Hi guys,
I've been looking around online for a CD recorder in order to copy some of my vinyl. I quite fancy the Yamaha CDR HDD 1500, which records to a hard drive as well as CDR's. Does anyone on the forum have any experience of this machine?
If so what would you say are it's strengths and weaknesses and how good is the quality of the CDR's it produces?
Are there any better machines, similarly priced out there?
Many thanks in advance for your help.
Regards,
Steve O.

Can it record onto cdr discs or does it need cdr audio ones?

I've owned this machine for about three years now. It has very good D/A converters (24/96 I think) and makes first class CDs from LPs. It also copies CDs extremely well.

It has a big hard drive so you can record programmes lasting hours if you wish. It will do all the stuff other hard disc players can do. Since it is mostly used for CDs and LPs I own, there is no need for a back-up hard drive. If you don't own the software, as with FM broadcasts, you just burn a back-up copy.

You can configure and bolt in bigger/multiple drives should you ever fill the one which comes with the machine.

It was designed to offer the same flaxibility in making compilations etc provided at the time by minidisc.

However, as with most hard disc machines the user interface takes a bit of learning. You can plug in a screen/keyboard, though I've never needed to - I also understand they're great for holding photographs, but I've never been there.

Replay from the hard drive is quite good but CD play is background music - ie not up to Naim CD standards. However, if you replay discs burned on it on a Naim CD the quality can exceed that of the original (heaven knows why).

It has a facility called AMQR for burning discs which gives longer pits and lands than normal burners and this gives great results at the cost of only a few minutes of recording time.

It will officially only use Audio CDRs but in any case gives best results with TDK blanks.

I use it as a sort of modern cassette deck which means I don't have to get involved in compiling albums and movings tracks on the hard drive using the U/I.

Its a great FM radio recorder.

most recording studios use these.

Alesis masterlink.

its an option. up to 96k.

also you can burn in high res format!!!!

Last time I looked the Alesis had a tiny hard drive and I believe there's a whole industry devoted to modding them. There is a review on the Stereophile site, I think.

yes and its the same price for more options.

I have a Yamaha CDR-HD1300 - I agree with abbeydog's assessment - it is an excellent machine for making copies of CDs or other source material. AMQR does seems to give better results than using my Apple Mac to burn Audio CDs.

Only downside is you cannot upgrade the hard-disk - only a Yamaha approved installer can do this because you need to make the firmware recognise the new disk - not too much of a problem.

The Alesis Masterlink is another superb recorder, but much more expensive than the Yamaha. You can make hi-res recordings on it, but not sure if you can play them back on anything other than an Alesis Masterlink. I've only spent a few hours with one of these, but definitely liked it.

Another alternative is a Panasonic DVD recorder with its 400 MB hard disk. This will do some fine recordings to DVD, which you can play back on a decent DVD player; I've done this on my Linn CMS with decent results.

Overall though I liked the Yamaha recording in AMQR with playback on the CDX2/555PS best of the devices I have access to.

ATB Rotf

Can you get the Yamaha in black?

Funny you should ask that - you can indeed and its roughly the same width as Naim kit...

I wold go for a Zoom H4. It's a portable device that, when connected to a PC, can do everything the Yamaha can do plus much, much more. You don't have to worry about if the built in hard disk is upgradable or not, becasue you use what ever is connected to the PC.

It's also much cheaper as you buy it in the music store...

JohanR

Hi guys,
Thanks for the input so far. Very interesting.
The Alesis looks quite a versatile little unit and it is black too, which aesthetically is a bonus. According to the Yamaha website the CDR HDD 1500 is available in Titanium only.
If there's any more info out there I'm very happy to hear it.
Thanks,
Steve O.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Adam Meredith,

My Yam is black but I had to order it.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Adam Meredith,

quote:

Originally posted by abbydog:

It will officially only use Audio CDRs but in any case gives best results with TDK blanks.

Intriguing, is there a way to get it to use standard cdroms?



SJB