[MacNN Staff]

I wanted to let you know of another great plus of the Mac OS.

I bought a Sony MiniDisc (model MZ-R70 Blue). It came with a PC Link with a USB connection for hook up with a computer. The salesperson and manual stressed that it would only work with computers that have Windows

98/2000. It did not come without any drivers but the Windows software was supposed to recognize it once you went through a setup procedure. You could then record from the computer to the Minidisc using SoundJam or similar audio software.

I decided to try it anyway on my PowerBook G3/500. To my wonderful delight, it worked! I plugged it into the USB port and the computer immediately recognized it as sound output. I could not hear any sound out of the PowerBook's speakers but the manual said that was the way it worked. I next launched SoundJam MP Plus, made a playlist, hit record on the MiniDisc, started playing the playlist and voila! It recorded without a hitch onto the MiniDisc. I plugged in earphones to the MiniDisc to monitor the music. When I was done, I unplugged the PC Link and sound returned to the PowerBook's speakers.

There were no freezes or other problems. I did not need to restart when I wanted to use it again. There were also no setup procedures like the manual said was necessary with Windows. I just plugged it in.

I thought you and your readers would find this as interesting and great as I did.

Denise McNickle

[dfbills]

So, this player doesn't actually store and playback MP3's, but actually records the analog sound output as it is played back?

Is there a MiniDisc player that can store MP3's in their native format for playback?

-d

[Fdanna]

Did you still have to manually enter names of songs and mark the track numbers? Does this connect to the optical port of the Mp3 player?

i have sound out running through my minidisc stereo, and have been doing this for several months, Macs and MD's belong together

[tasslehawf]

The USB connection you used is still only analog audio. Why not just use sound-out on the mac (well you did get that cool adapter).

And no there is no device to store mp3's on MD. MD's use their own compression. They don't compress as much as Mp3.

Yes, you still have to enter the titles manually.

I would like to see a USB to TOS/Link adapter (Please!!) to do digital to digital. And some nice Mac titling software would be nice too.

dfbills:

MiniDisc recorders do not save files as native MP3 but in ATRAC format. Since you convert the sound to this format during the recording process, your playback to and record from is a 1:1 ratio of time -- there is no high speed dubbing (at least in portable recorders) or file copying (as with portable MP3 players).

Other links:
http://MacOSPage.MadBee.com/archives...D/mp3toMD.html
http://home.sprintmail.com/~dalegreer/MacMD.html

[John]

I'm curious if the older iMacs (Rev/A and Rev/B) support sound out through the USB port? Also, I thought the USB sound was digital, not analog, at least that's what Harmon Kardon says.

Anyone know any way of getting audio digitally *from* a MiniDisc to a Mac?

My MD player doesn't have a TOSLINK out so I assume I'd have to buy a different player, but is there any cheap player with USB audio out or something?

Cheers,
Richard

i bought an mz-r70 (silver) recently (one or two months ago). I don't recall getting such a cable.


big frownie.

It should also be noted for all of us Minidisc users out there that the new Creative Labs SoundBlaster Live (PCI Card) that was previewed at MacWorld last week has a $30 or so expansion card that supports a breakout panel with SPID/F Optical I/O (among others) that will work great with TOSLink!!! I can't wait, then at least it will be a full on digital out to my MDs!

-Chris

Most MiniDisk decks provide optical spid/f (digital) in and out. Most portables provide optical in only (I have yet to find a portable that does optical out). There are mserveral vendors who make sound cards for Mac that have optical connections on them. Check out: Digidesign, MOTU, Steinberg, Yamaha...there are others as well. This would be your best bet for digital transfer between MD and Mac.

The USB Cable you mention from Sony intrigues me - I would have assumed it was digital, though others have suggested otherwise.

Other options for pure digital transfers include the add on audio card (mentioned in the other posts - explained here: http://home.sprintmail.com/~dalegreer/MacMD.html) or Roland's new UA-30 Audio Canvas desktop recording studio (http://www.edirol.com/music_equipment/usb_audio_products/ua30.html).

Many options exist, they're just hard to find sometimes.

t

tasslehawf says that the USB sound out is still only analogue. But isn't USB a digital port?

Any sound data that goes through the USB port (and into the minidisc player) must be a digital stream. That digital stream, once it hits the minidisc player, gets converted to ATRAC, so the sound should stay digital all the way through.

So the music isn't digital in the sense that a the MP3s are being directly converted to ATRAC (2 steps), but more in the sense that MP3s are being converted to a digital stream, then into ATRAC (3 steps.) Either way, the audio should stay digital all the way through.

The only way I could see analogue being part of the process is if the digital audio data through the USB port gets converted to analogue sound once it hits the minidisc player, and *then* get's converted to ATRAC.

Can anyone confirm or refute any of this for me?

I would also like to know if anyone has figured out a way to "mount" the MD on the Mac desktop, then drag the files to the Mac, like from a cd. Anyone?

Originally posted by brother:
tasslehawf says that the USB sound out is still only analogue. But isn't USB a digital port?

Any sound data that goes through the USB port (and into the minidisc player) must be a digital stream. That digital stream, once it hits the minidisc player, gets converted to ATRAC, so the sound should stay digital all the way through.

So the music isn't digital in the sense that a the MP3s are being directly converted to ATRAC (2 steps), but more in the sense that MP3s are being converted to a digital stream, then into ATRAC (3 steps.) Either way, the audio should stay digital all the way through.

The only way I could see analogue being part of the process is if the digital audio data through the USB port gets converted to analogue sound once it hits the minidisc player, and *then* get's converted to ATRAC.

Can anyone confirm or refute any of this for me?

The audio gets sent as a standard audio signal that has been digitized -- much like the output of a CD player. It is not sent as mp3 format. The minidisk converts the signal into an analog signal (just like a CD player) then puts that analog signal into the input of it's ATRAC converter. So it goes digital -> analog -> digital.

This is easier to do then it sounds. Every minidisk has to have an ATRAC so that part is already part of the recorder. All they realy have to do is convert the USB audio stream into an audio signal. Because the USB stream isn't compressed this is very easy. This audio signal then goes into the ATRAC. Easy to implement from a designers point of view.

In order to convert MP3s directly into the minidisk format one wound need a special driver for the minidisk recorder so that it received the real mp3s -- not the converted mp3s. One would then have to have a mp3 -> ATRAC encoder built into the minidisk recorder. Not likely to happen anytime soon. Plus the conversion would take forever!!

Originally posted by William Douglas:

The audio gets sent as a standard audio signal that has been digitized -- much like the output of a CD player. It is not sent as mp3 format. The minidisk converts the signal into an analog signal (just like a CD player) then puts that analog signal into the input of it's ATRAC converter. So it goes digital -> analog -> digital.

A quick correction. it goes:

- digital - (as a mp3 file)
- analog - (Soundjam does this conversion)
- digital - (computer converts the analog signal for output on USB)
- digital - (your minidisk gets the data)
- analog - (minidisk converts the USB stream back into analog)
- digital - (the signal goes into the ATRAC)


So there you go, it goes digital - analog - digital - analog - digital. Hardly an efficient procedure.

[tooki]

Originally posted by William Douglas:

The audio gets sent as a standard audio signal that has been digitized -- much like the output of a CD player. It is not sent as mp3 format. The minidisk converts the signal into an analog signal (just like a CD player) then puts that analog signal into the input of it's ATRAC converter. So it goes digital -> analog -> digital.

Uhhh...no. It stays digital all the way, although the digital format changes! To utilize your diagram:
MP3 compressed digital -> uncompressed digital -> ATRAC compressed digital. It is not aanalog until it hits a DAC (digital -> analog converter), which it does not do until playback. One KEY feature of ATRAC encoders is that they can use direct digital inputs, which makes TOTAL sense, since that is what an MD deck's A/D converters output!

tooki

Since Sony owns a record label, it would seem doubtful that they'd allow direct copying/playing/etc of mp3 to minidisc. But wouldn't this be a stellar idea? Think about the cost/performance factors --- a blank MD holds about 140 megs of data (compare to most portable 64 meg mp3 players) and cost approx. two dollars. Adding a USB port (looks like they already have) would be a minor thing. They used to sell an external MD Data drive, so they know how to do this. Not to mention they recently released a MD Camcorder with a 650-meg MD (?). Hmmm... the possibilities get more delicious all the time.

PS - regarding MD players that have optical in AND out --- there is one. The very first Sony MD player, the MZ-1, has both in and out optical ports. It's a big old clunker that gets rather warm and only lasts about 60 minutes battery time, but it's got what you are looking for. I still have one, even though I've got a much newer model.

We are missing something here.

We need a AIFF or MP3 to ATRAC encoder/transcoder. This probably would require a license from SONY for the CODEC, and given their history, there is no way. The CODEC could be reverse engineered, and added to a not-official-patch for soundjam or some other audio jack of all trades.

IMHO, ATRAC sounds much better than the best high bit rate MP3 solution. SONY keeps improving it so that your old disks actually sound BETTER when played back in a new machine, and a disk recorded on a new machine sounds pretty good on an old one. Amazing!

rufus13 in pdx

Umm ... so far I haven't seen an accurate depiction yet of the exact nature of the transfer from the MP3 to the minidisc player.

From Sony's web site:

"MZ-R70PC, msrp $299.95, Includes PClink (USB cable, PCLink converter and mini-mini stereo cable) for recording your favorite music files
from the internet"

The mini-mini stereo cable goes from the "PCLink converter" into the MD recorder. It only transfers analog stereo audio -- nothing more. The PCLink converter converts from USB digital audio (16-bit, 44.1khz, stereo) to analog stereo audio. Therefore, the transfer goes like this:

MP3-compressed digital -> 16-bit, 44.1khz, stereo uncompressed digital -> analog stereo -> ATRAC digital audio

If memory serves, there IS out there a simple USB->S/PDIF converter, but this MZ-70 kit does not use it. There are also other converters, such as a USB audio breakout box made by Roland (cost is about $299), or the aforementioned MAudio 24/96 PCI sound card (about $220).

--Kyle Griffin

But what I want to know is can you copy digital music form the Minidisc player to the Mac? (And then write it on CD, for example.)

Mac USB to MiniDisc -> Thunderwire

There is a fair amount of confusion here, partially because people insist on muddling together compression, formats and analog vs. digital all together. To make it simple.

All compression/decompression is internal to the MD device. The recorder only inputs or outputs uncompressed audio, in either analog or digital form.

Therefore audio can only move in or out of the device in real time.

The three input methods for getting audio onto a minidiscs are: analog unbalanced audio (ie. a microphone), analog line-level signal, or optical digital audio signal.

Without knowing what the Sony cable does, it is still quite clear that the MD end outputs either analog or digital uncompressed audio.

Ideally, it would be a digital signal, and the cable have an optical ouput, if it doesn't there must be a digital to analog conversion taking place in the cable itself.

[mitchell_pgh]

These are the real questions that we should be asking...

- What capacity does a standard MD have uncompressed per "cartridge" (or whatever you want to call them...) [I remember hearing it was something like 100 MB - though that seems rather high]

- What kind of I/O throughput do you get? Kb/s...

+ A few things haunt the MP3 format +

A) an universal/inexpensive small format transportation/storage media
B) a portable low power device to play MP3's on
C) a universal system to transfer the MP3's

the MD seems like a solid hardware solution, if they only had native USB support and MP3 decoding...

Didn't someone come out with a portable CD player that would read native MP3's

I'm not going to pay $100+ for a 62 MB Sony Stick!!! Give me a brake... We need something more like 5 bucks that will hold 100MB so my dog chews it up, I'm not going to cry...

where can I buy a link cable like the one you are speaking about?

Originally posted by tasslehawf:
The USB connection you used is still only analog audio. Why not just use sound-out on the mac (well you did get that cool adapter).

And no there is no device to store mp3's on MD. MD's use their own compression. They don't compress as much as Mp3.

Yes, you still have to enter the titles manually.

I would like to see a USB to TOS/Link adapter (Please!!) to do digital to digital. And some nice Mac titling software would be nice too.

Check out http://www.minidisco.com/minispecs/rolandua30.html USB to digital recording!!

Originally posted by RGS:
Mac USB to MiniDisc -> Thunderwire

is it thunderwire available

Get a Roland UA-30 from Minidisco.com. I have one and works great for USB>MD via optical. If I had a deck, I could record from the MD>Mac.

Thunderwire? I have been waiting and waiting for this one. Digial Audio (9.04) is now on the Mac, so what is taking these guys so long?

let's think logically for a second guys -

the main (basically only) benefit for transferring the signal through digital means vs. analong is simple - less static background noise and a better copy.

transferring via USB is completely digital. there is NO ANALONG involved at all - USB is a digital connection after all. the only thing changing at all is what format the music is in.

think of it like this -
the life of an mp3 file into a MD recorder through USB -

hard drive (digital) -> motherboard and chipsets (digital) -> cpu (digital) -> back to various motherboard/chipsets (digital) ->USB port (DIGITAL) -> wire (digital..noticing a trend?) ->minidisc player (where it is encoded).

using a optical input or a USB input to record onto your MD would yield zero difference if both the sources and the S/N ratio to both were the same.

end of story

What all you guys who want your mp3's onto a portable unit cheap need is a product that isn't made (yet):

Take a 2.5" drive, the same kind that Apple use in the Powerbooks, add firewire/USB connectivity, add some ram, add a mp3 decoder, a rechargable battery, a display, and some software.

Connect the unit to your computer, (maybe it could have a dock where it would charge its batteries at the same time), it mounts like any harddrive on your desktop, copy your mp3's into it, disconnect unit.

To save battery the unit preloads songs into the ram memory, using the powerdraining harddrive only once in a while, and displays the playlist onto the display.

For example, if you just play songs, without changing the expected order, the unit, if it had 64 mb of ram, would only need to spin the harddrive about once every hour, yet you would be able to store your whole cd-collection on it, easily. Afterall, a 30 Gb drive stores more than 400 cds.

Make it easily upgradeable, allowing you to switch ram and harddrive.

Make the case out of clear plastic, in a range of colours, slap an Apple on it and you got yourself an "iSound"... not gonna happen.

[chuckles]

Originally posted by mfisken:
Get a Roland UA-30 from Minidisco.com. I have one and works great for USB>MD via optical. If I had a deck, I could record from the MD>Mac.

I wrote an E-mail to thunder wire, no indication again of a release date. "Spring 2000" seems to have passed.

mfisken, I was wondering what you meant by "had a deck." I want to go from my MD to my Imac.

Just licking my chops waiting!

So what is the best way to record from MD to a Mac? Is there a way to conviently seperate teh tracks and make sure any dead space (like when the MDplayer for moving to the next song) isn't recorded?

TIA,
T

There is a high speed MD dubbing solution. Sony sell a home MD/CD combo deck which does 4x dubbing direct CD copies. It even reads CD-text and transfers the title. My friend has one and it rocks!

Oh, yeah I wish that Sony would port their PC MD manipulation software to the mac.

Sony's USB dongle is actually an outboard D/A converter. Sound out of the USB port is digital, gets converted by the dongle, and goes into the minidisc deck as analog.

Supposedly the Sony dongle produces a higher quality signal than the stereo out jack on most computers. Plus it doesn't have to deal with all of the emf noise.

[roders]

There is already an MP3 to Artac (the MD compression format) available, just follow this URL <http://www.letsbuyit.com/en_GB/deal.jhtml?catid=50&subcatid=6165&dealid=57592>
+ a standard (muszac) MD holds around 71 MB of data although you can get get specialist ones for different purposes that hold considerably more.
+ finally any USB audio signal is digital, but if the signal that comes from a USB port/cable goes into a normal line input or microphone input (both of which are analouge) on a MD then a conversion of the audio stream from digital to analouge will take place as the signal enters the MD but if the input on the MD is S/Pdif (stands for Sony/Philips DIGITAL interface) then the signal remains digital as & when it enters the MD.

I have also tested the Roland UA-30 with my iMac DV, a Sharp portable and a Sony deck, and it works just beautifully, both digital and analog. I got it as a demo from Roland, but ended up giving it back because it's just too freakin' expensive for what I need. I believe that some enterprising dudes have written a driver for the Opcode SONICPort device, which is a little cheaper and less flexible than the UA-30, so that can be another option. I'm still on the lookout for a simple USB -> TOSLink converter--that's really all I want for now. Any information would be appreciated!

[tasslehawf]

A lot of you seem to be missing the point here.

The sony USB converter converts the audio coming out of the Mac (digitally) to a standard analog stereo signal. The connection isn't digital. The adapter outputs analog.

Originally posted by group51:
Thunderwire? I have been waiting and waiting for this one. Digial Audio (9.04) is now on the Mac, so what is taking these guys so long?

"Spring 2000" is their listed timeframe. Maybe they'll ship it by the end of Summer?

[mr100percent]

You really don't need the adaptor. The Mac sound is good enough because it's built on the motherboard, while this adaptor is built to bypass the flaky sound cards in PCs

It has USB on one side, and an audio ut on the other side. And yes, it works on my rev/A iMac, which has OS 9. I'm not sure about pre-OS 9, tho.

There are some confusion here as well as some right information here. If you want to have more information on Minidisc, goto www.minidisc.org. Anyway, I want to make several things clear:

1. MD uses ATRAC compression, around 1:5 ratio, and it has better quality than MP3.

2. When you record a music, no matter if it is digital or analog, it will do the compression. When you play the music, it does the decompression.

3. MD has 74minutes, some has 80minutes recording time on it. The data cap. is around 130MB. [60, 74, and 80 minute discs exist, see other post. --ed]

4. SONY develop the MD as a recording device, not a data storage (although there are some MD storage device, but it is not the MD Walkmen or Deck menstion here) So, it record music in ATRAC compress format either from a digital or analog field.

5. The PC-Link USB device from SONY is analog, it convert the signal to analog and connect to the MD using standard stereo mini-plug.

6. Yes there are USB digital device, there is a device call MD-Port is a USB to Digital signal($99).

7. Toslink is a optical digital, which, some of the cable's one end is Toslink and the other is Optical miniplug, which is the optical mini-plug on most of the MD Walkmen.

8. SPDIF is coxial digital, and it need an adapter to convert the signal into optical digital, so you can not connect a sound card with a SPDIF output to a MD Walkmen. [a few home (43cm) MD decks have coaxial digital inputs. --ed]

9. Yes there are MD Decks from SONY that can link with the computer and you can do the recording and the title on your computer, check out the SONY site.

10. For those people who wonder why MP3 not killing minidisc, it is because minidisc is cheaper especially the disk itself (around $1 for 74 minutes of music) so I can have as many disks as I want with my MD. The quality is better, even with the 128Kbit MP3, MD quality is still better (according to many lab test data, check out www.minidisc.org and MD doesn't require a computer to do recording. MD is very popular in Asia and Europe, it actually almost replaced tape already overthere. That's why US more people buy Minidisc player than MP3 protable player.


[fixed URLs and some typos, while I was at it. --tooki]

[This message has been edited by tooki (edited 07-27-2000).]

Originally posted by Force9:
What all you guys who want your mp3's onto a portable unit cheap need is a product that isn't made (yet):

Take a 2.5" drive, the same kind that Apple use in the Powerbooks, add firewire/USB connectivity, add some ram, add a mp3 decoder, a rechargable battery, a display, and some software.

Archos was actually showing a product like this at MacWorld: The Archos Jukebox 6000. Basically looks like one of the 2.5" USB HD's with rubber bumpers at the corners and a set of controls pasted on the front. Supposed to have a 6 gig drive for $399 introductory price. The show model was in a display box, so I suspect it wasn't a working prototype, and their website doesn't have any info on it. (Of course, their website doesn't seem to have been updated in months...)

how exactly does this PC link work?
ie, how exactly does it physically connect between your PC and your MD?

[tooki]

Originally posted by William Douglas:
A quick correction. it goes:

- digital - (as a mp3 file)
- analog - (Soundjam does this conversion)
- digital - (computer converts the analog signal for output on USB)
- digital - (your minidisk gets the data)
- analog - (minidisk converts the USB stream back into analog)
- digital - (the signal goes into the ATRAC)


So there you go, it goes digital - analog - digital - analog - digital. Hardly an efficient procedure.

Wrong again!!

SoundJam does not convert to analog. It just decodes MP3 into UNCOMPRESSED DIGITAL audio, which it passes on to the Sound Manager. The Sound Manager sends the SAME UNCOMPRESSED DIGITAL audio across the USB stream, where the USB converter converts it to analog and outputs it to the MD deck's analog inputs (too bad Sony doesn't use the Optical Digital In!!!).

The exact path is:

-compressed digital (as MP3 file)\
-uncompressed digital (soundjam oes this conversion)
-Sound Manager sends this data across the USB bus
-USB pod converts digital to analog
-A/D converter in MD deck digitizes the audio
-ATRAC chip compresses the digital audio and writes it to disc.

tooki



[This message has been edited by tooki (edited 07-27-2000).]

[tooki]

Originally posted by mitchell_pgh:
These are the real questions that we should be asking...

- What capacity does a standard MD have uncompressed per "cartridge" (or whatever you want to call them...) [I remember hearing it was something like 100 MB - though that seems rather high]

The raw data capacity of a 74 minute (well, 74:59 to be precise) MiniDisc is 140MB. It's a shame DataMD is dead, because at $2-3 a disc, they'd be an extraordinarily cheap storage medium, if a bit slow.

60 and 80 minute discs are also available.

tooki

Xitel (www.xitel.com) are releasing a USB->TOLSINK connection next week. It should work with MAC operating system 9.04 just as the Sony device does. Priced at $99.

If I were to get any of the available (or coming soon) USB to optical devices, would I be able to record a CD digitaly from my computer without it being convereted anywhere along the way to analog? I ask this because I don't have a CD player with optical out.

The thing that you're looking for is availaible for several months already at www.xitel.com
=)

go to:
http://www.minidisco.com/miniordermp3.html

and check out the roland thing, it costs a bit at $US239 or so but works with mac os9 and windows, FULLY DIGITAL CONNECTION.

[Lord Kenja]

The optimal thing would be to get a hold of a Sony MDS-DL1 http://www.sony.co.jp/soj/CorporateI...36B/index.html (part of a Sony thing in Japan where you can download music over a satalite dish). It connects with a IEEE1394 (FireWire) and records in 4x speed.

Although one would have to write some - I persume - pretty trivial software to make it work.

The problem is that I have not been able to get a hold of one so far :/