The Yamaha AN1x Synthesizer mailing list

Dear All,

I have experienced very strange behaviour from my An1x the last 4 months.

- The sound is messed up (noise, crakling type.. or sound lost)
- Some keys are not responding (repeated pattern of keys), but may respond on certain velocities
- The noise or lost sound is almost always on the 2nd voice engine only (half polyphony for single sounds or missing 2nd part for dual).

This may have started as I opened it to fix a broken key (which I succeeded with..)

I have opened the unit again trying to locate any loose cables or similar, but haven't succeeded.

Giving the An1x a hit from top solves the issue temporarilly.

Anyone have any ideas?
I really love this synth and would really like to fix this.

Very Best Regards,
Kristofer Lindblom,
Sweden

Op 21-7-2013 19:26, klindblo schreef:

> - The sound is messed up (noise, crakling type.. or sound lost)
> - Some keys are not responding (repeated pattern of keys), but may respond on certain velocities
> - The noise or lost sound is almost always on the 2nd voice engine only (half polyphony for single sounds or missing 2nd part for dual).
>
> This may have started as I opened it to fix a broken key (which I succeeded with..)
>
> I have opened the unit again trying to locate any loose cables or similar, but haven't succeeded.
>
> Giving the An1x a hit from top solves the issue temporarilly.
>
> Anyone have any ideas?

Yes, stop hitting your synth. :)

The AN1x, for some reason, has a daughter board that does the second
half of the 10-voice polyphony. There's a chance that this somehow got
dislodged. I have no idea where this daughter board is, but there's
probably just a bunch of chips on it (at least one of them big and
labelled Yamaha) and nothing else. Try setting it again.

- Peter

Hello Kristofer !

Take a look at ANY connector inside , daughter board included.
Remove it, better clean the connector with an electronic contact cleaner
(KF or similar stuff), put it again firmly in its socket : done !
Looks likely to be a bad contact issue... or may be SEVERAL issues : the
"crackling sound" could be caused by a dirty or bad output jack too, the
missing notes are more likely related to another connector or ribbon
cable issue. And if the "missing part" is always on the 2nd voice it's
(90%) the daughter board connector that's messing.
I don't think it's a more "electronic" trouble, such as a bad or "near
dead" chip.
Cheers.
J.F.

klindblo a écrit :

>
> Dear All,
>
> I have experienced very strange behaviour from my An1x the last 4 months.
>
> - The sound is messed up (noise, crakling type.. or sound lost)
> - Some keys are not responding (repeated pattern of keys), but may
> respond on certain velocities
> - The noise or lost sound is almost always on the 2nd voice engine
> only (half polyphony for single sounds or missing 2nd part for dual).
>
> This may have started as I opened it to fix a broken key (which I
> succeeded with..)
>
> I have opened the unit again trying to locate any loose cables or
> similar, but haven't succeeded.
>
> Giving the An1x a hit from top solves the issue temporarilly.
>
> Anyone have any ideas?
> I really love this synth and would really like to fix this.
>
> Very Best Regards,
> Kristofer Lindblom,
> Sweden
>
>

Many thanks,
Will try the below mentioned things this evening, will update when I will share the progress once I have tried it.
/K

--- In AN1x-list@yahoogroups.com, Jeff <jf.serviere@...> wrote:
>
> Hello Kristofer !
>
> Take a look at ANY connector inside , daughter board included.
> Remove it, better clean the connector with an electronic contact cleaner
> (KF or similar stuff), put it again firmly in its socket : done !
> Looks likely to be a bad contact issue... or may be SEVERAL issues : the
> "crackling sound" could be caused by a dirty or bad output jack too, the
> missing notes are more likely related to another connector or ribbon
> cable issue. And if the "missing part" is always on the 2nd voice it's
> (90%) the daughter board connector that's messing.
> I don't think it's a more "electronic" trouble, such as a bad or "near
> dead" chip.
> Cheers.
> J.F.
>
> klindblo a �crit :
> >
> > Dear All,
> >
> > I have experienced very strange behaviour from my An1x the last 4 months.
> >
> > - The sound is messed up (noise, crakling type.. or sound lost)
> > - Some keys are not responding (repeated pattern of keys), but may
> > respond on certain velocities
> > - The noise or lost sound is almost always on the 2nd voice engine
> > only (half polyphony for single sounds or missing 2nd part for dual).
> >
> > This may have started as I opened it to fix a broken key (which I
> > succeeded with..)
> >
> > I have opened the unit again trying to locate any loose cables or
> > similar, but haven't succeeded.
> >
> > Giving the An1x a hit from top solves the issue temporarilly.
> >
> > Anyone have any ideas?
> > I really love this synth and would really like to fix this.
> >
> > Very Best Regards,
> > Kristofer Lindblom,
> > Sweden
> >
> >
>

--- In AN1x-list@yahoogroups.com, Peter Korsten <peter@...> wrote:

>
> The AN1x, for some reason, has a daughter board that does the second half of the 10-voice polyphony.

The "some reason" is probably easy to explain, if 5 notes was as much as they could achieve without pushing the per-chip clock higher than was practically possible or desirable, but they wanted more than 5.

And/or maybe each individual synthesis chip can, for some reason, only load one timbre for all 5 of its notes, in which case they would need to use two separate chips to enable the bitimbrality of the AN1x.

The PLG150AN also only offers 5 notes and one timbre. Chances are this is because it's almost the same chip(s) on a card and they probably couldn't and/or didn't want to fit two sets of 5-voice ICs on a card that size. Anyway, the reason is probably related somehow.

> I have no idea where this daughter board is

It's very easy to find. It's basically sticking right in your face when you open the AN1x. It's plugged into the main board and simply mirrors two chips that exist on the main board underneath it, each pair being one synthesising chip and one RAM chip, 5 voices each.

db00451 schreef op 5-9-2013 02:51:

> --- In AN1x-list@yahoogroups.com, Peter Korsten <peter@...> wrote:
>> The AN1x, for some reason, has a daughter board that does the second half of the 10-voice polyphony.
> The "some reason" is probably easy to explain, if 5 notes was as much as they could achieve without pushing the per-chip clock higher than was practically possible or desirable, but they wanted more than 5.
>
> And/or maybe each individual synthesis chip can, for some reason, only load one timbre for all 5 of its notes, in which case they would need to use two separate chips to enable the bitimbrality of the AN1x.

That would explain two chips, for sure, but it would not explain a
separate daughter board. :)

- Peter