I think that Sony made a major mistake when they didn't market the DATA-MD as the new super-diskette also. Then we could have used MD's instead of unreliable ZIP disks to carry all sorts of information from MP3's, music & data. And now it's probably too late...

I still think that Minidisks are quite cool, the later generation ATRAC's are not bad at all. But only a few people uses MD today.

/Mats

They are much more popular as a consumer format in Asia. They are also used a fair amount in radio for remote reporting. I don't know how many of those little MD multrackers are out there but they were popular for a little while.

Definitely not something I would use in the studio enviroment -- but for location recording, collecting SFX/ambiences or capturing live music (aka bootlegging, heheh) they're alright.

I use a fairly recent Sony portable MD with a nice stereo mic and get good to excellent results. If I use a really nice preamp, that greatly improves the audio...

weezy

While they never sounded quite as good...they were certainly more convenient than an 'Edison Wire Recorder'...

Who ever came out with that flaming piece of shit should be slowly fed into a wood chipper...like it should take at least a half hour before their balls reached the blades.

I am guilty, I compose mostly midi, and when I moved the old 8-track out, I found myself needing a few tracks, for expressive instrument, a vocal, or maybe an acoustic picked track, so I got an MD 4-track. It has all the sync capability, and integrated perfectly, giving me four digi tracks to work with, without going DAW. I do not put entire tunes on it, just an occasional track. I really found the benefits in VO work, as said earlier; Radio/TV has great use for these things. When I am are working with a script, and talent, I just tuck it under my arm and go. I just # the lines, and we are off, take, take, take... When finished, I edit, good, no-good, good, etc. After editing, which takes minutes; all the #'s fall in place perfectly with the script. You can then just thumb through the cuts. I think the sound is pretty good, but stay away from generations. I have been told that adat W/TC would be better for the music. They are not very expensive, and might be a consideration, but, it could be back to analog too, just won't sync up as nice. I will continue to use MD in V/O production.
BTW, Fletcher, LOL, there is nothing like a DX-77 off an MD.
--Rick