I found this information on the internet that could relate to the cold weather and the Sony mini disc problem. It is only a shot in the dark, but I have a feeling that this may very well be the case. What I do know is that cold weather will affect cassette recorders causing them to slow down when in the record mode. Some of the Sony models had a pitch control to compensate for this problem when the audio being recorded in the field had to be transferred to a computer or another audio source. I had a portable minidisc recorder, microphones, a video camera, and a digital camera that all use AA batteries. Before I left, I got the maximum capacity rechargeable AA cells I could find and brought lots of spares just in case. I should have been able to run my minidisk recorder for 3 or more hours with a fully charged set but it always seemed to run out on me.
Extremely cold temperatures impair the performance of batteries because chemical reactions work slower at lower temperatures. Batteries make or store electricity using chemical reactions. Before my trip I anticipated that cold weather could give me battery trouble. I bought a battery pack for my camera that attaches to the camera with a cable so I could keep the batteries warm under my coat. But the temperatures I experienced were never below freezing, and were not cold enough to cause problems. The battery problems I did experience were probably caused by a few bad batteries. My minidisc recorder takes 8 AA batteries and if a single one of the them malfunctions, the machine won't work. So I did occasionally run out before I wanted to, even with all my spares. One day I was on a long trip and I had to shuffle all the batteries several times, even removing cells from my microphones to get the last bit of juice out to take some pictures. Audio List Help, Guidelines, Archives and more... http://www.pc-audio.org To unsubscribe from this list, send a blank email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED]