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PinkFloydDudi · Post by **PinkFloydDudi** » Fri Aug 19, 2011 6:57 pm

Jeremy Bender wrote:Thanks McHale!

But, how does this explain my clunky keys where it seems there is nothing stopping them knocking on the case (or so it sounds)? I posted about this in the other thread about the keyed quality (the stage piano thread) and whilst it doesn't affect playing my top key is low and most of the black keys in upper octaves plus the lowest and highest white keys make a clunking noise

I'm not sure I am brave enough to open it up and check!

That sounds like a problem all on its own. I think everyone is in agreement that the keys can be slightly uneven and not equally spaced (with an explanation why from McHale) - but I certainly don't hear any clunking noise when playing.

Just throwing this out there, does it make that noise with it off? I'd chuckle a bit if what you are hearing is the damper pedal noise on the grand pianos or something

=P

McHale · Post by **McHale** » Fri Aug 19, 2011 7:07 pm

Jeremy Bender wrote:Thanks McHale!

But, how does this explain my clunky keys where it seems there is nothing stopping them knocking on the case (or so it sounds)? I posted about this in the other thread about the keyed quality (the stage piano thread) and whilst it doesn't affect playing my top key is low and most of the black keys in upper octaves plus the lowest and highest white keys make a clunking noise

I'm not sure I am brave enough to open it up and check!

That "clunking" sound is probably the hammers inside. It has actual metal, mechanical hammers. That's a GOOD thing. And to make them graded, the hammers are in like 5 or 6 groups of different weights. The top and bottom key makes a different sound because it's at the end of the keybed and doesn't have a key or any more felt next to it.

I do *NOT* recommend anyone opening up the Kronos and risk losing their warranty. How you mount the bottom (wood or metal) directly affects the playability of the keybed. Dan was 100% correct on this.

I'm 100% behind the Kronos keybeds. I know the 61 key very well since it's on my M3 and now that I fully understand the RH3, I think it's a VERY solid design. It is not cheap in anyway.

There will be a lot of RH3 keybed pictures coming at some point (next time the Kronos gets opened up).

Bruce Lychee · Post by **Bruce Lychee** » Fri Aug 19, 2011 7:09 pm

aron wrote:The part I don't understand is that .... this action is in other keyboards right? How come we don't hear about other people complaining like this? Are the Kronos buys a bunch of complainers?

Maybe it's the way the posts are made. Complaints instead of statements - which really should go to the company after the first few posts are made.

If I were bothered enough to write day in and day out about a problem that affected my time enough to feel I have to write every day about it, I would probably get rid of the keyboard. That's what I certainly did with several keyboards. Now that I think about it, I didn't complain enough about those [/b]

I think it is only in the SV1. I haven't hung around any SV1 forums so I can't tell you if there are similar complaints. That being said, the same action does not mean you will get the same results because there can be differences in the supporting structure.

I'm waiting to hear back from Korg, hopefully with a positive resolution.

Jeremy Bender · Post by **Jeremy Bender** » Fri Aug 19, 2011 7:13 pm

No pinkfloyddudi it's not the damper noise...

EXer · Post by **EXer** » Fri Aug 19, 2011 9:27 pm

McHale wrote:I do *NOT* recommend anyone opening up the Kronos and risk losing their warranty.

I totally agree. But Korg should definitely provide 4 GB RAM from stock so that we need not open our Kronoi.

McHale wrote:How you mount the bottom (wood or metal) directly affects the playability of the keybed. Dan was 100% correct on this.

I don't understand that.

I have opened several Yamaha, Roland and Kawai (but no Korg) keyboards to change their internal batteries (I even had to open a keyboard to chase away a spider that crept in, incredible but true!), and I never had any issue with the keybeds.
On all these instruments there is no connection between the keybed and the bottom lid.

Is it different on the Kronos? If it was the case, that would be a design flaw...

McHale · Post by **McHale** » Fri Aug 19, 2011 10:45 pm

EXer wrote:I totally agree. But Korg should definitely provide 4 GB RAM from stock so that we need not open our Kronoi.

I disagree. The vast, vast, vast majority of Kronos owners will NEVER sample ever. Why make the Kronos cost a lot more for a feature that most will never use? It just drives the cost up.

EXer wrote:Is it different on the Kronos? If it was the case, that would be a design flaw...

The keybed aligns to the frame and the screw on the bottom goes through the bottom, the keybed, and the chassis. I don't see a problem with it. It's very solid and by securing it to the bottom plate instead of to something else, it's actually sturdier. I'll give you that we have differing opinions if it's good or not, but I definitely would not call it a design flaw. It's not like you need to have an engineering degree to line up the holes before mounting the bottom.

-Mc

EXer · Post by **EXer** » Sat Aug 20, 2011 12:08 am

McHale wrote:I disagree. The vast, vast, vast majority of Kronos owners will NEVER sample ever. Why make the Kronos cost a lot more for a feature that most will never use?

I disagree (at least, we agree to disagree

). Following that reasoning Korg should not have included a sampler in the Kronos at all. And the Kronos would not sell, remember the FA-76 (1st Fantom). Fortunately, the Kronos has a built-in sampler, and even if most of the users won't sample themselves, many of them will use the possibility to load samples. And for that, there must be enough RAM (unless streaming user loaded samples from SSD becomes an option). And given the price of the Kronos, 2 GB more RAM would not be asking to much.

McHale wrote:How you mount the bottom (wood or metal) directly affects the playability of the keybed.

McHale wrote:The keybed aligns to the frame and the screw on the bottom goes through the bottom, the keybed, and the chassis.

I'm not sure I understand what you mean.

On all the keyboards I have opened so far the keybed is screwed to the chassis by dedicated screws, and removing the bottom does not separate the keybed from the chassis (although some screws holding the bottom go threw the keybed too).

Do you mean that on the Kronos the keybed is not being screwed to the chassis anymore when the bottom is removed? If this is the case, I keep thinking that it is a design flaw: one should be able to open the bottom lid without interfering with the keybed.

rrricky rrrecordo · Post by **rrricky rrrecordo** » Sat Aug 20, 2011 12:25 am

McHale wrote:The vast, vast, vast majority of Kronos owners will NEVER sample ever. Why make the Kronos cost a lot more for a feature that most will never use? It just drives the cost up.

I have 1 GB RAM in my Motif XS. I don't use the sampler to - uh - sample, but I've bought some really nice sample collections from the Motifator shop. I'd love to have 4GB to fill - (granted, it would take a dog's age to load that much data into the XS)

Ojustaboo · Post by **Ojustaboo** » Sat Aug 20, 2011 12:53 am

McHale wrote:
I disagree. The vast, vast, vast majority of Kronos owners will NEVER sample ever. Why make the Kronos cost a lot more for a feature that most will never use? It just drives the cost up.

-Mc

I would agree with you if ram was expensive, but when you can buy 2gb ddr2 ram from around £15 inc vat, bearing in mind the shop I got that price from is going to be making a reasonable mark up, how much more would it have actually cost korg? Can't see it adding more than a couple of £ to the factory cost.

On the plus side at least once it's out of warranty people can upgrade cheaply if they choose to, unlike the m3 which just cost me £120 for 256mb which is 5 times the price I can buy 4gb ram for my laptop.

Mind you, if the kronos had a 64bit op system, whatever amount korg put in, someone would always wish they put more in.

Best

Joe

McHale · Post by **McHale** » Sat Aug 20, 2011 3:44 am

Ojustaboo wrote:I would agree with you if ram was expensive, but when you can buy 2gb ddr2 ram from around £15 inc vat, bearing in mind the shop I got that price from is going to be making a reasonable mark up, how much more would it have actually cost korg? Can't see it adding more than a couple of £ to the factory cost.

This was explained by Stephen Kay earlier. Adding a cheap part costs a LOT more in the end. I'll see if I can find the post but a $15 part could result in a $100 price increase.

NuSkoolTone · Post by **NuSkoolTone** » Sat Aug 20, 2011 5:22 am

As I'm thinking about the spacers, I gotta say. I'm really NOT looking forward to having to think about that at 2AM after a gig. I just wanna pack my sh*t and go home!

Ojustaboo · Post by **Ojustaboo** » Sat Aug 20, 2011 7:57 am

McHale wrote:
Ojustaboo wrote:I would agree with you if ram was expensive, but when you can buy 2gb ddr2 ram from around £15 inc vat, bearing in mind the shop I got that price from is going to be making a reasonable mark up, how much more would it have actually cost korg? Can't see it adding more than a couple of £ to the factory cost.
This was explained by Stephen Kay earlier. Adding a cheap part costs a LOT more in the end. I'll see if I can find the post but a $15 part could result in a $100 price increase.

Fair point but the extra ram slot is already there and it's not as though a separate part has to be sourced.

They would simply be doubling up on a part allowing them to probably buy it at a lower cost due to the increased amount they are buying, the only real extra cost would be the time it takes to install the second bit of ram, probably around an extra 10 secs per keyboard.

EXer · Post by **EXer** » Sat Aug 20, 2011 9:29 am

jeebustrain wrote:Even though I know it's nowhere near as bad, I'm starting to have flashbacks to the Alesis Fusion forum 5 years ago...

The early versions of the Alesis Fusion suffered from bugs and from dull presets that didn't really emphasize the great potential of its synth engines (*). To Alesis' credit those bugs have been fixed by OS updates, and patches ware made available for download.

• With the latest version of the OS, a bigger HD and after a price drop the Fusion really became a very interesting multi synthesis synth workstation; unfortunately the writing was already on the wall...

(*) my understanding is that the Alesis developers worked under their management's pressure to release the product on schedule and within the planned budget, finished or not. IMO in certain situations managers can do more harm to a product and to their company by not allowing more budget and delay to bring the product to a better level of finishing; this is a very common error, not only in the music industry; in the case of the Fusion, they payed the full price for that... But this is another debate.

EXer · Post by **EXer** » Sat Aug 20, 2011 10:31 am

Ojustaboo wrote:[...]I really really hope this isn't a result of say new top management lowering quality to make more profit because thats the sort short sighted thing many companies have done over the years and once your product gets a name for being cheaply built, it can take years to recover.[...]

I share that hope...

johnxyz · Post by **johnxyz** » Sat Aug 20, 2011 12:58 pm

Despite the great synth engines, I think I'm out with this thing. I'm finding myself an OASYS.[/quote]

Exactly my thinking now. Its the synths i want - i'm going to hunt for a 76 note Oasys to use live, with my PC3x, then add a Mac Book with VSTis for more syths, strings and pianos.