Too many MDs?

At approximately the 20 minute mark of the video, Mat talks about an ad that is going to run. But there was no ad there...even though I don't have YT Premium. Did YT demonitize the video? Or does YT not show ads when accessing the video from the Patreon link?

Your laughing at the beginning is so relieving :-D

Brilliant :) would love to get in to mini disks one day :)

Excellent!

Thanks for that. Will take a gander.

Where do you get your replacement battery for the Sony md? Hopefully they are not expensive

I have a Sony mini disc player. Battery is dead and lost the adapter for a single disposable battery to attach. But would never throw away. Another fine video.

Great vid Mat! When I was younger and just as immature, I had a subscription to Rolling Stone magazine. One year they had some silly promotion (does anyone remember this?) and I was given a Sony MD with some music on it with an issue. It was part of a contest they had with Sony and a maybe their record label as well promoting the format. For some reason I remember that it may have been a Liz Phair record? I don’t remember but i think there was a giveaway of cash, albums, and MD gear. All you had to do was play the MD in your player and I guess a recorded voice told you that either you were a winner or a loser. I was already a loser as I didn’t have a player or a friend who had one. I held on to that disk for years until away at grad school my mom “cleaned” the basement out of my treasures. What could of been? I’ve wanted a minidisc player ever since even though I wouldn’t know what to do with it. There’s just something about the mechanics, miniaturization, and the problems it solved back then that make it still appealing to me. 🍻

You've finally done it. You've convinced me to buy my first MD deck. I now have six choices of media to record to on my home stereo 😓. I must say, I think this could be one of my favorites. It's just odd enough to grab my interest over other digital sources like CDs which are just so familiar that have become boring at this point.

Similar to the compact cassette player videos you have done. Have you spotted any common MD mechs that are shared between brands? Or were they all making their own mechs. I'm not talking about the buttons or the displays or the I/O. Just the actual mech with the loading articulation and perhaps the motor. I'm curious how many models used the same mech either say from one brand like sharp or ones that were used across multiple brands. like, was Sony or sharp selling its mechs for others to put there own shell on? Just a curiosity of mine.

I can relate to this. If I had the cash and the space, I would be buying reel-to-reel tape recorders by the hundred.

if possible, after you've checked the entire lot, I'd like to get a working one, brand doesn't matter, as long as it's md-lp and using those gum stick type battery, and in reasonably working condition, I'd gladly pay for the postage...

Notable that in such a random sample none of them seemed to use AA batteries (without an additional caddy). My little Sony portable is great and AA works to it's advantage in 2021. Did JPN just not do AA batteries?

I think one of the Sharp machines is the same model as used in Season 5 of The Wire... I just can't remember which episode!

Thank you for buying those lots so I won't have too. Lol There really are some really unique players in there and I've searched for a while as well on some Japanese auction sites.

Well - I saved this 68 minutes of Junk up for Friday night and enjoyed it all. Thank you. Those are all beautiful little machines in their own way - even the crappy ones. I was secretly hoping you wouldn't find the 2nd disc. If it weren't for those damn content matches I would have suggested the Old Spice music on finding the 1st. Temperamental is the keyword I think. My own MZ-G750 comes out every now and then. It refuses to work sometimes. For some inexplicable reason plugging it into the mains gives it the kickstart it needs after a few minutes, even with an alkaline cell in situ. There's no rhyme or reason to it yet I still keep going back - my affinity with MiniDisc will never end - I am sure of that.

This should be an annual tradition, Mat. I was so excited when I saw the email from Patreon arrive at my inbox. I told the missus I can't wait to clear an hour from my schedule and just watch it uninterrupted.

I finally had time to watch this. In two weeks, I’ll be retired, so yeah. I can’t wait. But I have some comments on a really fun video. Loved your enthusiasm. When you said “I think I’m going mad,” I had just laughed and wondered the same thing. A lot of them do remind me of cigarette cases. That’s weird to me, because I never really saw a cigarette case. Must be from too many Antiques Roadshow episodes. I love “innit?” The boring Sharp pieces with the single dimple look like they have a little trash bin icon in the dimple. My goodness I hope you washed your hands after that. I’ll give you a dollar to taste the mint player to confirm.

The one man show might be a rakugo performance.

Can there be too many MiniDisc players? Well, as far as I am concerned, 100 is not too many since I thoroughly enjoyed the video. Yes, it’s a dead format but it was a great system back in the day. And I still have my MZ-R91 that I bought in 2001-2002 sometime for the princely sum of UKP250 which was sonewhat of a bargain back then. Oh how time flies… Then in 2003 I got my first Apple iPod which instantly rendered the MZ-R91 obsolete. But that’s another story.

That was a tour de force, Mat. I hope it's a success.; you deserve it after that! :-)

Enjoyed this one. Minidisc is something I’ve always been fascinated by but to be honest getting a player etc seems a bit of a hassle to me. The extra features (track titles etc) are a bit pointless to me as I am completely blind and the price of prerecorded albums from the time is astronomical. Great video though 👍

Got to end of the video and enjoyed seeing all the different designs. Would be good for some teardowns before throwing some of them away as interesting to see if they all ended up pretty quickly in their lifetime using all the same off the shelf parts, or did we have a variety of manufacturing and R&D still at that point for MD? Sad to think after all the work that went into MD it is something that will never be made again and had a relatively short existence.

This is rather like a DankPods' lucky dip

I would LOVE if skip intro uploaded that japanese dancehall mix ❤️❤️❤️

Enjoyed.

You may be suffering from MD madness.

I really enjoy the casual videos. There's a more personal connection in them that is nice.

So, you're making a huge wall full of MD players? A kind of Pixel-Art? 😁

Being an industrial designer for one of the MD player brands must have been a great experience. The sheer number of designs, materials, finishes, etc is amazing. It seems like a real playground for new ideas, ever though every single player is based around the same basic components.

Count me in as another US resident who had no knowledge of minidiscs before discovering Techmoan a number of years ago, and now finds them fascinating. I'll be off now to watch "MiniDisc - An Appreciation" for the umpteenth time.

2021 me: "...and in the future, we have a movie theater in our living room. For real. The screen measures 60 inches diagonally. And because of its level of detail and how well it reproduces a wide range of colors and light, the picture is much, much _better_ than anything you've seen in a movie theater so far. Get a load of this: It's connected to computers that can play literally tens of thousands of movies on request. That _includes_ all of the Lucasfilm movies we love. Plus Star Wars Episodes 1-3 and 7-9...yeah, they all got made eventually." 1986 me: "WOW!!!! And we actually _own_ all of this? AWESOME! So what did we watch most recently?" 2021 me: "We watched some guy in England who bought like a hundred broken pocket-sized music players from Japan, in plastic bags, sight unseen. He sat at a desk and opened the bags up and showed us the players for an hour or so." 1986 me: "....." 2021 me: "No, seriously, it was really great."

Apparently MATRIC was a discount brand from a company that started as an OEM for AIWA? https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/松木技研

Are you trying to single-handedly revive the Minidisk format? :P Joking aside I do like these comparisons because it gives you a broad look at the design choices that were made back then. If only modern tech could take these lessons learned 30+ years ago and make the ultimate whiget...nice design, informative readouts.

FWIW, Eco Reuse Factory is the tagline for HARD OFF

I don't know how likely you are to read this Mat, but just so you know, I loved this video. I totally enjoy ones like this where you just open up and go through a bunch of random lots of something cool like Minidisc players. It's something I enjoy doing myself, so with a video like this, it also kinda feels like I'm also there, checking them all out, looking out for the really cool stuff. Would definitely appreciate more videos like this in the future, please don't feel detered from making them! :)

It's a form of addiction. And we're your enablers :)

I wonder if these are being collected up by some recycling company then auctioned off as they fetch more money than just being dismantled for scrap metals, might explain the state of some of them! What a shame MDs were so short lived, such a great technology for their time. The fun of having something physical like cassettes, the fun of being able to do your own compilations, and digital recording with instant access. Even the clunk of inserting or removing an MD is very cassette like.

As someone who has never owned a Mini Disc player, I am unlikely to suffer from that rare disease of "MD Fatigue". So many different colours, they must have had a fashion aspect to them back in the day. And yes, one day I'm buying a car in that iridescent blue/green colour.

This is why YOU are Techmoan, Mat, and no-one else ever could be - your evident enthusiasm as you are going through a bag of 100 discarded MD players is so interesting and entertaining to watch. Really great, thank you!

I started to watch this last night but I had to go to bed. When Sony invented something unique they pushed it like crazy. It was the same with El Cassette. They wanted to succeed that they made the for most of the other brands that didn't want to commit to it. They were all Sony Machines with most of the major brands in Japan. It's probably why the came up with Sony Records so they could release there own labels on SACDs and Mini Disc. I had moved away from this sector so I had never owned one. I did fancy getting a Hi Md Version just to try the optical output on my SACD player and record in PCM mode. Just to see if I record a Sony SACD recording, will give the Mini Disc music and track titles. If that makes sense

My favorite is the yellow Sony. I think it's worth restoring and find one of those wireless "speakers". I also like the disks that have some designs to them, perhaps you can make a wallpaper with them.

I love this kind of video. The first one was awesome. And this is great!

Another great Minidisc haul video! Shame the orange cammo one doesn't work. I think the Personal Disc Memory is where the player remembers a number of discs you've used, and maybe remembers what track you got to and can pick up where you left off last time.

Love this type of video and MD stuff in general. The black Kenwood in the first batch is the portable I have, although mine is metallic blue.

I love your videos about the MiniDisc format. I, myself still use MiniDisc in almost every room in my apartment and on the go :)

Ok. Stop everything. I'm turning off my phones, making a large coffee, and treating myself to an hour of Techmoan Minidisc Nirvana.

Ah what a lovely video - my first MD player was in there as well and yes it was a nasty Sharp 🥴 bought it 2nd hand from a shop in Tottenham Court Road.

Thanks for video, loved it. What are you going to do with them all mount them on a wall display? Seriously though, thanks for this I did enjoy it, shame none of the Panasonic ones were any good

Thoroughly enjoyed the video Mat, made the hour stuck on the plane waiting for maintenance to fix it go by much easier. Keep up the good work.

Do try the MD players that have Dolby Headphone. I use to have some wireless headphones that had dolby headphone and it was very effective at recreating a surround effect.

Awesome collection I remember a few of these . Haha those sharps are nasty loll 😂 don’t apologise for talking I like how you explain things

Why? Why, I must ask... ...did 1 hour 8 minutes go by so quickly? 😐 video not long enough 😃 your thrill of finding machines you like while we are along for the discovery is why this type of video is so much fun. It's how I feel when I open record lots that I have purchased. I like the blue and red/orangish colored Sony. Recently this untested Sony MZ-R900 MDLP with a handful of blank minidiscs sold for $85.11 on the Goodwill auction site. 🤭 https://ibb.co/DV5pcDw *bemoans that MD never properly kicked off in the US*

Oh man the early 2000s electronics design really brings me back to Best Buy trips in my high school days!

Jauce executives: "Those old MiniDisc players sure seem to be popular in the UK! Wonder what they do with them?"

This is honestly great, it's nice to have varying kinds of content. I could watch you unbox MD players all day, except I'm already jealous that it looks like you've got a couple of nice Hi-MD models in the bunch... as of 10 minutes in. And now I have to buy an MZ-E800. What a cool design.

I think you should aim for one of every type.

That Matric one was pretty wild and it showed up in a Google search for me -- the exact model: https://www.facebook.com/minidiscclub/photos/a.1643836162309833.1073741841.1269796989713754/3363882053638560

I really enjoyed this one, mostly because here in the States MiniDisc was almost non-existent in comparison to Japan or Europe. The only MD player I ever saw was owned by a mate from the UK.

I think you need more Minidisc players

I love seeing how much the design departments obviously loved having a bit more freedom to experiment on these - that flappy opening on the lime green Sony's a new one on me but what a great idea! So much more freedom to play about with button and display placement made it a great format for design geeks

You had me for the entire 1:08:36! So many Sony styles I knew nothing about. It seems Sharp was trying to ride the iMac craze with their candy colored "jem" models. Thank you for posting another MD video.

I don't know why, but I was reminded of this classic video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-z4iw8Ppo1o

Brotherhood of the MZR3! Still have mine sitting in my drawer, bought in 1996 in akihabara. Still plays fine though the mechanism is noisier when seeking the head around than when new.

You could be going though my old gas bills and still make it feel like time well spent with an old friend. Never change, man.

This is ridiculous timing - I'm in the middle of importing a car from Japan which comes with an OEM MDLP player, and I rewatched your entire MiniDisc video last night. Been looking to buy a semi decent MiniDisc recorder (ideally with NetMD support) so I can make some MDs and actually use the built in player in my car, so if you want to offload one, hit me up!! ;)

I enjoyed that. Maybe Colin from thisdoesnotcompute could collaborate with you on the video of getting some working?

So what you're saying is I need to give up on these detailed car videos - just go down to a car park and talk about what I see there! 😉

My first personal MD was the Sony MZ-E62 and I still have it, still in working condition. That Sony blue/green one is stunning! that's going on my wish list!

Favourite one has to be the black and white Sony one with the wallet design.. really nice looking.

Looks like I've got my evening sorted

The sticker on the Panasonic at 10:45 or so says it was from Bic Camera in Yurakucho (the one closest to Tokyo Station basically) in August 2006. I'm not too sure what the sticker was for though, maybe a second-hand device? The title on it suggests that it goes on the unit and specifically says it's not for the usual warranty card. The sticker at the lower right of the unit says it was made in 2006 so maybe it was ex-display.

LGR's Clint has described the ethos of his channel as being "Have a few late night drinks then go on eBay". I am wondering if the ethos of Techmoan is "Have a few late night drinks then go on Jauce" :-)

"I got a fever. And the only prescription .. is more MiniDisc!"

Yes, can't wait to watch this, hopefully you got to find the sequel to the Never Study English MD!

Something about mini discs players, brings back the memories. How about support techmoan on pateron for £10 a month get free mini disc player lol (only kidding). I brought 1000 records the other month (since sold them back on) its fun bulk buying

I wish I still had my MD players, including an Aiwa I bought in Japan, they were stolen 20 years ago. :(

I do sincerely enjoy these videos. I would have been a teenager when these were a big thing, and I remember really wanting a mini disc player at that age although I never bought one. So it's one of those things where, rather than learning something new about old tech before my time, it's nostalgic for me. I feel like I'm gawping at all these things like I did when they were in catalogues. Not to mention the unique designs from Japan. (Not belittling the usual content whatsoever, as the main reason I enjoy the channel is learning about things that existed that I never knew about)

Was only saying to the wife that I have put the mass mini disc video on loads of times and I don't know why I like it as it's not very good compared to your usual quality... And POW!!! A NEW ONE! This is a guilty pleasure for me. Thank you! I think it's because your just chatting and not scripted or like anyone else on these and the minidisc one encapsulated perfectly. Anyhooo Watching now:)

I loved the last mass MD unpacking. Looking forward to this one!

I don’t think there’s such a thing as too many MDs. In fact, we could do with more of them LOL. I am really afraid MD blanks will start to become more rare in the next few years with the advent of new limited releases on MD.

Brilliant! A million different minidisc players! I’ve got a silver version of your first blue Sony one.. Love those still!

The Sharp at 12:00 was my first MD recorder (and was sold in the UK!) Still remember the literally sharp edges on the rocker switch things.

Sweet, another hour of Techmoan. Gonna watch this during work tomorrow <3

I immediately started singing "How Many Mics" by the Fugees. 😁

I’m so jealous!!!

I loved MD. Wish I could get mine to work 😫🤣

awesome