Sony Portable Mini-Disc Player/Recorder (MZR500PC)

Other products by Sony

Product Details

Product Manual [710kb PDF]

• Item Weight: 9.6 ounces
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Shipping: Currently, item can be shipped only within the U.S.
• ASIN: B00005T3MK
• Item model number: MZR500PC
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (9 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #95,831 in Electronics (See Bestsellers in Electronics)

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  #37 in	Electronics > Portable Audio & Video > Minidisc Players
  #49 in	Electronics > Home Audio & Theater > Minidisc Players & Recorders

• Date first available at Amazon.com: November 21, 2001

Product Description

From the Manufacturer
FREE Carrying Case with purchase, Player/Recorder, PC Link allows download of digital audio, including MP3, WMA, WAV, AAC.

Product Description
Whether you are playing or recording music, Sony has you covered! The MZR500PC is a MD Walkman« Player/Recorder PC Bundle! It has Digital Automatic Gain Control that helps to ensure superb sound quality while recording, whereas the Automatic Volume Limiter System helps maintain normal volumes during playback! Its convenient compact size makes it perfect for taking your downloaded music with you wherever you go!

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

19 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Great MD player, January 5, 2002

By	B. R. Schimke (My House) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I have had this player for 2 weeks now and I am very happy with it. When you opoend the box you get - One sony MZR500PC mini disk player. It has a metalic blue aluminum top, and a dark clear blue plastic bottom. The plastic is very tough, and won't break. Also you get a whimpy 3 inch 3.5 mm to 3.5 mm headphone jack cord (Standard size headphone jack), a pair of decent headphones - good bass reflex, but don't "bounce", a Instruction manuel and a PC link, which you just pop in to your USB port and windows wil do the rest, no cd reqiured - (Unless you dont have some drivers that are on the Win9x, Win Me, Win 2000 or XP. it IS compatible with Windows XP, theres a booklet on how to instal it on Windows XP. If you have WinAmp or another Mp3 player that alows you to create a play list, you can start it up and just let you MD player sit there recording. If you have the time you can title a song while its recording, which helps in finding the song you want to listen too. Whats really nice is the 35 to 40 hour playback on a SINGLE double a (AA) sized battery. Sony claims 48 hours, but if you stop the MD (MiniDisk) or any thing else that drains batteries, you get less time of play back. No AC adapter is included, but if you have rechargeable AA batteries you can use those. Battery lifes are as follows - play Back 30 - 40 hrs. Recording - 6 - 10 hours. The display on the unit has a volume meter spanning across the top, 5 point battery meter to the left, then track lenght, record time left or remaing track time is displayed (Changed from option menu), then there is a 6 character disply to the right (shows track names - MD title - Menus) There are not many buttons on this MD player, every thing from Bass Boost to record quality is done through menus. You press a botton and a menu will pop up - Edit, Bass, R-Mode (Record Mode) and so on. There is a Hold button o0n the back of the player (IF its turned on, when you press a button it won't do anything. Youd use this if you put it in your pocket. Its about 3 x 3 inches and less then am inch thick. Sound qualitys can be set for - Stereo (Full CD quality) Mono (Mono but still cd quality - Twice as long record) LP2 (Twice as long record + stereo, cant tell the diffrence) then theres LP4 (Four times as long record) which doesn't sound good. I don't know why they have this, some say its for lectures... but theres no microphone jack on this model. If you want one upgrade to the MZR700PC. Also theres no remote. And theres no space for a remote. Ill just clear up what jacks it HAS. 1 - Headphone 2 - Optical In 3 - Digital in (2 and 3 are in the same jack, its weird, but a optical cord goes through the jack to another jack because its like a half inch long plug. Phew, long sentence.) and finally it has a 3 Volt DC in plug. One thing i thought was funny is I live in Maryland, which is called MD. Get it? (Forced laughs)
All in all this is a great Mini Disk player AND recorder. Very small, well built and conserves power well.

17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars My preferred music mix device. One of my favorite toys., January 8, 2003

By	C. Burkhalter - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

The first thing you need to know about this player is that it is not able to do any digital recording. Analog recording only! That's by no means the end of the world, but if you are serious about using a minidisc player a lot, you might want to pony up the extra funds and go digital. On the other hand, analog recording means you don't have to fool around with any dubious computer software, so its not all bad.

Minidisc players are great for several reasons. The player is microscopically small (and just plain cute!). Minidiscs are removable (like a cassette or a CD), so you can fill up dozens and dozens of discs with different recordings. (This is why I use minidisc and not MP3. I need to have no less than 12 hours of music on my person at any time. With a portable MP3 player, this is just not practical. With a minidisc player, its a walk in the park.) Minidisc players handle the shuffle feature far better than CD players ever will - there's never any pause or noise between tracks. Recording is ridiculously easy; all that is required is a headphone jack. You can hook your minidisc player into any stereo, walkmen, amp, casio keyboard, television set, or whatever and record music in real-time (i.e., if the song is three minutes long, it takes three minutes to record it). This is great for recording on the go - like say you're at your friend's house and you hear a new song you just love, you can plug your minidisc player in and record it right then and there. Hooking up to computers is also quite easy, but recording from your friend's computer isn't a seamless or quick process (this device is pretty monogamous when it comes to computers). Minidiscs can be recorded over again and again, and you don't have to record or erase everything at once. You can record and delete tracks one-at-a-time. This is not like your CD Burner; it works more like a really advanced cassette deck. On the downside, minidisc players have moving parts, and therefore may skip if bumped or jostled (whereas an MP3 player you can throw in a washing machine without it skipping).

My first and foremost complaint about this specific unit is that it doesn't get very loud. I don't know whether this is a side-effect of the recording process, or is a limitation of its output. What I do know is that if you walk through a high-traffic neighborhood, or board a bus, you may have to strain to hear the music even with the volume turned all the way up. Quite a problem, but one I've more or less adapted to. To be fair, a lot of this has to do with the recording quality I select. You can record in Stereo, Mono, LP2, or LP4. At LP4 you can cram nearly FIVE HOURS of music on one little disc. Very cool! I most often record in LP4. But I compromise my sound quality by doing so. If you record in Stereo, or even at LP2 (you still get 74 or 148 minutes of music, respectively), your sound quality improves substantially. Another way to combat the quiet volume is to set the "RecVol" manually, rather than automatically (ALWAYS do this!). HOWEVER, you'll still struggle with the weak volume, though it won't be nearly as bad.

As far as other features go, labeling tracks must be done by hand, and is no more difficult than storing numbers in your cell phone. Manual track editing isn't tough at all. Moving tracks (you can change a song's position in the mix) is super-easy. And everything is done on the player itself, so you can tool around with your music on the go.

The final issue is whether or not a minidisc player is worth the money. Of course, that all depends on what you want to do with it. Is it good for a work-out? Absolutely not. Is it a good replacement for a CD player? Not if most of your music is on CD. (Remember, a minidisc isn't really an improvement on CD. Although the player and disc is smaller, the sound quality is inferior.) Is it useful for recording your garage band? I think so. Is it useful for home electronic recordings? Absolutely. Is it a good way to store MP3s? Sure! Could you use it to record environmental sounds, or even to record interview conversation? With a good microphone (which is not included), you certainly could. Myself, I find it most useful for recording tracks from my swollen vinyl collection, so that I can listen to my records away from home. And for that purpose, there's no better personal audio device than a minidisc player. I kinda bought this on a whim (basically I wanted a new toy), and I've been really very happy with it. But if I didn't have so many albums on vinyl, I'm not so sure how much I'd use this device.

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Great for the MiniDisc Beginner, January 5, 2002

By	K. Kaplan (Boca Raton, FL United States) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

I recently purchased the Sony MZR-500, and it has proven to be one of the best investments I have ever made. I chose this over an MP3 player, and it has satisfied me greatly. The sound, although not as powerful as other portables, is very very refined. The BassBoost is clean, and the sound is sharp, smooth and perfectly balanced. There is a 10 milliwatt amp inside this device, and it is more than enough to power a pair of decent earbuds. One word of advice: treat yourself to a decent pair of earbuds or headphones. They make the listening experience much better. The PCLink option is decent. The battery life is great, too...although recording sucks up a lot of battery power. The unit, might I add, is quite solid, and feels like a quality piece of electronics. I have a few gripes though--first, they don't include a power adaptor, nor a rechargeable battery... they should be included. Second, the included headphones are god-awful--replace them. Third, they dont include an optical cable, or an RCA splitter cable. Fourth, you can't use a remote with this player, and there is no microphone preamp. I say, save your money and go with the MZ-R700, or even the MZ-R900 or 909, since they come with everything you need. If you are strapped for cash though, I whole-heartedly reccomend this MiniDisc player, and you will not be dissapointed with it as long as you don't care about what it lacks. Enjoy!