Bought the 510 bundle at a SEARS close-out for $299. Great deal, the sound is really good. Even listening with headphones in a quiet room I have a hard time distinguishing MD from CD. But I use it mainly in my noisy car so who cares?
The editing features really kick ass. I like to mix compilations and using the MD is 10x better than regular tape for any type of editing. Cut and paste is VERY accurate, changing song order is a breeze, and the UNDO feature is a nice extra.

The remote is cool, with more buttons than any other I have ever seen (whole alphabet + control buttons). Makes it easy to name songs etc. The included MD-40 (?) portable playback unit is ok, nothing fancy (although it does remember where on the disc it was when you cut and restore power to the unit, very convenient in the car)

My only "annoyance" with the 510 is the lack of a digital fade, which is really only a software issue (I think) and should have been included.

It has digital in and out, and with my new Toshiba DVD I will be able to record digitally from CD.

4 stars (because no digital fade..)

I got an MDS-JE520 for Christmas and am I impressed! As a long time audiophile (34 years)I was a skeptic at first. I tested with ADK Pro 240 headphones, which reveal flaws better than any speaker at any price, and was amazed! Direct digital recordings of CD's and recording of vinyl records are indestinguishable from the original. This $250 deck beats any cassette recorder at any price! It is much easier to use than a cassette deck and much more convenient. I highly recommend this product to anyone interested in recording.

Bought it about a year ago. At the same time a friend of mine also got one.After just six months, every time I walk by it, it turns itself on.
Or it can just turn itself on whenever it likes to. This happens, whenever
there is no disk inside. I called Sony and they said that the unit needs to
be fixed. Two months later the same thing started to happen to my friend.
But a week ago, his player broke down completely, and he can't even take an
MD out of it. The ejecting mechanism went dead.
As regarding to the sound. It has one of the worst A/D and D/A converters
out there. My tape deck sounds much better. The sound is too bright, with
almost no bass. The only feature that I liked, was the ability to enter
song titles, and disk titles. Overall I like the format very much, but
I don't like the equipment. Sony just promissed the new generation of the
MD Players/Recorder, which would be much closer to the CD quality.
The model JE530 should be out soon, which should replace JE510 + JE520.
I am giving it two stars. Both of them are not for the sound or quality
of the MD player, but rather for the format itself.

Great audio format, I'd recommend about any other model than the Sony MDS-JE510. The 500 or the 520 don't have the problems this has. My friend and I each bought an MD bundle the same time, and about 13-14 months after we bought them the both developed the turn-on bug. It's caused by a poorly designed microswitch that senses when disc is inserted/in place. After following some instructions someone put up on the web, we mostly repaired ours to working order before things got bad (mine will still keep turning itself on for a few minutes after a disc is ejected). All that aside, I've been very happy with features, button layout, overall design, remote layout, and sound quality. I'd have given it a 5 if it had been reliable. I have to give it a 3 because of its problem, though.

Yes as you can well imagine, this is another digusted MDS-J510 owner. I have a total lemon to tell you about. I have had the eject mechanism fixed twice. Also, I have noticed that mine makes varying quality recordings. For example, most of the time, it makes a perfect recording which sounds good. Other times the new recording will sound like a scratched CD. The MDS-J510 finds some discs very difficult to read at times and it will skip like a scratched CD. Or it will try to read some disc's table of contents and then report "Disc Error". This all occurred using analog connections and both Maxell Gold and TDK mindiscs. I have tried at least 2 different discs from each company. Now another problem. I just picked up an Audioquest Optilink1 toslink digital cable to record from my Pioneer DV-414 DVD to the Sony MD. I get no sound whatsoever on the recordings. During recording, the level meters on the MD are moving to the music and when I monitor the recording in progress, it sounds fine coming through the output of the Sony MD. Durind playback, the Sony MD is very slow in reading the table of contents and then when it gets to the 1st track it takes for ever and a day to read the 1st second of the track and no sound comes out. Has anyone heard of these problems??? (the latter two, not the eject problem as that seems like a common occurence) I you have encountered this and have any info about this, PLEASE email me about it. I will give this unit a 1 star rating because of its reliability. Like another reviewer said, "I would recommend about any other MD player/recorder on the market but the Sony" I believe that as well. Thanks.
My system:

AMC 1100 preamp
AMC 2100 amp
Pioneer DV-414 DVD/CD player
Sony MDS-J510 Minidisc player/recorder
Paradigm 7seMk3 speakers
Monster MCX-2s speaker cable
Monster M-550i interconnects
Audioquest Optilink1 toslink cable for DVD to MD connection

I bought the MDS-JE510 bundle from SONY's company store through a friend. I love the format. The audio quality is better than tape and the editing features are what really make the MD great. HOWEVER, my unit developed the "auto-on" problem at about 11 months. I sent it to SONY for warranty repair. It was returned and worked for almost 5 months (1+ months past the 90 day repair-warranty period). I sent it in for service a 2nd time (I had to pay) and it was returned with horribly distorted audio in the headphone jack. Now 75 days later the "auto-on" problem starts again (3rd time). SONY apparently cannot repair this problem. I e-mailed them but got a form-letter reply. Customer Service management is not sympathetic. I love the MD format but SONY does not stand behind their product in my opinion. So I have to agree with the "anything but SONY MD" comment. 5 Stars for the MD format minus 3 stars for poor SONY service.

MDS JE510I have had this unit for about 14 months. I bought it as part of a Bundle that included the MZ-E40. Although many users have reported problems with this unit, I have had none.

I did a work-around to prevent the "self-turn-on" bug from ever happening by plugging in the unit to a switched outlet on the back of my amp. Thus, there is no way for the unit to receive power unless the amp is on - and when the amp powers on, the MD also get powered on.

Ease of editing is probably the strongest point, followed by cd-like sound. This unit can now be had cheaply, but not that much more cheaply than the 520, which would be a better choice (or the 530) for most people, since those units have had fewer problems reported.

There is at least some chance I will replace my 510 with a 930 sometime soon, but until that happens I have no complaint.

records as good as any top end tape deck

as long as it is not a busted bucket-o-&%$@

lets get this straight. if you buy a sony mini disc player make sure VERY SURE that it is not the mds-x00, x01, and most x20 cause they all exhibit a high SUCK factor. the doors brake, the loading and unloading mechanisms fail the power supply is possesed by evil spirits and sony should recall the hole lot.

they SUCK SUCK SUCK SUCK
suckiest sucks that ever sucked a suck


should read zero

ps mine died the week before warenty was out as i was making discs for my trip to turkey. when i got back 5 weeks later those choads at sony would not fix it, and for 5 weeks i had no tuneage.

Similar Products Used:

none

Excellent format...if it would have caught on. size of disks

Remote size (as big as the damn MD player), eject mechanism, Poltergiest power control, sony audio SUCKS! sony support SUCKS!

I can't believe a company as old as sony can come out with crap like this MD player and expect their stock to rise in value!!
I don't know if they were built on a friday, sony was in a hurry to get on a bandwagon, or the team of chimps that designed this turd block built them all on 'free crack in the workplace' day.
DO yourself a favour, buy ANYTHING else EXCEPT Sony...unless you're on survivor and you find one washed up on shore and there's nothing else, STAY AWAY!
This thing is like my ex...it's not too pretty, it just sits there and works when it wants to (not very damn often) and it powers up on it's own when I don't want to use it.
Im sure the fine people at sony tested this door stop for at least 1/10 of a second before releasing them to the market. Shame on sony for selling it and I feel shame for buying it.

Similar Products Used:

none before, and never will own another...sony audio

Good controls on remote.

Most controls on remote

I have another lemon with the rest on them. Isn't there some lemon law to force a recall if a certain percentage of units go bad? Anyway, The loading mech jammed 4 times (had to pay for two- $85 ea.) and now the write protect sensor is stuck in the "protected" mode. I hear that the new je-x30 series are working ok now, but I just can't trust that till I see the results. Looking into a JVC 448bk or a sony ES series (longer warranty) On a side note: My portable player for the car, (e30?) got stolen. Bad coincidence? This is a great site btw! Mucho info!