2005, 05:10 PM

does anyone know if/how you would use a sony minidisc with itunes or have any information regarding this? thanks in advance.

Tenacious Dyl · Mar 27, 2005, 11:00 PM

hrmm.. I am uncertain.

Perhaps if you used/had a highenough quality / feature filled minidisk player, you might be able to hook it up as a "drive" to your mac through firewire or usb. Similar to hooking up a pendrive / mp3 player / digital camera / media reader. I am uncertain if then, it would identify tracks using the CBBD (or whatever) database... but I see no reason it wouldn't let you import un-named tracks.

If that fails, you can always try plugging the minidisk player's output into your line-in, and recording the songs that way.... orrr you could even use something fancy like a Motu, and plug the minidisk into the Motu and the Motu through firewire into your mac.

Are you looking to put music ON the minidisk player from the mac, or get music from the minidisk player TO the mac... getting it on the mac seems much easier to me... again.. i dont know much, im just trying to help

macman88 · Mar 27, 2005, 11:11 PM

thanks for the reply. i am trying to put the music on the minidisc. the problem is that the sony software cd is only for the pc. i would like to not have to use the audio-out to line-in on the minidisc.

Goldfinger · Mar 28, 2005, 11:44 AM

Minidisc audio is recorded in ATRAC, iTunes does not support ATRAC. Only the sony software does. No way that you can let an MD player show up on your desktop as a hard drive, unless those new MDs support it (the high capacity disks).

Severed Hand of Skywalker · Mar 28, 2005, 12:00 PM

Originally posted by macman88:
thanks for the reply. i am trying to put the music on the minidisc. the problem is that the sony software cd is only for the pc. i would like to not have to use the audio-out to line-in on the minidisc.

Honestly the best thing to do is sell it and get an iPod that works on both platforms. That is what I did.

Michael1980 · Mar 28, 2005, 05:11 PM

There is no way to use Minidisc on mac (even with VPC). The only way is optical out (or analogue out) to record in real time.

brapper · Mar 28, 2005, 05:18 PM

Originally posted by Michael1980:
There is no way to use Minidisc on mac (even with VPC). The only way is optical out (or analogue out) to record in real time.

....which is a tedious procedure.

macman88 · Mar 28, 2005, 06:33 PM

i wouldn't even have to use this awful (non-ipod) product if it wasn't for my ipod being broken two past the warranty without applecare.

tooki · Mar 29, 2005, 03:01 AM

HiMD models do in fact work as USB Mass Storage devices, and the discs are in FAT32 format.

But without the ability to encode ATRAC3 (not ATRAC!) files, it's useless except for data storage.

It's too bad Sony tries so hard to keep their formats closed. ATRAC and ATRAC3 are great codecs, and MiniDisc is superb media. (Read: indestructible.)

tooki, ex-MD junkie

Michael1980 · Mar 29, 2005, 12:37 PM

There is no Atrac encoding on the computer period.
Only Atrac3 (bad codec) and Atrac3Plus (bad codec also, but better than Atrac3) are available.
Type-R SP still rules!

off/lang · Mar 29, 2005, 02:34 PM

I too used to use Mini Discs. I found recording via optical out in real time too much of a pain.

Still, I wish the format had caught on more back in the day.

wuzup101 · Mar 29, 2005, 08:18 PM

I also like the minidisc format. It really is too bad that sony only supports their format. I read a while ago that they were going to move away from that and start supporting mp3 as well as several other common formats; however, nothing seems to have come of this. I actually probably wouldn't have purchased an iPod if it wasn't for this. I had/have 2 relatively nice MD player/recorders; however the first was pre USB transfer (optical recording in real time only) and the second was a later version that allowed you to use the sony music software, which IMHO is possibly the worst piece of software written for any platform at any time in history. Neither of these players interfaced in an acceptable manner with my new powerbook, so I ditched them. I gave one to my brother who has also since purchased an iPod...

turtle777 · Apr 15, 2005, 10:48 AM

Originally Posted by tooki

tooki, ex-MD junkie

Haha, me too.
Never used my MD again after switching to the iPod.
I even started "digitizing" my MD collection, which is a sucky work load...

Unfortunately, Sony crippled MD far below its potential. Typically Sony.

-t

Goldfinger · Apr 15, 2005, 10:58 AM

Yeah, I was an MD junkie as well untill I got my iPod mini. I do miss the decent batteries. The iPod batteries are a joke.

analogika · Apr 15, 2005, 12:46 PM

Originally Posted by Goldfinger

Yeah, I was an MD junkie as well untill I got my iPod mini. I do miss the decent batteries. The iPod batteries are a joke.

I don't know what's wrong with 18 hours of real-time battery on the current iPod minis (according to at leasst two reviews I've read so far).

turtle777 · Apr 15, 2005, 01:05 PM

Originally Posted by analogika

I don't know what's wrong with 18 hours of real-time battery on the current iPod minis (according to at leasst two reviews I've read so far).

I don't know what's wrong with 4 hours of real-time battery on my 5 months old G3 iPod, but it surely feels wrong.

I'm waiting for it to drop close to 3 hours and return it to Apple for a new battery. As long as it is within 1 year of purchase, I heard they'd replace it for free.

-t

Socially Awkward Solo · Apr 15, 2005, 02:36 PM

Originally Posted by wuzup101

I read a while ago that they were going to move away from that and start supporting mp3 as well as several other common formats; however, nothing seems to have come of this.)

They already have players that support MP3's as does the PSP.

azt33 · Apr 15, 2005, 03:38 PM

The 2G Hi-MD recorders support native MP3 playback, so you can transfer MP3 songs to the units without any conversion. I have been an MD enthusiast for some 6 years now, although the iPods I've owned the past year have seen more use. I just wish there would be software availbale for Mac, it's not going to work without any software available.

Cadaver · Apr 15, 2005, 11:19 PM

Originally Posted by off/lang

I too used to use Mini Discs. I found recording via optical out in real time too much of a pain.

Still, I wish the format had caught on more back in the day.

I managed to skip the MD phase... but I am an ex-DAT junkie.
Now that was a cool format (for the day). But, boy, real-time CD to DAT dubbing was a

!

wuzup101 · Apr 16, 2005, 01:42 PM

Originally Posted by Socially Awkward Solo

They already have players that support MP3's as does the PSP.

Cool, didn't know this. If they would have done this from the start of the players that could record from the computer I think they would haev been more successful. Better yet, they might have tried to hire a software engineer that wasn't smoking something

In all honesty the MD format is very nice, but with no software on the mac I wouldn't use it anyway. They could make it really easy and just make it click and drag "flash drive" type of software like some of the other players on the market use...