You're probably quite right! production of DAT recorders and tape finished ages ago but yet professionals still use them.
On 18/09/2011, at 8:02 PM, Gordon Smith wrote: > I think you'll find that although the things may be out of production, it > probably isn't the end of the story. There are still a lot of enthusiasts out > there who use those things, including some community radio services which use > them as a cheaper alternative for trills and promos. > > So I think there's still life in the old dog yet! > > > On 18 Sep 2011, at 09:44, Dane Trethowan wrote: > > And so its time to mourn the end of the Minidisc with the last model rolling > off the Sony production line at the end of this month, Sony stopped producing > blank Minidiscs earlier this month. > > Minidisc was first introduced to the world 20 years ago by Sony along side > its compeditor the DCC - Digital Compact Cassette - from Phillips. > > Both these formats were deliberately marketed at the consumer, the idea of > the DCC was that a cassette recorder could play/record on a digital media. > The idea of the Minidisc was that a portable device could be offered to fit > into a shirt pocket which would play pre-recorded audio and be able to record > high quality audio. > > As we can see from history, DCC flopped which is interesting because the > idea's a sound one - pardon the pun - and Minidisc ruled the roost. > > I first saw a portable minidisc recorder in late 1993 though I wasn't at all > interested, I played about with the machine making some recordings and > playing some pre-recorded MD'S which were available at the time but the media > to me sounded extremely harsh and I refused the buy it, oddly the dealer of > the Sony shop where I saw it agreed me me and suggested I perhaps look at a > DAT - Digital Audio Tape - machine or wait a little longer when it came to > the MD, I bought a DAT recorder and that's another story for another day and > whilst it can be said beyond doubt that a DAT machine has provided me with > the best audio recorder I've ever used it didn't come anywhere near MD for > the manipulation of an audio recording. > > In 1994 I bought my first MD hi-fi deck and the dealer at the Sony shop was > dead right! audio quality of recordings had improved quite a bit, a little > furry at the top end but certainly very listenable. > > Bought my first MD portable in 1995 and audio quality had improved to the > point where a recording made from a CD was much the same as the original, > particularly if that recording was made with a digital lead linking source CD > player to MD recorder. > > In 2001 I bought another MD recorder, a lot smaller than the first portable > recorder I bought, this one did indeed fit a shirt pocket but yet this > recorder did so much more, was able to play MP3 files, had various > "Recording" modes to MD using different levels of compression or no > compression at all, I think from memory you could record 11 hours of audio > using 128K compression which sounded very reasonable when it came to music. > > The last generation of Minidisc I played with was a product beyond Sony's > wildest dreams back in 1991, this little beauty could be used as an external > drive on your computer so copy anything over to a Minidisc, press the play > button and hear the music, see the pictures etc. Problem with this system > was that the space on a MD was limited to 1GB, think Sony brought out a > higher capacity blank MD which was backwards compatible with all MD recorders. > > So here we are at the end of the MD road and its the perfect time to reflect > on this wonder development as I am doing. > > For many of us including myself it would have been the first experience had > with digital recording and editing and ah! how very precise we thought the > editing was, certainly far better than tape. > > I still have my 2001 portable MD unit here, works perfectly though I have to > get a replacement rechargeable battery for it at some stage. I still use it > because its the smallest thing in my audio toolbox which I can carry around > with me allowing me to edit my recordings. > > > > ======================================= > > The Techno-Chat E-Mail forum is guaranteed malware, spyware, Trojan, virus > and worm-free > > To modify your subscription options, please visit for forum's dedicated web > pages located at > http://mail.tft-bbs.co.uk/mailman/listinfo/techno-chat > > You can find an archive of all messages posted to the Techno-Chat group at > either of the following websites: > > http://mail.tft-bbs.co.uk/pipermail/techno-chat/index.html > > Or: > <http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]> > you may also subscribe to this list via RSS. 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