Mini-Disc Music

[Klaus-Peter Schrage]

Condon Thomas A KPWA wrote:
> Does anyone on the list know how to get music from a mini-disk
> player/recorder onto a linux system?  What hardware is needed?
> 
Minidisc players/recorders usually have digital outs, either optical or 
coaxial. And recent soundcards, even cheap ones, have digital i/o as 
well (called s/pdif). So, when recording from a md player, you usually 
can do so on a strict digital level - provided your soundcard has a 
corresponding s/pdif input, optical or coaxial resp.
But alas, the support for digital i/o in Linux soundcard drivers often 
is poor (at present, I am struggling with my new Terratec 6fire 24/96 
soundcard).
You'd best consult www.alsa-project.org, go to their "soundcard matrix" 
and see if there's an ALSA driver for your soundcard available, and if 
it's supporting s/pdif i/o.
Otherwise you can alway connect the line out of your md player to the 
line in of your soundcard and use your favorite sound recording 
software. But then you'd miss the benefits of digital recording, as 
there is a lot of digital/analogue and analogue/digital converting involved.
Klaus