http://www.keysoftservice.ch/kn7000/index-e.htm

and
http://www.keysoftservice.ch/kn7000/sd-tm7000-e.htm

Come off it Technics ,159 euros thats nearly £100 what is this about we buy a keyboard with lots of so called new technology which is very difficult to use unless you buy loads of other software at a highly inflated price, and then only the panasonic reader will work properly with the software HELLO!how stupid do you think the technics players are? When it comes to the next purchase just how many customers do they think they will have left they will certainly be 1 less ME.
jan

Hello,
I agree...they develop such keyboard with special features as the Sd technology ...bu in order to benefit all these technology you have to pay for it.
Not very friendly for the customer.
Alain

I agree too. £100 is a hideous amount of money for what appears to be some glorified file manipulation software. And to have to buy a SD reader too (if one ws not supplied when the 7000 was bought). Admittedly the software is unlikely to sell in the thousands due to the relatively small user base and they need to recoup their investment but even so it seems a lot. I bought Windows XP yesterday for only £59, and think of everything that does!

I really wish Keysoft would also get someone to translate their 'English' webpages properly rather than have to try to read through and interpret their 'broken English' version!

Richard.

Kozy, I think it looks pretty stupid to talk as if I am in some way responsible for the price, rather than just posting the information

TP ..... IMHO ..I don't think KK was speaking back at YOU, rather he was addressing technics .. the other readers/writers also appear to have thought he was speaking to technics, the company, rather than technicsplayer, the writer .....
t.

Fair enough then, but Technics don't sell the software.

Sorry Alec I did not mean to shoot the messenger
As for technics not making the software, they must have some connection otherwise keysoft would not get a look in for this software,after the fiasco earlier this year with the hardrives and how conveniently keysoft closed the website and left lots of people high and dry.
This software should have been included in the box with the 7000 even if the price had been altered accordingly, rather than leave the keyboard without the means to work properly as it should in this day and age also a bit of loyalty to the customer would not come amiss I personally have bought 5 of technics flagships over the last 10 yrs
and certainly will not buy a 6th. Also even down to the card and r/w we have to buy the inflated price panasonic card and r/w in order to get full compatability.
Thats got that off my chest.
jan


[This message has been edited by kozykeys (edited 11-06-2002).]

Hi Kozy
as I understand it, Technics have left a software area available for third party suppliers to design plug-ins, and this is what Keysoft does. I have no idea about the economics but presumably it depends on the numbers of the potential market.
regards.

Technics has decided to use almost the same file system that has been used for many years with hard drives for Technics keyboards. I am amazed that it has not changed or improved much in all that time. It seems to me that the decision was an attempt to give us song names that are more easily understood while keeping hardware costs as low as they can. So we have keyboard hardware that can only work with 8 character file names with a special system of 16 character string names used for the display. The SD display is great! We don’t have to live with cryptic 6 character names like we have used with floppies. But that file system comes with a cost. Windows can’t see the names that we see at the SD display of the keyboard. It sees a folder name like TFLD001 for the first folder on the SD card that we might have named “Big Band Styles” or whatever. It sees the file name 01001kn7.cmp for the composer file of the first song of the first folder. Windows sees a file named kn7000mn.inf for the file that contains all those neat 16 character string names. These file names are very similar (not exactly the same) to the names that were used with the Keysoft hard drives. So, although we can use the keyboard without the Tech Manager software, it would be nice to have a little help managing the file system that Technics has chosen to use.

I tend to agree that it would have been much better consumer policy to include something like the Tech Manager as a part of the keyboard. But, I expect that price competition forced some of those decisions. It would also have been much better, I think, for us to deal with Technics rather than Keysoft for something like the Tech Manager. Historically, Keysoft has not done well with English translation, nor with meeting it’s own predictions of software releases.

Having said all of that, I will buy the software just as soon as I can find it here in the US. The ability to put the SD card in a reader to edit names and reorganize the placement of data on the SD card at the computer is a great tool. I also like the ability to print a cross-reference between the 16 character string names with the actual file names that they are associated with. I feel confident that most any SD card reader will work with the files that I have since I don’t work with audio files or secure stuff on the SD card, not yet anyway. So, I will first try my little SanDisk Cruzer card reader to see what happens.

I use a panasonic pcmcia cardbus sd reader which seems (and should be) faster than usb, limited only by the card write time. This handles the audio fine. I suspect that not all other readers will interface with the jukebox software and handle audio, though technics, midi and pictures should be fine, but have not tried any other readers yet. The next laptop will have a sd slot built in, hopefully that should handle audio ok since toshiba are one of the systems original developers.

The plug ins will give sx6 type functionality with the superior tlx lyrics (which I much prefered) in the screen and should be much better on the tv screen too and also twenty six character file names.