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Gordon Henderson wrote:
You can get Minidisc recorders that connect via USB, the original USB models were called NetMD recorders and the idea was you could transfer audio to Minidisc but not the other way.I know nothing about Minidisc technology, however I've a feeling it's going out of fashion...... and I had a friend who has hours and hours of recordings/interviews, etc. all stored on miniDisc technology.So short of connecting the headphone out to line in on a PC and running audacity, I presume/hope there is a way to get the digital data directly off the discs - but having never even touched one, I'm in the dark regarding their capabilities.Do they come with USB interfaces, or some other digital connection?My friend is a bit clueless too, although I'm going to try to catch up with her in a week or so's time to have a look at the hardware she has, but it would be good to have a bit of a clue before I see her!Basically we want to get the recordings onto a medium which will make it future proof - as long as we re-copy to the future every 3 years or so...Gordon
However Sony then released a range of recorders called HiMD which offered extra capacity and the option to upload audio back to the PC. I have both types of recorders myself. I gather as long as the recordings have been made originally using analogue connections then it can be transferred back to a PC in WAV format. However if the recordings were made digitally (for instance doing a digital copy from CD to Minidisc using an optical digital cable) then you can't copy the recordings back.
If you want, I'd be happy to give it a go. If you could bring a couple of discs along to the next LUG meeting, I'll bring my Minidisc recorder along with the cables and we can give it a try.
The only other option I can think of is doing a digital copy using the digital output of the Minidisc into a digital input on a PC. This would require a Minidisc deck with digital output (generally these are the 'hifi separates' type decks), and then it raises the problems of the format the Minidiscs were recorded in orginally. The very first recorders recorded in either standard play, or mono (basically giving twice the recording time by recording in mono rather than stereo). Every Minidisc player or recorder should support this.
Then a few years later Sony released the MDLP format where it would use a different version of the ATRAC recording format. This new format could record at a lower bitrate and either get twice the capacity (LP2) or four times the capacity (LP4) on a disc. These discs will only play on a MDLP compatible Minidisc player/recorder (still not impossible to get hold of, but not as easy as the original decks).
Finally Sony gave it one last go with HiMD which used a completely different encoding scheme and could increase the recording time on a standard disc but this would mean that the discs were no longer backwards compatible, or it could use HiMD format discs which were higher capacity again but not backwards compatible either. I've not seen any HiMD 'hifi' separates decks available, only portable recorders (like the one I have).
If you could find out the model number of her Minidisc recorder I could probably give you a better idea of the format the discs are in, or if you can get hold of a couple of discs before the next LUG meet then we could try my Minidisc recorder to transfer them over in WAV format.
Rob -- The Mailing List for the Devon & Cornwall LUG http://mailman.dclug.org.uk/listinfo/list FAQ: http://www.dcglug.org.uk/linux_adm/list-faq.html