After spending the last few days in pain researching how I can make backup copies of old MD tracks, I have given up! My tireless searching was basically rewarded with a big zilch, since it is basically impossible to transfer music from your minidisc to your PC without having to record it manually. If this alone does not stop people from buying expensive MD recorder units, then I will be damned!
Here is the scenario: I have 2 MDs worth of songs and they are showing signs of physical wear. Since they were given to me by a homeless friend (who found an MD player and a few discs in a box in a back alley), I thought I could just transfer those tracks to a new blank MD from the old ones via the computer using a brand new MD player/recorder that my partner and I bought last year. Having basically little experience in hooking up MDs to the PC it never even occurred to me that I would be unable to transfer tracks (except ones I recorded on the MD unit) from the MD to the PC.
At first I thought this was because the two discs that I had were a little too old or worn, since the SonicStage software kept telling me there were an error every time I chose to transfer files from the MD to the computer. However, after searching through Google I found out that this was in fact a common issue. A few days of search basically told me that the only way to back up those two discs was by way of analogue recording to the computer. This is such a Sony thing. They come up with a really good idea and then they cripple it by adding some silly protection.
This has taught me a few lessons. First is never buy a piece of technology without a proper research (particularly since MiniDisc is not a new technology). Second is never buy into a technology just because your partner’s friends think that it is good. Third is never buy anything with “Sony” on it. Last, is buy an iriver mp3 player because it can record to hard-drive and you can transfer the files direct to your PC without any special driver.
I really do not know why anyone would buy an MD recorder anymore, let alone just the player. It really does not make sense anymore that you should buy a device that records music using a proprietary compression called ATRAC and then will not let you get it out of the discs. At least with my ipod I could transfer music back to my PC without having to resort to doing analogue recording (I know the ipod does not do recording at high quality).
All I can say is if you are thinking of buying an MD recorder to rescue your old discs, then don’t! If you still have the original CDs then just rip them into mp3s and get an ipod or any mp3 player that does not require a special barrier software like SonicStage. If you don’t have the original discs then buy them because it is a waste of time trying to make backups of MDs, except if they contain your own live recording recorded on the unit itself.
To add insult to injury, a couple of months ago my Sony MicroVault suddenly fried itself a few days after I bought it and luckily it was replaced free of charge by the retailer. I can now say confidently that I will never buy a Sony product again.