Sony MZ-N420D Net MD Walkman (Blue) by Sony
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Digital camera reviews of Sony MZ-N420D Net MD Walkman (Blue)
Digital camera Review: Good Value for your money
Summary: 4 Stars
I've been using this mini-disc player for a few weeks now. Pros: The battery life is excellent, although burning music to the device zaps its battery life much faster. The cost for blank mini discs is very low. It is lightweight and easy to transport. When recording music on "mininum bit rate transfer" the quality is still excellent. I can typically transfer about 80 songs to one minidisc. You can add, delete, and rearrange music as much as you want on the minidisc, so you aren't stuck if you make a mistake.
Cons: The Sonic Stage program it comes with converted all my music files from Windows Media Player/Real One, etc. without asking me first. The Sonic Stage program is tricky to learn how to use; the "help" section is very unhelpful. The actual player lists the name of the song as it begins, but the viewing area is so small that it's hard to read, and if you miss the initial display, you're out of luck!
Despite the drawbacks, I am basically happy with this product.
Digital camera Review: Great for Recording "Out of the Box"!
Summary: 4 Stars
Does anyone ever miss their portable cassette recorders? I mean, what does one use in today;s world to record a conversation or a performance without having to get the computer or complicated equipment involved? Anyone? We all have digital cameras and most even take pictures, but how often do you wish you could have recorded your baby;s first giggles or when Uncle earl visited and told all his corny jokes but is now passed on? Seems no one pulls out a recorder any more. MD appears to be the last bastion of handheld recorders that don't require additional equipment. Record onto it and play from it. No muss, no fuss. I will always feel it was a shame MD's never "took off", but do hope they'll always be around. I am a big fan.
And by the way, I prefer to carry a $5 disc on my pocket to carrying around my $350 iPod!!!! I mean really. Isn't anyone nervous about carrying around their thousands of songs and multi-hundred dollar equipment? If we all had MD players, one could do like we did with cassettes/removable media: "Hey man, check out this recording I just made of _______!". Ins=trad, most opf us run around shooting pics with our cell phones and have no idea how to share them. Does ANYONE know how to record audio to share any more? Does anyone care? I do, and that's why I want another mini-disk to replace the one that recently broke (Thanks Sony!).
Digital camera Review: Great to have mixable media for travel.
Summary: 4 Stars
A recent review I read in PC Magazine where they felt the ATRAC
format was noisy, not the case. A disk I started (using ATRAC) sounds roughly as good as some disks I dubbed using an MD deck some time earlier. Hence my decision to go with this technology as opposed to the FLASH RAM or hard drive based devices since I already had an MD library. It sounds pretty good, not great as it is a portable device and my ears are pretty good for such things. I hope it lasts a while because looks like Sony is getting ready to bail on the MD format and I don't want return to make any more Sony electronics (non-media) purchases. Don't get me started on the rootkit nonsense because I believe the music execs all deserve jail for creating a new conduit for spyware.
Digital camera Review: Hard to use, but worth it
Summary: 4 Stars
I've wanted a cool device for transporting my music for more than a year now. After a lot of research, I finally decided to take the plunge and I recieved my Sony Minidisc player today. Price was the main factor for me and it seems to be the same size as some of the larger hard disc players out there. One disc will hold about the same as a 256MB player.
Bad news first: The software installs very slowly and the manual even mentions what to do if you have problems (I just restarted a few times). Once you get it going, you have still to learn how to use the software. Once you learn it, it's pretty easy to use. Sonicstage seems to be extremely friendly to only one party: Sony.
The software seems designed for people who want to turn their CD collection into minidiscs or don't use their computer to listen to music much. You can't use the protected MP3/ WMA files you've previously ripped from your CDs; you have to do it all over again using their software. The files you save don't have any tags (which is something I love about WMA), you do it all manually. At first, I thought it would only let me use the songs I've gotten illegally, but eventually I figured it out.
I don't like that you can only put a song on 3 minidiscs, but this does seem to be 3 at a time. When I checked in some songs I decided I didn't want on the mix, it went back up to 3 more times. Good news there.
This player seems like the perfect solution for a lot of people. It fits places CD players won't, like in your pocket or purse. Everything says it's shockproof, but I haven't tested that out yet. I think the discs will hold about as much as MP3 CD discs will. It's comparable in storage to the 256MB MP3 players and those just seem too small. Since I am in college, I don't want anything that will walk away too easily, especially if I'm paying that much for it.
I say if you can master the software, go for it. There should be a label on the packaging. Caution: patience required.
Digital camera Review: Love this Player!!!
Summary: 5 Stars
My husband has the white one ($99). He has had his for a year and loves it. I got this one(blue - its cheaper, but the same model) for myself with some birthday giftcards from amazon. I love this. It does not skip or anything. I does take a little while to burn the music, not just drop/drag/ and go. But it makes up for that when you can put the number of songs on it that will last you for ever. And add to it the fact that the battery lasts a lot longer than in other players. My husband and I went through 2 different players before this one...lets just say we will stick with this player for a long time. We have his and hers players and love em. He runs and I walk and they do not skip. I also bought the carry case made for these and I love it. My husband just carries his as he runs, but I can't stand to hold stuff while I workout. I have run with it, using the case and it is so much easier. You won't go wrong with this player.