Just blew $40 on a brand new shielded USB cable. No dice.

Poor you. I think one SD1000 should go back to Italy, so they will understand more the problem. But for now, no one want to send back its SD1000

SD1000 is powered by external power supply, not USB.

This, is 100% correct, Ketron does not support the SD1000 working over usb powered connector, they just can not guarantee it working, be ause it uses more power then the USB interface maximum supports...

Just look up the power consumtion of the SD1000 and then have a look at the USB port specs... If it works for you, then you are lucky..

So I am Luky, My SD1000 is USB powered with all the computers I own.

Someone had 2 SD1000. One was ok, and the other not, in the same computer...

I was informed that the SD1000 requires 5v. S.O.L. Had I know that I probably would not have purchased it. I guess I'll still keep it for desktop use, but will now also need t keep the SD4 for portable situations.

Phillyjazz, do you know vArranger? It is an amazing software for the SD1000 !

For the good news, I did the first test with the 64 bit version of vArranger.

I have tested to load 5GB of SF2 samples + some 64 Bit VST instruments, and all seems to work ok !!

I have pretty good luck with vA2 with SD-1000.
But my issue is...WHEN will Ketron fix the identified bugs??
Also, Mine...the power switch from brand new out of the box will not stay in...so AJ is supposed to get me a replacement SD-1000

Dan : Yes, I have seen the videos and gone to the website. Looks great, but I have a big investment in Band in a Box (100s of styles and thousands of tunes.) Would love to have vArranger even just for the interface, but can;t afford it right now after dropping so much on the SD1000. I'll save my pennies. I would love to get it for the patch management alone in live situations, I also have a boatload of SoundFonts, so it would be good for that purpose too, on my Windows tablet. I could probably get away with not carrying a module.