Worth a good look.
Written: Apr 26 '01
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Pros: Near perfect sound in a small, cool looking package.
Cons: Feel like a sound engineer when I record songs.
The Bottom Line: A great product and definitely worth the money I paid for it, but I think I will eventually upgrade to the R9000.
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| david74mr's Full Review: Sony Walkman MZ-R90 Personal MiniDisc Player |
I live in New York City, which means I don't have a car, which means anything I want to bring with me, I have to carry. If you know me, you know that I hate having to carry things. I don't like bags, I don't like bulging pockets or holding things in my hands. Travel light, I say. Must be left over from my Army days. Anyway, I digress. My point is that everything I carry is small. Make it small or not at all. I've got the Samsung 6100 (and am considering the Motorola v8162). My wallet is the size of a credit card and 1/4" thick. I could go on and I won't talk about other small things I might/might not have. Anyway...
I love listening to music. All the time. Before I moved into the city, I had a car with a good stereo. I would drive and just crank it up. After the car left me, it was to the Walkman. I made my own tapes from my collection of CDs. Anyone whose ever had a walkman knows that the things are seriously bulky. So, I made the switch to a portable CD player. Now, some of these things are no bigger than a CD itself, which is pretty nice, but...you have to carry the darn CDs (and even the CaseLogic stuff doesn't
make it less cumbersome) and a CD player won't fit in your pocket. So...about a year ago, I bought the Sony MZ-R70.
These are the things that are most important to me, in order of importance.
1) Size
2) Battery length
3) Recording time
If one of these features is substantial, i.e. really really small, then I might consider skimping on the others.
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Why I didn't get an MP3 player
I didn't opt for an MP3 player, mostly because my computer (a Compaq laptop) was bought in May of 98 and thus didn't have the necessary USB port. Also with only 24MB Ram, a 180Mhz processor and 1G harddrive, I think it would have been difficult to use an MP3 player regardless. I wasn't about to spend $1000 or more just so I could have some tiny little MP3 player.
Secondly, a minidisc player can record music anywhere, as long as you have a 2.5mm plug (the standard headphone plug) on the end. I can record a song off my friends CD player at his place, or with a microphone at a BB King concert. As far as I know, an MP3 has to get its songs from a computer.
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I had the R70 for about a year. It was about the size of a minidisc and modestly thick. There's a big lump on the back for the AA battery. Everything on that worked fine. It was also really, really durable. I must have dropped it five or six times on concrete (not on purpose of course) and despite the nicks and dents, it still worked. The door would get stuck when I opened it and the cover to the battery compartment wasn't tight so if you bumped it, it would turn off, but hey, other than that, it worked great. Well, I finally got tired of that mess, so when Circuit City put the R90 on sale for $249 (the same price I paid for the R70) I scooped it up. What a great purchase. Now, let's get down to business and review this darn thing.
- LOOKS
I think it is available in other colors, but mine is a kinda bright royal blue. I'm partial to silver, but this is certainly eye catching and stands out from all the other silver and black devices. Let's be honest with ourselves--part of the reason you buy this is because you want people to notice it. I think it would look better without the groves on the right half of the front, but I can live with it.
- SIZE
3.125" x 0.688" x 2.875 is what Sony says, but translate that to small by thin by small. It really isn't much bigger than 3-4 minidiscs stacked on top of each other; pretty close to 10 nickels stacked, to give you an idea. It easily fits into any pocket you have; I frequently walk around with it stuck in my shirt pocket. It's a noticeable improvement over the the R70.
You can get a smaller player, but they don't record and they are not that much smaller. Besides, if you don't buy one that records, you have to buy a seperate recorder (yes, I know that's quite obvious). I like having the convience of being able to record anywhere, anytime.
The new R9000 is not much smaller, just so you know.
- WEIGHT
Again, Sony says 3.7oz (roughly 20 nickels) which means soooooooo light. If I have it in a jacket pocket or even pants pocket on a pair of loose fitting pants, I am constantly checking to see if it's still there.
Again, you can get lighter if you don't have a recording player.
- SOUND QUALITY
First, I think a minidisc is able to fit a whole CD on a much smaller disc because it chops of the very high and very low frequency sounds, I think.... Now, for the average person, unless you have the hearing of a dog, I honestly don't think that those frequencies make much of a difference. I suppose in a studio you could tell the difference, but you most likely won't be able to.
I suppose quality of sound ultimately depends on how the song you are listening to was recorded. First, let's depense with the notion that MP3 is superior quality. The quality of an MP3 song depends on the bit rate, i.e. how much information is gathered per second of sound. So, if you copy ("rip") a song from a CD with a low quality CD-ROM and do it in the interest of time and memory, the sound can be pretty bad. I mention this because you are not necessarily taking a step-down in quality with a minidisc. If you use good equipment when recording, you'll get a really good sound. It won't be the "exact" same quaility as the original CD, but I think you'll be hard pressed to tell the difference. Remember, you're listening to this through headphones in your ear, not a 20ft speaker stack at the Meadowlands. I used a 6ft double-ended 2.5mm cord for 2 bucks from Radio Shack connected to my $50 portable CD player and it's sounds great to me. If you have an optical output on your CD player, use it; I can't verify it, but I'm sure the sound is better. If you aren't lucky enough for that here's what I suggest: (1) use a component CD player if you have it, instead of your portable one--the sound is usually better quality, (2) get the best 2.5mm cord you can--the shorter the better (the sound degrades as it travels down the cord) and (3) get a good set of headphones. When I bought the R70, I tossed the headphones it came with (too bulky anyway) and bought a good pair of in-the-ear headphones for $15. Check out the specifications on the back of the headphone package. Make sure they have enough power relative to their size (mine are 40mW), otherwise, I don't care how good the quality of the recording, all you'll hear is a distorted mess!! Oh yeah, with good headphones, this thing is LOUD. I crank it up ALL THE WAY and get no distortion at all. Remember, mine are only 40mW. Also, I did notice an imporvement in sound over the R70 when playing the same minidisc on the R90.
I rate it a 5 for Sound below because I honestly believe that if you use good equipment to record, take the time to record a good sound, i.e. playing with levels and settings, and if you use good headphones, that you will have close to a near perfect sound.
- BATTERY LIFE
Having a great sounding player is all well and good, unless the thing dies on you. The R70 had a decent amount of playtime with the supplied rechargeable battery, I guess around five hours or so, and double that (I think) with a regular alkaline battery. Not quite long enough to make it through a long trip. Not bad, but it got annoying at times. The R90 has a much better battery life, but I haven't seen the reputed 12 hours yet, though I haven't been timing it either. I also play it loud, which might drain more power than normal. Anyway, no annoying power outgages, which will be nice for all you Californians!! The battery is unique to the product, so if it does run out in the middle of an airport, you can't easily replace it (I don't know if Sony sells these separately--they should), but with the added attached that screws onto the top (which makes it bigger and uglier), you can get some crazy amount of battery life and play the thing for over a day straight.
- EASE OF PLAYING
Pretty straightforward here. Press the open button, slide in a disc, close, press play. You can select different ways to play, i.e. repeat, random, etc., if you want. The buttons are small, but not impossible. The ones on the R70 were better, but I suppose Sony had to make them smaller to get the whole package smaller. Smaller buttons on the included remote, but I don't use it (more to carry) so I really don't care. Only complaint here is that while your are flipping through the tracks, you can't see the track number if you have given the song a title. For me, the songs are in a certain order and I remember where it is on the disc, and it's hard to skip to track 24 if I don't see the numbers. There is plenty of space on the screen and I don't understand why Sony didn't do this.
The R70 operated with standard buttons while the R90 has a toggle switch on the side. It's neat, but I wouldn't say it is especially better.
The 40 second shock resistant memory is going to make it hard to screw this thing up, unless you bump it in the first 40 seconds of pressing play, I would guess. I can take my hand and tap it fairly hard with noticable loss in sound.
The "Line Out" is from the same plug as the headphones, you just have to select a different option from the menu. Selecting this outputs volume at the highest possible level. This is convienent for using with a car adapter or just plugging into external speakers. Not a big deal since I'm pretty sure I can figure out how to work the volume on two things at once.
Apparently the R50 model had virtually instant playing once you hit the play button, unlike the R70, which was annoyingly slow. I did notice a slight improvement in the R90, but it isn't instant. To me, this isn't a really big deal, though waiting for fast forward/rewind can be annoying. I think this is primarily an issue of conserving battery power. My guess is that, much like slamming on the pedal in your car uses a lot of gas, accerlating the disc to the playing speed at a slow rate uses less battery power than having it instantly spin at the right RPMs. I think it should be a user definable option.
- EASE OF RECORDING
It is really easy to record something. Take a cable. Plug one end into the headphone jack of a source, plug the other end into the white jack on the R90. Press play on one, record on the other. Bingo. What makes it complicated is getting the R90 to record EXACTLY what you want. First off, unless you are using Digital Synchro Recording (I think you have to have optical output for that but honestly I don't know) you have to time everything just right otherwise part of the song gets cut off. Same with stopping recording at the end of a song. Nowadays, a lot of songs on CDs have some sort of intro before the song, i.e. stuff you may not want to record, so you also have to account for that. This is where the MP3 would do a better job--easier editing. In the R90's defense though, this is mostly a problem of getting the CD to start playing at the right place. What I end up doing is pressing record on the R90 first, play on the CD player second. Then, when the song is finished, I let it record for a second or so before pressing stop. After that, I use the edit button on the side to mark the beginning and end portions that I don't want. Of course, I don't always get it right on the first try, which means erasing the marks then trying again.
Then there is the issue of sound level. You can listen to what you are recording with the headphones, but I find that what you end up hearing after you recorded is not always the same. You really have to be careful with what the settings are on the device you are using to play the source from. If the volume on my CD player is too low, when I play it back on the minidisc and turn it up, I get a really obvious hissing sound. Too loud, and it is too much for the headphones. Same with things like bass. To much and it buzzes the headphones. Not enough and it turns techno into tyco.
Unlike an MP3 player, you always have to babysit the thing. I have to sit there and wait for it so I press stop at the right time.
There is a model of the R70, and maybe others, that can download MP3 directly to a disk, but since I don't have a USB port, I don't care about that.
- RECORDING TIME
Using a 72 minute disc and recording in stereo gives you 72 minutes of music. I am more concerned with fitting more music on a disc, so I record in mono and get twice as much music. Using an 80 minute disc (which I haven't seen) you can fit 160 minutes of music on one disc, which is over two-and-a-half hours of music. I'm pretty sure that beats any MP3 player of a comparable size, or at least it comes close.
- DURABILITY
The cover is made of magnesium, but who knows if it would keep it from breaking in a fall. I dropped the R70 a lot and it kept on ticking, but this just feels like it would break easier. Don't get me wrong, it has solid construction and all, but I guess the light weight worries me a little. If I do drop it, on accident of course, I update this review. The cover is sure to get scratched up.
DATE/TIME STAMP
who cares
- NO FM RADIO
As far as I know, no player has one and I don't understand why. I have seen radios that were the size of hearing aids, which means that the actual working parts of the thing were very small.
- ONLY ONE HEADPHONE OUTPUT
The R70 had two headphone jacks, which was a real convienence feature. Granted it is not really important but it would be nice. Space issue, I guess.
- NO BACKLIGHT
Ok, the remote has a cool backlight, but why not the player? It is impossible to see the screen at night. Why not make it work like an indigo light on a watch?
- CAN'T RECHARGE AND USE AT THE SAME TIME
Ok, this is VERY annoying. In order to recharge the battery, you have to press stop, which means (as far as I know) you can't use it while it's recharging. For playing purposes, this is fine, but for recording, this is a pain. Recording eats up more power than playing, so once you are done recording, you have to let the R90 sit for a while before it is completely ready to go. I suppose you could attach the external battery option while recording, but that just seem unnecessary.
Having said all of this, I really do like the R90 and I am happy with my purchase. If did have a computer that worked with MP3, I might get an MP3 player provided that it met my three criteria. I've read mixed review about the Sony NW-E3 but it is really small and holds two hours of music (I think). Maybe I would. It's really small.
However, if I had to do it all over again, I think I would opt for the R9000, which you can get online, and at ebay for under $300. 21 hours with the included battery and five hours (I think) of recording time if you skimp on quality a little. (Honestly, I've read a lot of reviews and not seen anything definitive about this. 160 for sure at mono, which is nothing different than what I have now.)
Recommended:
Yes
Amount Paid (US$): 249
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Epinions.com ID:
david74mr
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Location: laurel, MD
Reviews written: 5
Trusted by: 0 members
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