I'm a new MKS-70 owner. I had long heard of the legendary MKS-70 and lusted after one. After many failed Ebay bids I finally landed one locally. Here is my initial opinion and some questions:

Opinion:

The sound is very warm and can sound quite analog. Some of the sounds it is capable of remind me in some ways of the Roland D-110. I find that the filter and resonance are surprisingly mild. My MKS-50 (Alpha Juno) is much more of a screamer and my Juno 60 is much more analog sounding. The MKS-70 has a broader sound pallet than either of these though. Overall I am happy with the unit, it's just not quite what I was expecting.

Questions:

Since the MKS-70 is the rack version of the Super JX (JX-10) I would expect the patches to be interchangeable between the units. I have found sysex banks of JX-10 sounds on the internet in two sizes. 10k and 17k. The 10k banks load into the MKS-70 with no problem. But the 17k files will not load. Even the JX-10 alternative banks on the Roland web site (which are 17k) will not load. Does anyone have any ideas?

Someone suggested that I need a memory card (M-64C) to load these banks. Is this correct? I did not get a memory card with the unit, but from reading the manual it looks as if the memory cartridge is only used to save/restore the internal memory of the synth and not provide real-time memory access.

Could it be that these 17k files contain sequence data from the JX-10? I understand that this is not supported in the MKS-70. If this is the case, is there a way to convert the sysex file to MKS-70 format by removing the sequence data? As you can see I am pretty confused by this.

What PC editor are people using for the MKS-70? I am trying to use SoundDiver, but it is very confusing. Any recommendations for a better editor?

Lastly, Does anyone have any cool sound banks for the MKS-70/JX-10 that you are willing to share? I have started work on programming my own but would really appreciate any additional sounds. I have only found the ones at the MKS-70/JX-10 sites linked from SynthZone's Roland page.

Thanks in advance to anyone that can help!

Sayer
mp3.com/sayer
members.aol.com/sayersweb/

The MKS-70 came out in 1986 and your wright it is the rack version of the JX-10 . All the JX-10 is essentially 2 JX-8Ps in one box . It was noted to have slow enevelope speed and a rather wobbly sysEx system . You really should try to find the PG-800 programmer , it works with the JX-8P as well as the JX-10 . That will give you real time control over the parameters and you will be able to make your OWN interesting sounds .