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  #1  
Old 2007-10-10, 11:29 PM
chinajoe chinajoe is offline
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converting sony hi-md tracks

i just did the pumpkins show at isu braden (go birds!) via soundpro bcm12-bass rolloff battery box-line in-mi md mz m10 hi sp. this is the third band ive done with it... but, i didnt think i'd have an opportunity to change discs during the show(2 1/2 hrs). so i went with hi sp...

havent transfered the disc to my pc yet b/c i still need to insert track markers. ive listened to the disc several times. the quality is pretty damn good. are you saying that once i upload to the pc via sonic stage that it will sound "worse?" i transfered a previous hi sp recording and could swear it sounded different than if the master itself. makes me think it removed something.

what about just hooking it up to the pc and playing it in real time? i think i saw a box that connects via usb cable had audio jacks. would my pc consider it a wav file at that point and not "remove" anything or would it still be as lossy, lossier, or not lossless at all? im not an engineer, so im having a little trouble understanding all these specifications. i'd like to know b/c once you transfer a hi md recording, you cant transfer it again via sonic stage. any help would be appreciated.
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  #2  
Old 2007-10-11, 02:48 AM
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Five Five is offline
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Re: converting sony hi-md tracks

upadate sonic stage, as of v3.2 and newer you can transfer as many times as you want to your computer unlike the old versions. it will also create a wav version if you ask it to (at least it does if you're recording lpcm wav). the quality should be identical to the original (after all its data). If you want to hook it up to your soundcard you can go in the menus and set the output to 'line out' then connect that to the 'line in' of your computer but this will most certainly sound a little worse (depending on your soundcard) since it would have to go digital>analog>digital and is not recommended. If your hi-md has a digital output (I don't think it does) then you could do a realtime digital transfer that way by hooking up to the digital input of your soundcard but that isn't really necessary when you can just bring it across via usb using sonicstage.

hi-sp recording setting is like a good quality mp3, that's how it squashes the sound on the disc to make more time fit, and while there has been an exception to allow lossy atrac md recordings in the past they will no longer be allowed to be shared on this tracker for all shows recorded January 1, 2008 and later. So I would recommend recording in lossless (wav) mode and do a disc change if necessary... its a lot easier than flipping/switching cassettes every 45 min like we had to do in the old days I know you're aware of the cutoff but just thought I'd mention it for other ppl who might be reading this.

Also one more thing I normally make the track marks after the transfer, I read somewhere that marking the tracks before transferring can cause some little problems, I don't know if that's true or not but I always cut the show after I get it over to my comp as a large wav file just in case.
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Originally posted by oxymoron
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  #3  
Old 2007-10-11, 02:52 AM
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Re: converting sony hi-md tracks

anyhow, in a nutshell update sonicstage and you're good to go.
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Quote:
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  #4  
Old 2007-10-11, 10:39 PM
chinajoe chinajoe is offline
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Re: converting sony hi-md tracks

thanks for the help. i'd love to be able to change discs on the fly, but some shows one has to be stealthy. pulling out your unit may cause a problem. thankfully, most of the bands i see tend to play about 70-80 min. it'd be nice if there was a 2gb disc out there.

also, it seems to record "quietly" i didnt see anywhere in the sonic stage book how i can increase volume before transfering to a disc.

otherwise, i do like the hi md. its small, does a good job recording in the pcm mode, and is rather easy to use.
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  #5  
Old 2007-10-11, 11:51 PM
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Re: converting sony hi-md tracks

yeah, its the smallest 'cd quality' recorder that I know of

maybe the trouble is with the autogain. on my model you have to switch to manual record levels each time you insert a new disc. its deep in the menus, unfortunately. then you can record as loud or as quiet and you want and is much better than the autogain. some info here:
http://forums.minidisc.org/index.php...aded&pid=49992

some more hi-md info here as well:
http://forums.minidisc.org/index.php?showtopic=7436

check around minidisc.org, excellent site they really know their stuff there.

recording lossless in WAV format on a Hi-MD you can fit 94 minutes on a 1GB disc. So you should be able to record all of those 70-80min sets easily without having to resort to hi-sp lossy compression. When I recorded Pearl Jam it was a 3hr concert and required a disc change, no probs really, it just looked like I was checking my cellphone or something.

Record in WAV format... you can fit the whole 70-80min concert on one disc, nothing to worry about.
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Quote:
Originally posted by oxymoron
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  #6  
Old 2007-10-12, 08:35 PM
chinajoe chinajoe is offline
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Re: converting sony hi-md tracks

today, had a problem transfering the disc. it doesnt let me transfer the 1st track anymore. there was an error in the transfering b/c it started before the name of the folder was updated on the disc via sound stage. thankfully, the track is nothing more a little house music before the headliners. its even marked on the disc as transfered, but its not on the hard drive!
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  #7  
Old 2007-10-12, 09:07 PM
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Re: converting sony hi-md tracks

did you update to a newer version of sonic stage? you should have unlimited transfers with the update. if you're using the older version it writes something on the disc so you can never transfer it more than once, sounds like that's maybe what happened. I hope you can get all the other tracks!
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Quote:
Originally posted by oxymoron
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  #8  
Old 2007-10-17, 10:42 PM
chinajoe chinajoe is offline
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Re: converting sony hi-md tracks

i couldnt find a reliable sonic stage update site. if it was on sony's site, then i missed it.

i did try to transfer the municipal waste show, but it did the same thing. it gave an error prompt on the pc, and burned the track as trasnfered. thankfully it was just pre show noise i think it might have something to do with the show being in its own folder. since the first track was marked as transfer, then perhaps this did something to to all the files.
i dont even wants to mess with the sp and vh shows until i get the update
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  #9  
Old 2007-10-18, 03:46 AM
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Zenith023 Zenith023 is offline
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Re: converting sony hi-md tracks

I, like Five, don't add track marks on the MD before transferring it. I find it easier to have the data in one long file, and then track it later. It makes any editing/mastering that needs doing so much easier, and far more consistant.

I think you can download the SonicStage (you want at least v4.3) update here (it's been a while since I upgraded my version, but that site looks familiar. Once you transfer the files from MD, you use the 'Save in WAV format' option to make yourself a WAV file which you can edit. You can definitely do this if you record in PCM mode, and I believe you can do it in Hi-SP mode as well, but as Five mentioned, it's a compressed signal so saving it to WAV would involve bloating it out and wouldn't recover the lost data (as is my understanding).

I recorded Rush recently in PCM mode, and although the gig was three hours long, they had well placed breaks which meant I could do two disc changes. I'm still having issues with the levels, but I can get by with the auto-levels. It's something I'm still not complete clued up with.
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  #10  
Old 2007-10-18, 11:56 AM
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Re: converting sony hi-md tracks

to get rid of autogain the method is over here:
http://forums.minidisc.org/index.php?showtopic=9045

on my Hi-MD I have to do it each time I change the disc a little bit of rehearsal and it can be done quickly in the dark with your eyes closed
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Quote:
Originally posted by oxymoron
Here you are in a place of permanent madness, be careful!
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  #11  
Old 2007-10-18, 04:31 PM
chinajoe chinajoe is offline
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Re: converting sony hi-md tracks

come to think of it, i added track markers to the municipal waste show before i attempted a transfer. its possible the error has something to do with that. but i do think it may have sdomething to do with the fact that i titled the disc through the pc, which then started to burn it to the hi md. the transfer from hi md to the pc started before that data finished writing. hmmm.

the van halen show really didnt seem to have any long breaks. the longest "break" seemed to be dave giving his ice cream man story. i'd rather run in hi sp and not lose music vs going pcm and maybe losing a couple of min. i know the whole lossy vs lossless argument, and ya'll are right. but, im probably going to try to use 2 discs tonight
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  #12  
Old 2007-10-19, 03:33 AM
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Zenith023 Zenith023 is offline
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Re: converting sony hi-md tracks

I guess sometimes it's a toss up between quality missing a vital part of the show. If I know there's going to be a clear encore break of a couple of minutes at least after an hour and twenty minutes or so, it should be a no-brainer really - PCM all the way. I guess taping with Hi-SP does take the stress of the disc change out of the mix as well. I know when I'm stood there sweating, second blank disc poised watching the "File System Writing" message flashing at me as it writes to disc in what feels like real time! It's a stressful business!

I have been stung in the past by bands (i.e. Tha Manics) who don't do encores. There's only been once situation where I've lost the end of the last song as an extra song was added earlier into the set. Up until then, there sets had been fitting snuggly onto one disc.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Five
to get rid of autogain the method is over here:
http://forums.minidisc.org/index.php?showtopic=9045

on my Hi-MD I have to do it each time I change the disc a little bit of rehearsal and it can be done quickly in the dark with your eyes closed
Thanks for that. I'll check it out.
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  #13  
Old 2007-10-21, 08:48 PM
chinajoe chinajoe is offline
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Re: converting sony hi-md tracks

when i upgrade, it says i should delete the older version of sonic stage. guess that means whatsever is saved under sonic stage is gone from the hard drive?
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  #14  
Old 2007-10-22, 08:19 AM
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Zenith023 Zenith023 is offline
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Re: converting sony hi-md tracks

Quote:
Originally Posted by chinajoe
when i upgrade, it says i should delete the older version of sonic stage. guess that means whatsever is saved under sonic stage is gone from the hard drive?
Hmm, I don't remember getting that message. I may have done though, but at that point I hadn't used SonicStage for anything that was worth keeping (just a few test transfers) so it wasn't really an issue.
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  #15  
Old 2007-10-22, 12:56 PM
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Five Five is offline
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Re: converting sony hi-md tracks

Joe backup your stuff you might be scared of losing to another folder if you're paranoid then upgrade sonicstage. it should only delete the older version of sonicstage and replace it with the new one, which is exactly what you want!

ps I would stay away from marking tracks on the md... just transfer the whole thing as a big wav and then cut it on your computer.

zenith: you're welcome for the link, I found it very helpful
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