I've been scanning over the md-l for the last couple of weeks and keep
seeing bits and pieces of MP3 to MD questions. All the answers seem to
focus on (generally speaking) simply hooking up an MD recorder to a
computer's soundcard output, via either digital or analog means, and
pressing record. If I am to understand correctly, this is the same
process as recording from any other source, resulting in up to 74
minutes of stereo music on the MD. Is anyone aware of any discussion
within the MD community of using the 140MB worth or data capacity on an
MD to store 140MB worth of MP3's? A 128kbps encoding rate for an MP3
comes to about 1MB/minute. That would mean just over 140 minutes of CD
quality stereo sound on one MD for about $3.00US! I doubt that current
MD player/recorders would play these discs, but what about a new
generation of machines with this capability? This could easily defeat
the RIO type MP3 players with their limited capacities, and absurdly
priced memory upgrades. They boast non-skip operation due to "no moving
parts" - who cares, MD has been skip free since the beginning! The
technology is here, let's use it to benefit the consumer. This would
also assure the survival of MD here in the US. MP3 and similar encoding
formats grow in popularity daily, especially among teenagers - major
consumers of music and completely at home on the internet. Why not
offer the public what it wants? Completely portable music as at home on
your computer as on a data equipped MD player. The new players could
even double as file transfer devices, but of course would be dual mode
and still play all your current MD's. Maybe I don't know what I'm
talking about. Maybe it's not possible, but I can't see why not. Is
this what Sharp Electronics is trying to achieve? A marriage between
MP3 and MD could be the future of portable music.
--
Craig Bernard
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
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