no i don't own one, not yet

i just want a quick way to access/swap the AUDYA's hard drive in case i have a HD failure during gig

they should have a screw off cover as does many Rolands (ie. XP-80, G-70) where you remove it with 4 screws, and voila, there it is,

remove and replace with your backup
but that would make too much sense wouldn't it?

make a new bottom cover for AUDYA with this opening and sell at a reasonable price and it will sell... and make all future AUDYA's with new bottom.

or you could pull a "Frankie" on it :-)

As I said on the other thread... For those contemplating an arranger (or any keyboard) that is dead in the water if the HD fails, first and foremost, backup is mandatory.

But I would also suggest you start to harass your manufacturer to consider a mirrored array of two HD's in the case. If you are not using SSHD's (and those are pretty expensive for ones big enough to handle live loops and sampler files), you are beating on your arranger (OK, playing it hard ) while the HD spins (and sometimes reads), probably not a recipe for long term reliability...

But an array (or at least, two separate drives that you could mirror manually) would be inexpensive (HD's cost pennies, these days ) and provide security and peace of mind for the professional player...

we just need quick acces

Diki,

If you buy a PC it comes with a recovery disk, so should Audya, it doesn't so like you say make a full backup.

I know it's "in" to pick on the Audya, but I don't know of any arrangers that have an easy-to-swap hard drive.
I've had four Ketrons, a Roland or two and several Yamahas and never had a HD failure.
Sure it can happen, but it's always important to have a backup of everything essential to get you through at least a night.
DonM

Don,

what other arranger, besides AUDYA actually has a HD? or a HD which has parts of styles that stream off of it (drums, bass, guitar)?

i know my G-70 does not have a HD,
but it DOES have a nice cover where i can EASILY access my expansion card,

i mean ROLAND was smart and thought "maybe the customer will want or need to quickly access/swap the card.

i just removed cover once to install expansion, only once, but it's EASY

i did not have to open up keyboard

same with AUDYA, it should be easy to swap out HD, it's not an expansion card, but you may need to access the HD MORE times than you would an expansion card...

The X1, the SD1, SD5 and the Midjay plus all the Yamaha Tyros line had hard drives.
I agree it would be nice to be able to swap quickly, but I'm just saying I've never had one fail. Hope I never do!
I'll have my E50 and/or laptop on hand if it ever happens on a job. Not ideal of course, but you must have backup of some sort.
DonM

DonM,

You are probably right, they are not likely to fail, but if a keyboard is moved around regularly then they are at more risk than your desktop PC and perhaps more than your laptop, but HDDs are far more reliable than they used to be, I think the Auyda HDD may be a pig to get out quickly and surely not on a gig, if it goes down you will have to start singing. Frank added a drive internally, it could be added to the outside but I think it’ s a risk you may just need to take not to have one at all, but a backup in a caddy to change HDD if needed would only cost you £10.00 for the caddy and £20.00 for the HDD and you have a spare drive and all your files backed up.

I guess I'd have to say in this particular case, the omission of USB2 from the interface choices is a bad decision. I know I'm not a big fan of its' inclusion on everything (seldom being necessary) but in this case, a USB2 interface would allow easy hook up of an external HD in case of the primary HD fails for any reason.

I think you are getting your wires a little crossed, leezone. That expansion on the underside of the G/E series is for a ROM expansion, nothing to do with the HD at all. In all fairness, if the SSHD fails on a Roland, you are just as hosed as if it fails on a Ketron. Probably more so, given how hard these are to find... Mind you, a SSHD is VERY unlikely to fail from playing stresses

But I still think that, as inexpensive as it would be to add, a secondary HD inside the Audya's case would be a better solution than hauling around a spare HD and having to hot swap on the gig.