Richard responded,
| It's a real shame you can't try them out. Prior to your post I would have
| thought that New Zealand was about the hardest place in the world to access
| and try MD items.
It seems that in the US one finds MD equipment nowadays only in the chain
stores, which carry portables and maybe some low-end decks. I wouldn't know
where in metropolitan Chicago to find other models any longer; a few years
ago I might have gone into United Audio (who carry no MD stuff any more) or
Abt (who might still have an R91 or R90 around), but now I'd be stuck. Best
Buy won't carry these models, and I doubt that Circuit City will have the 640.
| Please be assured my post was not meant to be condescending, nor
| was I trying to "turn you toward buying the 940", it's not like I'm
| connected with Sony or anything and I own a 520 myself after all.
There was no hint of condescension, and I'm sorry if I implied there was.
When I said you were trying to turn me toward the 940, the only passage that
seemed that way was your description of how if I bought the 640, then when
I hear someone else's 940 I would cry. (Right now I wish I could cry; I had
eye surgery last week and am going through the artificial tears like ...
well, like water.)
| I wouldn't have believed there would be a
| difference between the CD players I tried sound wise until I actually tried
| them, so maybe you'd be surprised too, if you had the opportunity.
Richard, once there was a debate on alt.audio.minidisc whether the output of
a Sony deck in monitor mode is ATRAC-encoded and decoded or passed through
untouched from the input. I decided to test for myself, and to try to keep
this short, I took an SCMS-unlimited source and, with various combinations of
recording and monitoring, made the following copies (all transfers optical):
1. a first-generation MD from the CD;
2. a fourth-generation MD (a copy of a copy of a copy of MD #1);
3. a thirteenth-generation MD;
4. an MD that would be first-generation if monitoring does not encode
but fourth if it does; and
5. an MD that would be thirteenth-generation if monitoring encodes but
fourth if it does not.
The idea was to compare #5 with #2 and #3 and #4 with #1 and #2. But I could
not tell a difference. When I couldn't, I tried comparing #3 to #1, and al-
though I knew which was which, I still couldn't tell a difference! So if
there's any advantage of the 940's DAC over the 640's (or vice versa), it
would be lost on me.
| One thing I've noticed in many of the reviews of MD items on the MDCP is
| that often people overlook mentioning how the MD thing they've bought
| actually sounds!
Maybe it's because they all sound good?
| On weight - you do seem to view the greater weight spec of the 940 as
| negative.
Yes. First, there are no bulging rocks of muscle under these mounds of
blubber, and second, I have no fancy stereo furniture (nor place to put any),
so my components are in a stack on a small rolling table. Already the CDR
recorder sits atop three MD decks atop a CD changer. The new MD unit will
make six; the extra weight is not good for the table, the carpet, the gravi-
tational stability of the stack, nor my back. Perhaps I could decommission
the 500 and store it or sell it, but I can already see Parkinson's Law coming
into play and situations where I'll need all four MD decks. Oh yes: the
table also supports the middle section of my shelf system next to the stack
of decks.
| I can see Scale Factor Edit could be useful for adjusting the level of the
| MDs you record ...
Scale Factor Edit, far more so than LP modes, was what I wanted a 940 for.
Now it comes out that the 640 has Scale Factor Edit (and LP!) as well.
| Just trying to be helpful, ...
Yes, thank you, much appreciated.
Ian Horsey asked,
> Out of curiosity, how much power do the 940 and 640 consume, and how
> much is a kWh where you are?
Rick had given the figures his earlier response to my original question that
started this thread, and Gaz has reposted them: 12W vs. 9W. With taxes and
all I guess we get soaked for around 9c per kWh. There are no figures for
the difference in power consumption during standby, so let's say for argu-
ment's sake that there is none: if I run it for three hours on an average
day, that's like 1100 hours a year, or 3.3 kWh of difference, or 30c. If
there's a three-watt difference even during standby, that's about $2.40 per
year. If the 940 had some clear advantage over the 640, I'd blow off the
$2.40 per year, but if it doesn't, well, it could be the straw that breaks
the camel's back.
More likely the extra four pounds (avoirdupois, not sterling) will break *my*
back, or they'll break the table.
New data: inetshopping.com has the 940 for $US320 and the 640 for $234. I've
a 940 on order from Video Direct for $289 (having believed at the time that
the 640 would not have Scale Factor Edit), and they've promised me a quote on
the 640 at the end of the week. If the difference is comparable to the dif-
ference at inetshopping.com, I'm going for the 640.
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