Emax

It looks like some bits are set in the Emax II EEPROM by these install disks. When the Emax II 
boots it appears to check the EEPROM and only allows the use of stereo sampling and >2MB of 
RAM if it finds the appropriate codes. One of my Emax II samplers, with 8MB and stereo sampling, 
sometimes fails to get the right codes on bootup and operates as a 2MB machine with mono 
sampling. So it looks like directly modifying the EEPROM data could be another solution to allow 
expansion of the memory. 

I believe there is even a facility to reprogram the EEPROM from the diganostics menu #7 "Adjust 
features". I have tried this out briefly but if anyone wants to do some OS (or firmware) hacking 
then this would be a worthwhile place to expend your efforts. At some point I will try capturing the 
signals going to the EEPROM with a logic analyzer to see what is being read. 

From my understanding, the EEPROM also stores the calibrations for the pitch wheel, mod wheel, 
volume slider, data entry slider, foot pedal, footswitch polarity, boot drive, headroom and LCD 
contrast. There was also a plan to add a user access PIN code but it appears that was never 
implemented.

On the original Emax I gather the EEPROM stores the filter calibrations as well as the code allowing 
access to the SE functions.

/Tristan

Thursday, November 27, 2008, 5:52:57 AM, you wrote:

>
That would be quite easy. The buyer needs a (WinXP/Vista) PC with 
internal floppy drive, because the disk copy can not be done on the 
Emax itself.

The buyer should use Omniflop (http://www.omniflop.com) and install 
the omniflop.sys driver before using the omniflop software. I 
recommend to use the latest version (2.2A).

Then start OmniFlop,
- click NEXT, 
- select "Read Disk" and click NEXT, 
- select the drive (A, B, ...) and flag all items except "Use slow 
step rate" and click NEXT,
- when Omniflop recognizes the possible disk formats, select 
80*2*10*512 Emax (standard) (or ...Emax (DOS standard) in the 
previous versions of OmniFlop)
- perhaps Omniflop will ask to get a free license key if this is the 
first time you use an Emax disk. Just press "Get license online", 
provide the required information on the webpage, and you'll 
immediately receive a key in your e-mail box which has to be copied & 
pasted into the field of the still open window of OmniFlop
- then the "disk read" process will start (provide a filename when 
prompted) and an 800K image will be saved to your harddisk.

This is the image we're looking for !

Note: I received an official Emu 2MB memory expansion install disk 
with one of my s/h Emax-II samplers, but I assume it has been used 
before and moreover, the last sectors of the disk seem to be corrupt 
so it's pretty unusable now...

///E-Synthesist

--- In emax@yahoogroups.com, "Ted Summers" <djtbs1@...> wrote:
>
> If someone on the group buys this and was going to duplicate the 
disk, it
> might be wise to post the instructions how to do the duplicating 
prior to
> them getting it. Maybe instructions and link to any programs needed.
> 
> Regards,
> Ted
> 
> 
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>