Yamaha CS80

Well, thanks to Bradley/Synth80s (and my friend Ed, for helping me
get it up the stairs), I am once again a CS-80 owner! The tolex is
a little bit rough and the keyboard needs a bit of work, but the
panel/knobs look and work great and the tuning is perfect.

Now I have to decide how much restoration and/or modification I want
to do to it. At the minimum I'll fix up the keyboard, clean up some
cosmetics, and add Crow's fixes to the CMOS boards (bypass caps,
etc).

At the other extreme is to gut all electronics between the
knobs/keyboard and the voice cards, replacing it all with a CPU/FPGA
based board to have MIDI, CV/Gate I/O, programmable presets (like
Prophet 5/OBX), voice assignment/unision modes, multi-timbral, auto-
tune, and split into two (three with power supply?) cabinets so one
person can move it.

I'm an electrical engineer and have some woodworking skills
(including portabilizing a couple of Hammond organs), so it's all
possible if I have the time and energy.

I'm going to take quite some time planning, deciding, and just
playing, before I do anything drastic. I'll be running some of
these ideas in detail in the mods thread, but if there are other
CS80 owners interested in massive rebuilds/mods, let me know,
especially if you have engineering, firmware, or cabinet-making
skills (hi Crow & Kent!). It would great to come up with a common
set of mods and split the development effort.

Much more later,

David

Hi David,

congrats on your find! But.... (boring old elitist alert) don´t rip this
CS80 apart. What makes it what it is is the entity... and chopping up a
synth that is rare and soughtafter seems sacriligeous to me.

I can very well understand the techie bit and the challenge to come up with
these mods but...


Regards,

Stephen.


"Human beings are a disease, the cancer of this planet, you´re a plague. And
we are the cure." (Agent Smith / Matrix)

Visit the official [´ramp] website at www.doombient.com

----- Original Message -----
From: "David Rogoff" <david@...>
To: <yamahacs80@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, August 31, 2004 7:58 AM
Subject: [yamahacs80] Yay - I have a CS-80 again!


> Well, thanks to Bradley/Synth80s (and my friend Ed, for helping me
> get it up the stairs), I am once again a CS-80 owner! The tolex is
> a little bit rough and the keyboard needs a bit of work, but the
> panel/knobs look and work great and the tuning is perfect.
>
> Now I have to decide how much restoration and/or modification I want
> to do to it. At the minimum I'll fix up the keyboard, clean up some
> cosmetics, and add Crow's fixes to the CMOS boards (bypass caps,
> etc).
>
> At the other extreme is to gut all electronics between the
> knobs/keyboard and the voice cards, replacing it all with a CPU/FPGA
> based board to have MIDI, CV/Gate I/O, programmable presets (like
> Prophet 5/OBX), voice assignment/unision modes, multi-timbral, auto-
> tune, and split into two (three with power supply?) cabinets so one
> person can move it.
>
> I'm an electrical engineer and have some woodworking skills
> (including portabilizing a couple of Hammond organs), so it's all
> possible if I have the time and energy.
>
> I'm going to take quite some time planning, deciding, and just
> playing, before I do anything drastic. I'll be running some of
> these ideas in detail in the mods thread, but if there are other
> CS80 owners interested in massive rebuilds/mods, let me know,
> especially if you have engineering, firmware, or cabinet-making
> skills (hi Crow & Kent!). It would great to come up with a common
> set of mods and split the development effort.
>
> Much more later,
>
> David
>
>
>
>
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>
>

Hi David,

Just need one more plinth for the after touch boards which is around here
somplace so bare with me.

KSR

--- In yamahacs80@yahoogroups.com, "wavecomputer360"
<wavecomputer360@g...> wrote:

> But.... (boring old elitist alert) don´t rip this
> CS80 apart. What makes it what it is is the entity... and chopping

up a

> synth that is rare and soughtafter seems sacriligeous to me.
> I can very well understand the techie bit and the challenge to come

up with these mods but...

Stephen,

You bring up a big, important issue, which I've been thinking a lot
about.

Here's the main options:
1) minor repairs, tuning, etc (easiest)

2) restore to new (RL Music approach)

3) replace some boards with currently available parts, but same
functionality (Crow's approach).

4) Keep the keyboard, ribbon, knobs, and voice cards. Gut/rebuild
everything else, making it lighter, repairable, and adding a lot of
new functions without changing the sound or playability. It should
still sound and act like a CS80, but add more features.

Each of these requires very different amounts of work. One issue
that's hard to ignore is how each of these affects resale value.
I've always had keyboards for a few years, play them (and tinkered),
and then sold them to buy something else. Is this a big concern for
others?

As an engineer, option 4 would be my choice. I'd want to do it right
and have it look great when done. This would be a BIG project, which
is why I wrote about working with other people to design and build a
few (ok, 2 or 3) of these. Not only would this ease the work, but it
would give it a bit of stability if there were a few of these super
CS80, with the same mod and multiple people who knew how they worked
(and could fix them).

Everyone please add your thoughts: I'd really like input on this.

David

--- In yamahacs80@yahoogroups.com, "wavecomputer360"
<wavecomputer360@g...> wrote:

> But.... (boring old elitist alert) don´t rip this
> CS80 apart. What makes it what it is is the entity... and chopping

up a

> synth that is rare and soughtafter seems sacriligeous to me.
> I can very well understand the techie bit and the challenge to come

up with these mods but...

Stephen,

You bring up a big, important issue, which I've been thinking a lot
about.

Here's the main options:
1) minor repairs, tuning, etc (easiest)

2) restore to new (RL Music approach)

3) replace some boards with currently available parts, but same
functionality (Crow's approach).

4) Keep the keyboard, ribbon, knobs, and voice cards.  Gut/rebuild
everything else, making it lighter, repairable, and adding a lot of
new functions without changing the sound or playability.  It should
still sound and act like a CS80, but add more features.

Each of these requires very different amounts of work.  One issue
that's hard to ignore is how each of these affects resale value. 
I've always had keyboards for a few years, play them (and tinkered),
and then sold them to buy something else.  Is this a big concern for
others?

As an engineer, option 4 would be my choice. I'd want to do it right
and have it look great when done.  This would be a BIG project, which
is why I wrote about working with other people to design and build a
few (ok, 2 or 3) of these.  Not only would this ease the work, but it
would give it a bit of stability if there were a few of these super
CS80, with the same mod and multiple people who knew how they worked
(and could fix them).

Everyone please add your thoughts:  I'd really like input on this.

David

I´d opt for 2) and 3). This seems to be the most sensible thing to do,
otherwise it would be like... well, imagine John Lennon´s psychedelic Rolls
Royce, you get it and decide to paint it black all over because you don´t
happen to like Paisley...

Honestly, I´ve never read something that off-the-wall... chopping a CS80
into pieces. Even if it was completely broken I´d either restore it to New
shape (if money were no issue) or use it as a basis to get spare parts from.

Stephen.

"Human beings are a disease, the cancer of this planet, you´re a plague. And
we are the cure." (Agent Smith / Matrix)

Visit the official [´ramp] website at www.doombient.com

----- Original Message -----
From: "David Rogoff" <david@...>
To: <yamahacs80@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Tuesday, August 31, 2004 6:40 PM
Subject: [yamahacs80] Mod or keep original? - was Re: Yay - I have a CS-80
again!


--- In yamahacs80@yahoogroups.com, "wavecomputer360"
<wavecomputer360@g...> wrote:
> But.... (boring old elitist alert) don´t rip this
> CS80 apart. What makes it what it is is the entity... and chopping
up a
> synth that is rare and soughtafter seems sacriligeous to me.
> I can very well understand the techie bit and the challenge to come
up with these mods but...

Stephen,

You bring up a big, important issue, which I've been thinking a lot
about.

Here's the main options:
1) minor repairs, tuning, etc (easiest)

2) restore to new (RL Music approach)

3) replace some boards with currently available parts, but same
functionality (Crow's approach).

4) Keep the keyboard, ribbon, knobs, and voice cards. Gut/rebuild
everything else, making it lighter, repairable, and adding a lot of
new functions without changing the sound or playability. It should
still sound and act like a CS80, but add more features.

Each of these requires very different amounts of work. One issue
that's hard to ignore is how each of these affects resale value.
I've always had keyboards for a few years, play them (and tinkered),
and then sold them to buy something else. Is this a big concern for
others?

As an engineer, option 4 would be my choice. I'd want to do it right
and have it look great when done. This would be a BIG project, which
is why I wrote about working with other people to design and build a
few (ok, 2 or 3) of these. Not only would this ease the work, but it
would give it a bit of stability if there were a few of these super
CS80, with the same mod and multiple people who knew how they worked
(and could fix them).

Everyone please add your thoughts: I'd really like input on this.

David





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