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Are there MP3 Players that use Minidiscs?

Posted by Cliff on from the more-mp3-mediums-are-good dept.

Delboy asks: "I was wondering if other people have thought that a Minidisc player would be a good alternative to a portable mp3 player? The thing that puts me off a mp3 player is the lack of storage, with a Minidisc it's practically unlimited, just carry more disks. Okay it's limited in the fact that it would take a lot more time to load it up with mp3's, but you have a very cheap storage medium and probably comparable sound quality. Comments?"

4 of 52 comments (clear)

  1. 4gig MP3 player... by Cheerio+Boy · · Score: 2


    Hammacher Schlemmer has a large size MP3 player that while rather expensive seems nice.

    It's only glaring failing I can see (without buying one of course) is that it uses Windows based software.
    Maybe it will work under WINE. ;-)


    The Tick - "Spoon!"

    --

    "Bah!" - Dogbert
  2. Re:4gig MP3 player...Glaring failing... by Cheerio+Boy · · Score: 2
    OK..OK..
    • BESIDES
    the fact that it costs $800.

    The Tick - "Spoon!"
    --

    "Bah!" - Dogbert
  3. MD + MP3... by Chops-Frozen-Water · · Score: 3

    As the previous comment mentions, MDs use their own compression scheme. So whether or not Sony will make an MD-MP3 player is up in the air.
    However, Sony's put out MD Digital Cameras now, that use MDs as their storage medium (a HUGE number of still images or a small amount of motion video), and reportedly are looking at ways to use MDs in more devices, so it's possible that a digital music player based on MP3 (or something) could use MP3s as it's storage medium, though Sony's also putting out their memory stick players, so I don't know if they'd want to hamstring that business...
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    The Future: Some assembly required; batteries not included.
  4. MD storage. by booch · · Score: 3

    The MD format only holds about 150 MB. The music format uses a compression method that is supposedly similar to MP3, but only compresses about 4X. The compression scheme is called ATRAC. (Someone had a sense of humor, because the name sounds like 8-track.) At the time it was released, 150 MB re-writable media of that size was impressive. Now, it's not all that impressive. Even though the MD media is cheap, the read/write mechanism is not. I think you'd probably be better off using one of IBM's tiny hard drives or some type of flash memory stick.

    --
    Software sucks. Open Source sucks less.