Sony MZ-R50 Over Sharp MD-MS702/722 and Sony MZ-R55
Written: Aug 17 '99
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Product Rating:
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Pros: Cheaper cause its a little old, small, feature packed, cool style, durable, long batt life with included LiIon
Cons: very little output power at headphone jack, auxillary batt pack is rather shoddy, no copper-based digital input, only optical, expensive when compared to the similar Sharp MS-702 after the current mail in rebate deal.
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| jeb's Full Review: Sharp MD-MS722 Personal MiniDisc Player |
When I was in the market for a portable MD recorder, the two main choices that stood out for me were the Sharp MS-702 or MS-722 and the Sony MZ-R50. The MZ-R55 had not been released in the US yet. This is an excellent recorder. It has digital input with sample rate conversion (optical only, though), analog I/O, all the usual features plus a handy stick remote. Battery life is configurable depending on what you want. For max portability, you can use it with only the stock LiIon battery and get somewhere between 5 and 7 hours of playback. With the included AA battery pack thumbscrewed onto the side, the playback life jumps to somewhere in the neighborhood of 22 hours. It also looks really sharp, in my e-pinion, far cooler than the newer, slightly smaller, more expensive MZ-R55, which I would buy this unit over.
It sounds as good as any other MD player (basically, about as good as your headphones can). The only problem with it in playback mode is that it can't push a lot of really nice headphones adequately, for example, my AKG 240M's with their 600ohm nominal input impedance. I haven't met a portable that can though. Check www.headwize.com for some schemos for portable headphone amps if your into portable Hi-Fi.
The other thing that's beat about it is that you can't send it digital data that's not optical. I don't understand what's hard about adding this feature. It would be great if I could run digital audio out of my S/PDIF connectors on my computer to the MZ-R50. You can buy/build adaptors, but its a pain.
I think this is the coolest MD portable recorder yet produced. I like it better than the Sharp MS-702 and MS-722, both of which I've used extensively because two of my best friends have them. They are clunky and less nicely designed. The MZ-R55 is cool, but more expensive and less cool looking than the MZ-R50.
Recommended:
Yes
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Epinions.com ID:
jeb
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Reviews written: 3
Trusted by: 1 member
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