Home > Consumer Reviews > Sony MZ-N710 Silver Net MiniDisc Walkman

wow!!! i bought this at the recomendation of a friend and i was not dissapointed!!!!
the speed it records at is mindblowing and as a new comer to net md it was great for me to get to grips with. easy to use and simple to install software really make this package what it is. the only reason it doesnt get 5 stars is because the ear phones keep falling out of my funny shaped ears!!!
all in all great stuff and ill never buy anythin but sony from now on

The Sony MZ-N710 Silver Net MiniDisc Walkman is a masterpiece of engineering! It produces the Best quality sound possible. If you have not already bought this beauty the i recomend you to buy it this minute!

This is the best mini disc recorder in all the lands! it has everything and when you use it, it feels like you are in another world! Either that or that you cant hear anything else othe rthan the music! It makes you feel like you are at a concert and when you finish using it, you cant wait for another apportunity to listen to it again.

Just got my NetMD and discovered several things:
1) The bundled software is crashtastic
2) There's a plugin for Realplayer for downloading songs to the NetMD but that's it - no other software supported.
3) Great, its got a microphone input so I can plug in a mic, record myself playing guitar, upload it to my PC to add other instruments . . . oh wait, no, you cant upload tracks.
4) You can't use it with a Mac (no software available) - so that Powerbook will have to wait.

The only thing I bought the NetMD version for was because I thought it'd be simple to plug into the usb port and chuck some tracks on. Ive resorted to recording tracks straight from my hifi system instead. The sound is fine - its a minidisc though so hey, its not rocket science.

Sony - your software support for this device is useless. Unless you buck your ideas up quickly, what with MP3 players, your NetMD products will be worthless anyway. Thanks for not a lot.

As a standard Minidisc player this model is top rate, very easy to use and very high quality. The design of the player is very pleasing, it is light and it certainly feels very robust. All of the connections are easily located and well marked and the charging cradle is an added bonus.

The product is however let down when you look at the NetMD side of things. One of the biggest problems is that if you want the highest quality of playback and compatibility for your discs on non MDLP players then the amazing 32X speed of transfer is reduced to about 1.5-2X, additionally there is a wait for music to be converted into a compatible format meaning that in practice transfering full stereo music using the NetMD technology is no quicker than simply recording it in real time.

Another problem with the product is that the SonicStage software seems to not like a wide variety of MP3 files, meaning that some of your collection may never be able to be transferred to MD via the NetMD technology. Additionally if you use your MD recorder to record lectures or sound effects the NetMD technology will not allow you to transfer your audio from the MD back to the computer, the only audio you can transfer back is that which originated from your PC.

Lastly Sonic Stage will only allow you to transfer any piece of music or audio to MD three times before u have to "check-in" one of your MD copies again back into the computer. This is a form of copy protection but it very annoying for someone who may be trying to copy audio that they own themselves such as a band who wants to make MDs to send out to promote themselves.

On a brighter note the NetMD technology does make it very simple to name discs and tracks and to perform other functions that are very hard on a portable recorder. To a lot of people this alone will be worth owning a NetMD recorder even if the other functions of NetMD are not all they are cracked up to be.

In conclusion this is a very good product that can do anything you want a Minidisc recorder to do. If you are upgrading from a conventional recorder to a NetMD recorder simply because of the new NetMD functionality be sure you read the fine print of what NetMD actually allows you to do before you part with any cash to be sure that you are getting what you expect.