Friday 2 February 2007

Minidisc

One of my office buddies, Ted, has a great sense of humour.

More than a year ago, I was showing off to him my then new minidisc walkman, the Sony MZ-NH700. I was telling him, wow, each minidisc I owned could be formatted to hold eight hours of music. And the sound quality was so much better than what mp3 players could produce.

He was not impressed. Drily, he said that there are 6.5 billion people in this world and he had to know someone who owned a minidisc walkman.

Ha ha ... that's Ted for you, with his sense of humour.

But seriously, I believe that no mp3 player can hold its own against a minidisc player. The sound quality is so much more superior, whether it is playback or recording. I can vouch for this. In 2005, I was attending a seminar in Kuala Lumpur with a friend. We were recording the speakers...me with the minidisc recorder and he with an mp3 recorder. When we played back the recordings, my minidisc sound was so much clearer.

Another instance of the good sound quality. I have been using my minidisc recorder at concerts for playback at home through my hifi system system. Pristine sound.

So, whether you like it or not, I'm sticking with my trusty minidisc walkman.

In fact, this is already my third minidisc unit. My first was a Somy minidisc deck, the MDS-JE510. I thought it was rather sleek and a replacement for my old tape deck. It lasted a few years of hard use. Then it gave up the ghost for good.

I also owned a Sharp MD-MS721 but then one day, I accidentally left the batteries in the player. But the time I realised it, the batteries had leaked and spoilt it some.

Now, I treat this Sony MZ-MH700 like gold, even though it has been superceded by newer minidisc models. And my collection of music on minidisc? It already runs into hundreds of hours. Enough said!

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