copying mini disk music to mp3's

[doc]

I don't know if anyone can help, but a friend of mine has some music on a mini disk that they would like to get to mp3. They have an old minidisk player, not too sure on its details.

I haven't seen a mini disk or a mini disk player before, and was wondering how would be best to do it.

So far I have 3 thoughts...

1. use the minidisk player's output into the mic socket on the pc, then record it to wav, then convert to mp3.

2. use the minidisk players output into the audio input on a pvr usb 2 I have, record to mpg file, then extract the audio to mp3.

3. something completely different that I haven't thought of that would be a lot easier and better

Does anyone have any idea what would be easiet/best?

Any help would be appreciated as google didn't really help.

Thanks.

[doc]

thanks for that. I can see that I'm going to have some fun trying.

My initial reaction was to tell them to copy/download the music again, but its home recorded music :-(

[Menehune]

The simplest (and probably easiest) way to grab the music is to use the analog out on the minidisc player and run the cable to the line in of your computer's sound card. You probably will need a 1/8 mini to RCA adaptor to get the signal into the sound card.

Once the sound is getting into the pc, you can either record into mp3 format (if your recording software supports it) or record to wav, then convert to mp3. My MusicMatch version 7.1 can record into mp3 format from my line in port. Use the highest quality possible-my copy of music match encodes up to 160 kbps.

[willemse]

As I do not know what you mean by Mini Disc it could be totally off. But if it is a small CD you could try to rip it to MP# with a freeware program CDex. I have done this with a small (~8 cm diameter) CD

See http://cdexos.sourceforge.net/


Hope this helps you

[nielm]

Originally Posted by willemse

As I do not know what you mean by Mini Disc it could be totally off. But if it is a small CD

It's not :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MiniDisc

[Diginerd]

/stating the obvious alrt..

If the player has digital out and your soundcard has digital in use that in preference to the analog transfer... Quality will be much higher.

[Rust_E-Z]

I have alot of expirience with mini disc, and most audio. have a recording studio in my dining room. anyway, digital out was never an option with mini disc, sort of a hardware tactic to slow piracy early on. so as was said before, auidio out MD to Audio in soud card is best. audacity is a free app for recording and editing audio that should work well. atrac is already compressed, so I would suggest recording in non comressed wave then converting to mp3. you should be able to do this all with audacity. avoid using any mic input!!

[doc]

Thanks for all of your help. I have a good idea what to do now.

Hopefully I'll get the equipment from my friend this weekend and then have a good go. Fingers crossed.

[stanger89]

Originally Posted by Menehune

The simplest (and probably easiest) way to grab the music is to use the analog out on the minidisc player and run the cable to the line in of your computer's sound card. You probably will need a 1/8 mini to RCA adaptor to get the signal into the sound card.

Well the best/easiest way is probably to get a new minidisc player that supports NetMD, which will allow you to connect the player via USB and extract the music digitally without loss. Then you should be able to convert them over to MP3. Not the cheapest way though.

Of course, FWIW, ATRAC3 (the compression used on MD) is way better than MP3. It's really a shame Sony burried MD, it had/has a lot of stuff going for it. Hi-MD is pretty cool.