True Facts: KORG Trident MK II

[Paul Schreiber]

Got one in for repair: had never seen one before. Interesting facts:

1) Uses infamous VARTA NiCad battery a la' Poly 6. Leaked all over the voice card. Ate
9 traces and dissolved 1 resistor. Suggest replacing with Ni-MH 3.6V battery.

2) Rivals the MemoryMoog for sheer guts: 17 pc boards, over 1300 parts, 53 trim pots.

3) Uses interesting concept: shares 1 uA726 expo. converter among 8 voices! The output
of the expo goes through a CD4051 (??!?!!) to each of 8 voices. There is a S/H cap
for each voice. Since the voices are assigned in "rotation", you have a 7/8th chance that
the key pressed is the "wrong" voltage, and you get a little 'squiggle' portamento effect
which sounds like a dirty Minimoog contact. Bizarre!!! At leat there's not 8 uA726s in it
(too bad, I'd rip 'em out of there and retire to Flordia). The uA726 is run VERY hot,
I measured 66C case temp.

4) Has a very nice BBD-based flanger, all self-complete on 1 card (like an ARP OMNI). 6
seperate delays all going at once.

5) Was purchased in pawn shop for $40 recently (how come all I see in pawn shops is
old tools and guns?)

Paul Schreiber
Synthesis Technology