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I think it's a real shame that there is no way (as far as I know) to use re-writable MiniDiscs in the same way that CR-RWs, for storing generic files. There onl

by retox 6y ago

I think it's a real shame that there is no way (as far as I know) to use re-writable MiniDiscs in the same way that CR-RWs, for storing generic files. There only seems to be projects like this for storing/transferring music. Can anyone in the know give a quick explanation why that is the case? I appreciate it's a moot point now with the extreme price of MD-RWs, but every now and then I'm reminded of them and get upset. It's probably out of the question now that there's an MD resurgence like cassettes are enjoying.

dehrmann 6y ago
I had a mz-n707. It had functionality to record, but as far as I could tell, there was no way to read the audio data back over the USB interface.
- bombcar 6y ago
  I suppose if you really wanted to you could encode the data and read it back via the aux in on the sound card, quite like the old cassette tape computers.
chefandy 6y ago
Not sure why someone hasn't done it recently, but I'm not surprised they didn't do it back then. At the time of MD's popularity, it probably wouldn't have made much sense to compete with zip and jaz drives unless you could make them much cheaper, and I doubt they could have with MD. Portable audio that wasn't as finicky as CD but was higher quality than a cassette was the real killer functionality.
turtlebits 6y ago
MD Data exists, it was slow and expensive. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MD_Data https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MD_Data
rvense 6y ago
The USB functionality came fairly late in the MD's life, I think. For the vast majority of MD devices, you could only get data in or out via audio connectors, which, even if digital, is incredibly slow and unwieldy - there's no transport control from the computer! It'd work like the tape drive on a C64.
cbmuser 6y ago
> retox 9 hours ago [–] I think it's a real shame that there is no way (as far as I know) to use re-writable MiniDiscs in the same way that CR-RWs, for storing generic files. HiMD does exactly that. It’s a FAT-formatted mass-storage device.

by retox 6y ago

dehrmann 6y ago

I had a mz-n707. It had functionality to record, but as far as I could tell, there was no way to read the audio data back over the USB interface.

bombcar 6y ago
I suppose if you really wanted to you could encode the data and read it back via the aux in on the sound card, quite like the old cassette tape computers.

chefandy 6y ago

Not sure why someone hasn't done it recently, but I'm not surprised they didn't do it back then. At the time of MD's popularity, it probably wouldn't have made much sense to compete with zip and jaz drives unless you could make them much cheaper, and I doubt they could have with MD. Portable audio that wasn't as finicky as CD but was higher quality than a cassette was the real killer functionality.

turtlebits 6y ago

MD Data exists, it was slow and expensive. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MD_Data https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MD_Data

rvense 6y ago

The USB functionality came fairly late in the MD's life, I think. For the vast majority of MD devices, you could only get data in or out via audio connectors, which, even if digital, is incredibly slow and unwieldy - there's no transport control from the computer! It'd work like the tape drive on a C64.

cbmuser 6y ago

> retox 9 hours ago [–] I think it's a real shame that there is no way (as far as I know) to use re-writable MiniDiscs in the same way that CR-RWs, for storing generic files. HiMD does exactly that. It’s a FAT-formatted mass-storage device.