G'day the Yamaha thing: i dearly love the home surround receiver RX-V393 and the 5 disc cd player CDC-565 i own, coupled to my JBL HLS-610 speakers, which, all up, cost me around about $1600 (australian dollars) 6 months ago.. (btw.. i love my speakers! go and listen to a pair! - they sound better than $4k speakers i had a listen to.. extremely high clarity, with powerful yet crisp and non-muddy bass, and well priced! ($700ish) :) i was torn between going for a sony setup or a yamaha setup.. the sony amp was rated at 100W whilst the yamaha at 50W, altho wattage ratings are typically iffy and not good for comparison between brands.. so i turned them both up nice and loud, and the yamaha far outstripped the sony.. (for the record, a NAD 20W amp apparently would flatten both of these units - they think EVERYONE is cheating with wattage ratings) from my experience tho, ie, my parent's 6 year old sony cd player, sony is a helluva brand.. and the only other yamaha item in the house is an old upright piano. which isnt the best indicator.. :) when going from cd -> tape, i still went and used the sony deck over my little kenwood mini system setup that i traded in.. the sony was, and still is, very good.. it has a heap of little features which are very useful on the odd occaision.. hence, me being reluctant to buy yamaha.. but volume is important, and the price was right.. and the sony amp had that 'new age' smooth lines and curves look to it which i didnt want.. i want my amp looking like an amp. a beefy big box with square corners and a fat volume knob. :P anyway, a little while ago, i regretted buying yamaha.. i dont remember why, but i just remember i did at that point. :P apart from that, my stereo rocks.. the cd player never skips. never. i even hit it. softly. :) ... which isnt good, but i'm trading it in for an optical out kinda soon :P and the result of that is, i love my yamahas and would recommend them to anyone who wants a powerful system with a couple of bells and whistles.. and the capacity to attatch about 9 speakers :P (4x 50W main channel, 2x 50W centre channel, 2x 25W rear effects and a subwoofer >:) back to minidiscs.. i can see the merit in buying a portable recorder, and i can see how portable players .may. be phased out of the market in the future.. which means they'll stop selling them in australia about 6 months later than the rest of the world.. :) i'm reluctant to buy anything non-sony through mail order, because sony is the only brand that exists on a large scale in australia, and i dont -really- want to go and buy something without getting my hands dirty mucking around with it in a shop first.. i'd prefer a MD recording deck.. if nothing else, just for the sake of having a complete system with which i can do almost anything.. someone who's been there and done that please speak up.. a deck isnt essential.. its a little bit more expensive.. but! the difference is a day or two extra at work, which i'm more than willing to put in if it means i get some benefits on the side out of it.. like a remote :) (did i hear somewhere that ~40% of the american population would rather give up sex than their tv remote? aaanyway...) i'm not sure if the MDS-330 has some of the features that people are associating with the advantages of a MD deck.. i still have to do my homework.. but the deck is VERY well priced over here.. remember, i'm looking at having this cd/amp setup, once complete with MD, for about 5-10 years.. so a porta-recorda may not be the best option for me.. if i end up getting a deck, the portable player is a must.. being able to go running with it would be brilliant, and people seem to think that 10 second anti-shock memory is inadequate for "active" listening.. someone commented that the E33 was an oldish model.. again, i live in australia, and thats what we get. sigh. if there's a particuarly good player coming through the international works or thats mail-orderable (?) that anyone owns, i'd appreciate it if you dropped me a line ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) damnit, i sound like a customer talking to a salesperson :P i appreciate all the feedback that i'm getting for this, you're a good bunch out there in md-land :P adios nick ______________________________________________________ Get Your Private, Free Email at http://www.hotmail.com ----------------------------------------------------------------- To stop getting this list send a message containing just the word "unsubscribe" to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
