In article <1193148464.421158.228850@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>, martin
<martinaylands@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
>(Sorry if this isn't the most appropriate NG, but I've tried others
>and not got much of a response)
>
>I recently bought a Sony NWS706 MP3 player and have been transferring
>a few of my CD's to it via its own SonicStage software (I should
>mention here that I'm a complete beginner when it comes to MP3 and the
>like).
>
>I used ATRAC 64kbps at first, because my player only has 4Gbytes of
>memory, and I've lots of long works, like symphonies.
>
>The quality seems fine, but according to so many people I've read on
>the Internet, 64kbps is such a low sampling rate, quality *should* be
>pretty bad.
>
>Today I transferred a few short works using both ATRAC 64kbps and
>ATRAC Lossless, and have been trying to hear the difference between
>the two. I can't say I can detect any, but the few seconds needed to
>switch between them makes comparison difficult. Also, I'm wondering
>if
>I'd suddenly notice a difference should I happen to buy a better pair
>of headphones in the future.
>
>The convenience of having a lot of music on my player, and not having
>to fiddle about transferring stuff as I need it, is very attractive,
>but I want good quality as well.
>
>With this in mind, I'd like to hear people's opinions on these two
>formats - is the quality of ATRAC Lossless worth the extra space?
>
>One other question: Is it possible to use SonicStage to store ATRAC
>or MP3 files on a CD, then load them onto an MP3 player via
>SonicStage when you need them? This would mean that you could have
>lots of large music files without having to worry about running out of
>space on the player or cluttering up your computer's hard-drive.
>
>However, I've heard that Sony have made this impossible to do, to
>discourage illegal copying. Is this true?
>
In my experience, once you use SonicStage to burn ATRAC files on a CD,
you're
stuck. I have a ****table CD player that can play ATRAC CD's. I can
create
an ATRAC CD using SonicStage and play them on that CD player with no
problem.
However, I can't play those same ATRAC CD's my computer, even though it's
the
same computer I used to burn the CD! It's strictly one-way. Typical Sony
madness.
As for offloading MP3's to CD, just burn the files directly to a CD and
im****t
them back into SonicStage when you want them.
I think 64kbps is what's called ATRAC Hi-LP in the minidisc world. It's
surprising how good this sounds; however it's not to be mistaken for CD
quality. IMHO storing 64kbps files in ATRAC lossless on your computer
just
isn't worth the extra disk space, assuming you have the originals. If you
don't have the original CD's, I'd encode them onto my hard drive at a
higher
bit rate. In any event, I think the "lossless" aspect does not transfer
to
the ****table device. Others may disagree, and I'm sure they'll speak up.
I hope you are enjoying your NWS706.
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