The freeze problem I mentioned always happend on stage. When you play live as much as we do nightly you are constantly switching styles and sounds on the fly to create sought of a medley when you have a full dance floor, so you may be doing 4, 5, songs in a row with different styles without stopping thus having to hit Buttons very fast on the fly (one of the reasons I dislike a touch screen unit)and this is where the problem lies. I think the unit is confused somtimes creating "LOCKUPS or FREEZE" problems. But a unit MUST be able to work flawlessly Under Stress on stage unlike home use. Just my opinion.

Scott,
I was only joking, but curious how you would react

About stressy stage-work :
A few weeks ago we did our first gig with the SD1. I think about 15 times we had main-power failures .... and they were very 'dirty' : Short, extremly short or long !
My Korg ih locked up often but the SD1 showed not a single problem.

We had no idea what caused the interruptions until we pulled out the powerconnector from the cable that supplied us : One of the pins was totally defective.
(That cable was NOT mine )

Roel

Henry,
you're right, this one miss the latest update, and I've been told by my
dealer that it will solve the "freeze" problem and more.
Since that seems to be history, I'll not tell you how many times I have
restarted this thing until now....
Thanks for your description about how to do things, all tips helps, and
at last I've managed to load and save to and from both HD and floppy.
Even recorded a little tune, but not yet for other ears to hear.

Scott,
I've converted some different patterns from KN5 to X1 format to try out,
and it works fairly OK. Have to do some adjustments, which I don't know
how to execute yet, also change some instruments, but the few I have tried
sounds pretty close in volume/balance. Very similiar as we know from the
converting of other brands into Technics.
Now I have to get myself some sleep before I fall down from the chair.
GJ

Added / Editet the next morning

Andrea,
when I started it up today, I've finally start the "solo" sound exploring.
Until now I've mostly tried to figure out how things work, and examinated
all the styles and variations etc.

Yes, you are absolutely right. It is a noisy "grumble" who is in present,
just as you have told us all the time. When using the organs you can hear
it very clearly, in fact very loud too. I.e. you can hear it in a more
"tiny" way when using the Stage Piano
I have not done any adjustments to the effects yet, just playing the sounds
in the preset mode.
I cannot understand why I did not notice this at once, because it's easy to
hear. (Guess I was too anxious to find out how to operate this thing)
GJ


[This message has been edited by Gunnar Jonny (edited 08-05-2001).]

Hi Gunnar and Everyone
I have to say, in the 10 minutes I had to try the SD1 at George Kaye's store - I felt rather bewildered. Never having played any Ketron/Solton keyboard, I found it very difficult to perform things that come simply on other keyboards. I would describe it as user-unfriendly. And, oh my god, ALL those teeny little buttons all look the same. Not good for me - my vision is not what it used to be!
But, I guess one would learn it within a reasonable time. Although it's disconcerting that even George is struggling with some operations on the SD1. I find it incredible that they would make a complicated keyboard like this and have no User Manual?!?
And to Tony, yes... I would like to see more standardization in the "front ends" of all these keyboards. It would be nice if all the companies all agreed on standard terms for things, and implemented more uniform ways of doing things from one keyboard to the next.

Well, I guess I'll be holding off on buying an SD1 at least until a proper User Manual come with it.
Tom
Tom

Wow, this is certainly becoming an interesting topic. The SD1 reminds me of a mystery adventure. Every twist and turn seems to turn up new surpises. I can't wait to hear what the NEXT chapter will bring. Keep the news coming folks ! - Scott

Henry01,

The manual I'll be writing will NOT be a final product of KETRON, rather - something I'll be doing on my own (similar to what I did for the X-series units).

I just had my SD1 this weekend after a long wait ... [it might have been biked from NY to Phili] <- (a joke). I have so far spent a total of over 8hrs with it not figuring out obvious style and sound operations but rather trying to access the 'hidden' features ... and I think I did get access to a lot, e.g the audio wave file syncapate to MIDI & arranger - rather cool! I have actually been able to download some wave files off the web and sync these up to the POP1 & Latin patterns - sounds like I had Janet Jackson and Maria Carrie in my house (wish I physically did!).

GEORGE: Your destination selection (in the SD1 unit) is determinded by what RAM style you are in PRIOR to entering the PATTERN EDIT mode. So if you want to edit any pattern (I believe) you will have to select the pattern to be edited (i.e have this pattern as your current selection) prior to pressing the PATTERN EDIT button. The difference with the X1 here is in the PATTEN EDIT mode, the X1 gives you the option of switching b/w patterns (using F6) to determine which pattern you want to edit and selecting the pattern with the SELECT buttons WHILE YOU ARE IN PATTERN MODE, whereas the SD1 does not - you'll have to determine this PRIOR to PATTERN EDIT mode. I will address your other questions via an email to you later today.

Anyone know what the voltage value is for the *RED
*BLACK
*YELLOW

wires from the transformer to the POWERBOARD of the SD1?

Added to the above what about * WHITE (for the X1)?

Thanks for the info.

PS: The manual will cover most of the functions currently supported in OS1.0a.

AJ

What a shock! I didn't expect to see your name testing out a Ketron. I thought you were a real Technics fan. But then read your review sounds like you are not real sure on that keyboard after a test drive.
I hope you get a chance to try the KN6500 soon! and before you make a decision.

Marilyn

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Gunnar Jonny:
[B]Just me all alone with a Ketron SD1..........
..........and a usermanual left at the store!

So at last, a Ketron SD1 is standing along with my excellent KN
Oh no, I've not bought it yet, just have it for tryout this weekend
to see if it is a keyboard that I'll go for.

I too envy the people from across the pond. They seem to have access to all the brands to demo. I live in Florida. There is a local dealer that has the VA7. I have gone to the store where I bought the KN6000 but they didn't have a KN6500 in stock. They were more of an acoustic piano store and never had more than one KN6000 in stock at a time. So hard to check one out here also. Yamaha and Soltron or Ketron I guess, you never see around here. Well you see the smaller Yamaha's but not the top ones. So know how you feel!

Marilyn

As a Technics user I understand where you're coming form in being spoilt! I'm the opposite from you, I had Roland keyboards before I went to the KN6000. All the things that annoyed me on the Roland......were done differently on the Technics. And done better! The Roland operating system just was not as user friendly by a long shot. The VA7 has the same things that annoyed me on my last Roland. Too many pages to scroll through to get anything done!

Marilyn

Marilyn. I too, live in FL, so I know what you mean. The best I could find in my area, Tampa, was the PSR9000, but already owning the 740, I found it too similiar, to expend that many bucks. I recently picked up a 6500 on Ebay, without a manual, so I downloaded the 6000 manual, then later I found the 6500 manual. the only difference seems to be the extra styles and some more voices, so I wouldn't worry too much about the upgrade. i also recently bought a Solton X1, so, am in the process of comparison. The Sax on the 6500 doesn't compare to the X1 sax.