Guillotine

Since I wrote about iPods I wanted to talk about something that I always found rather upsetting. Sony’s MiniDisc format. I can honestly puzzle forever on why this format did not catch on let alone wipe CDs off the face of the earth when it was released. I will warn you now… This is a flat out rant. I always felt strongly about the MD format, and am rather confused that it never became what it should have been.

When the MiniDisc first arrived on the scene it was meant to be a replacement for the audio cassette. The CD was already destroying the vinyl market yet we needed something that was recordable. Yes you can write to a CD once… You can even get CD-RWs, but in my own experience I’ve never gotten one to write more than a few times before errors started appearing not to mention you had to re-write the entire disc rather than simply adding or deleting. The MiniDisc on the other hand was kind of like a little hard disk using a non-linear format allowing one to record, erase, and even change the order of tracks on a disc. The MD is truly re-writable. I believe it was advertised that MDs could be re-written about 100 times without error, but all I can say is that I’ve re-written and edited discs over and over with no noticeable effects. This alone you think would have been enough to take the CD for a serious run.

Another nifty thing about the MiniDisc has always been the sound quality. Anyone that has ever listened to an MD recording would come to appreciate the brilliance of Sony’s ATRAC codec. While it was rumored to be “near CD quality” I think you would need analysis by a computer to tell the difference unless you have ears made of crystal. To put it into terms the MP3 culture can understand… Most MP3s you purchase off of iTunes are compressed at 192 kb/s. In standard SP record mode the MiniDisc was getting 292 kb/s. Anyone that has dealt with an MP3 ripper before will attest that higher bit rate equals a better sound. The same can be said of any digital media that uses compression. So even by today’s standards an MDs sound quality would be more than a match for your typical MP3 device. As a matter of fact I think the highest quality MP3s I’ve seen were at 256 kb/s which still leaves the advantage to the MD (Quality wise).

How about capacity??? Sony did an amazing thing here, but most people fail to realize it. The average CD holds 80 minutes of audio. The MiniDisc also holds 80 minutes of audio at the standard recording position, but it does it on a disc that is about 1/3rd the size of a CD.  Granted the first MDs were introduced with a 60 minute time, but soon added 74 minute and then 80 minute discs to the mix. Not to mention that MDs could be set to different recording positions like a VHS VCR to get longer play time on a disc. When the ATRAC 3 codec was released you could record on the LP2 mode to get 160 minutes @ 132 kb/s onto the standard 80 minute disc. With the release of the Hi MD format you could get 160 minutes @ 256 kb/s on a standard 80 minute disc while the 1GB Hi MD discs could fit 475 minutes @ 256 kb/s. The Hi MD also offered an LP mode which gave ridiculous record times, but the sound quality suffered greatly in Hi LP mode.

A few other notes… The MiniDisc also came in it’s own protective casing which meant big bulky jewel cases were not necessary, and even with the casing it takes about 1/3rd of the space of a CD in a thin case (about 1/6 the size of a standard jewel case). The MiniDisc was also one of the first portable devices to offer anti-shock that actually worked. This was never quite perfected in portable CD players, but the MiniDisc really had to be knocked pretty good to skip.

So what you have is a truly recordable piece of optical media with amazing sound quality, and capacity that easily matched that of the CD all in a package about 1/3 of the size of a CD. What could have went wrong??? Well… Advertising is what did it. Sony tried to push pre-recorded media to sell MDs when they should have stuck to the recording abilities of the unit as it’s selling point. Obviously the MD did not have a massive library of pre-recorded titles so it was plain to see that it wasn’t going to win out over the CD with it’s tremendous library of available titles. They should have really focused on what it can do that CDs at the time couldn’t. Many will cite price as the reason it failed, but that’s just not the case. All new technology releases with a high price until the company can recoup it’s development costs. If MD had been a success then the prices would probably be comparable to standard CD media by now.

I was rather pleased to discover that MD actually did well, and is still in wide use in Asian and European countries, but even that is coming to an end with the ever growing popularity of MP3 devices. This is not a surprise no matter how the MD-philes will scream that the format is still superior the fact is that any media including CDs will fall to a mass storage device like an MP3 player which is also a truly recordable device, but has the capacity to hold an entire library of CDs with no luggage.

While Sony has not officially dropped the MD format it is rather obvious that it will come soon. They currenty only offer one portable model which is more of a MD/MP3 hybrid than a true MiniDisc device. It is only a matter of time before the MD goes the way of vinyl and Laserdisc to only be cherished for nostalgic reasons. I myself have an MD deck connected to my stereo as well as a portable unit. Recently I considerd transferring some of my MP3s onto MD only to realize there was no point to doing so. I feel a bit sad that few gave this format the credit it deserved, and that what it could have been to the audio junkies of the world was never realized. Yes it would still have been wiped away by the MP3 player in the end, but the truth is that it never even reached it’s potential in succeeding the cassette. If it had been marketed better I honestly believe that the MD could have also eventually have replaced the CD if only Sony had snuck up on it rather than taking it on at the beginning when it didn’t seem worthwhile to switch. Ah… What could have been.