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I went to a rehearsal last night. Set up my keyboards... powered on my trusty EPS 16+ sampler and stood there as the power supply burned up and started to smoke. (Sidebar: Has anybody ever tried to find parts for a piece of equipment that was 11 years old when the company went out of business, and THAT was 12 years ago?) I took the thing apart last night and there was so much damage... capacitors all swollen.... obviously more to fix than it's worth.
So this morning I got online ans started hitting the usual suspects... eBay and Craigslist. I found some stuff but not a lot. And the thing I can really use is an EPS 16+ because I have all these samples on discs....
I was finding a lot of the EPS available, but the samples are not backward compatible and my samples will not work in an EPS. I was not sure of that when I started shopping, so I struck up a conversation with a guy in PA and it turned out he had an EPS 16+ for sale a short while ago. I explained that in my position, my budget would only allow me to spend what he wanted for the EPS, and since that wouldn't work I guess I would just have to make do without it. I explained why things were bad and that here I was at age 60 going back to playing in a bar band for supplemental income and that it was so bad I was in danger of losing my house.
He wrote back to me that he himself was an aging musician and hoped that by age 60 he had a house to be close to losing and that he would have thick enough skin to play in a bar band again. Also that his EPS 16+ did not sell on Craigslist at the price he wanted and that it must have been the universe telling him to let me have it at the price he wanted for the EPS.
Sometimes things happen that just renew my faith in humanity. I am truly blessed far more than I believed just a short time ago.... Now I need a reason to be near Philly so I can meet this guy and thank him in person.
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Hang onto the old one. Nothing is nonrepairable, actually, but if for no other reason than the old one may be able to upchuck parts if the replacement ever needs them.
--Mac
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Yeah, the floppy, the display wasn't damaged, the keyboard is fine.... they are the identical model..... it was quite an event with that burning smell in a cramped basement.
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I second what Mac says. Baryy and I had matching Juno 106's, and his died up long ago from abuse, and I kept his old one. Mine has hardly ever been played (maybe a year or so) and is in almost perfect shape. Knowing I have guts for it is cool. It's one of my older synths, so finding parts would be next to impossible unless (like Mac) you are into replacing actual components and parts on circuit boards. Sounds like you've met quite a wealth of good people lately. Maybe Karma is catching back up. 
I do not work here, but the benefits are still awesome
Make your sound your own!
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It may be. All of you here are on that list.....
AND my friend Rachel, the one that sings like Emmylou Harris, has another Ensoniq synth I will take off her hands. That will make 6 different Ensoniq models in my museum....
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Eddie, my main axe (actually my only axe with keys) is an Ensoniq VFX SD. Still cranking away since 1989.
Before that I had an ESQ1; which was Ensoniq's first synth after the Mirage Sampler. I used to save sequences and patches via cassette tape data transfer (modem screech!).
The VFX SD has key aftertouch, which I used to use to some effect on held chords. Sadly, almost no keyboards these days have that feature, nor soft synths.
The Ensoniq folks were the real deal. It's really too bad they sold back in the day; as soon as they did - the innovation stopped.
Glad to hear of your good fortune. Pay it forward.
-Scott
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Oh, and by the way - there's a song hiding in your story. Write it.
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Scott, I have an ESQ-1, and SQ1, a VFX, a VFXxd, a dead EPS16 + and a new (to me) EPS 16+ on the way and a TS-10. All Ensoniq, all the time. The VFXsd doesn't boot anymore so it isn't pictured, but here's my studio rig.   I have had Ensoniq my whole musical life. Love the way they sound. Here's how the place actually looks right now. Did some moving.  
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I thought my work area was messy ,but you win Eddie !
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That's not mess, that's work goin' out the door.
I know people who keep very tidy home studios, but nothing ever seems to get into the can for some reason.
Eddie's is very tame, actually, you oughtta see what this place can look like when there's a deadline looming. For one thing, if it was my studio, that dead Ensoniq would be in the pic, opened uo and awaiting components with the soldering stand still there waiting to burn some poor unsuspecting soul. Behind the coffee mugs.
--Mac
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Journeyman
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I used Eddie's picture to prove to MY wife that it is not just me!
I'm doing allright for Country Trash ....
I used to care, but things have changed (Bob Dylan)
BIAB 2026W + RB
M-Audio FastTrack C600, Rode NT2-A
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Epiphone Sheraton, Ibanez 12str, Washburn 6str, Cort 6Str Nylon
Yanagisawa Tenor Sax
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Quote:
I know people who keep very tidy home studios, but nothing ever seems to get into the can for some reason.
I recently bought an amp from a guy who has a home studio. It was beautiful, all set up in a sun room, with the best of everything, a huge TV sized monitor, latest MAC, an array of vintage guitars and keyboards all artfully arranged around the room, the latest Tascam with automated sliders, portable acoustic panels and much more. I was awestruck.
I asked to hear some of his music. He fumbled around a while then took me to somebody else's web page and played a song that he "added a track to" about ten years ago.
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That's not a mess at all, it's mostly the contrast with the cables against the white wall that makes it look messy. Hang some black cloth on the wall and it will look much better. I made the mistake well, not really but sometimes I wonder, of buying a very modern and cool looking corner glass desk on sale for $200. It looks great when it's clean but man, the dust. As soon as it gets dusty it looks like crap and every 10 days or so I'm forced to pick up all the papers, disc's, flash drives, keyboard/software manuals, car keys and everything else that lands on it and dust the thing. It's like having a black car, after one day it looks like I haven't touched it for a month but when it's clean it looks sharp.
Bob
Biab/RB latest build, Win 11 Pro, Ryzen 5 5600 G, 512 Gig SSD, 16 Gigs Ram, Steinberg UR22 MkII, Roland Sonic Cell, Kurzweil PC3, Hammond SK1, Korg PA3XPro, Garritan JABB, Hypercanvas, Sampletank 3, more.
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I went away for 10 days and came home. (The latter is implied eh?)
My wife has always loved decorating and the shows. Her mother gives here 80 or 200 magazines every few months and she pours over them for hours, huddled in a corner with little light, imagining this or that floor treatment, jeez. Then the TV shows on cable. I just leave.
But she descended on my 'studio' and painted it, redecorated it. So proud.
OMG, on the walls were 80 pictures, 8 1/2 x 11. All framed in glass things with little clips to keep the glass in place. Book shelves I used all the time, with great cloth over the shelves so you have to get the darn cloth out of the way to get anything.
Then the sound triggered the glass...which one?
What do you say?
I saw the big Mac at Best Buy...I can afford it I guess. Wow. I'm going to fill my house with stuff.
John Conley
Musica est vita
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Hey Eddie, that doesn't look bad at all, and there's nothing that some cable ties couldn't fix. Or, Bob's suggestion of a black background.
It does look functional, and that's what counts.
BIAB 2026 Win Audiophile. Software: Fender Studio One 8, Swam horns, Acoustica-7, Notion 6, Song Master Pro, Win 11 Home. Hardware: Intel i9, 32 Gb; Presonus Quantom HD8 & Faderport 8, Royer 121, Adam Sub8 & Neumann 120 monitors.
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Save the cable ties, you may need 'em for handcuffs one night...
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Mac, Quote:
Save the cable ties, you may need 'em for handcuffs one night...
Sounds like you've played with some of my old friends. 
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Eddie, Back in the day, I had my Ensoniq VFX-SD repaired at Al Nalli music in Ann Arbor, MI. The thing started to emanate a 'honking' noise at full scale and come to find out, this was fairly common with the VFX/VFX-SD. Inside, there's an edge connection between two different PCBs and the fix was to hard-wire the two halves together. Here's a page dedicated to them that shows the repair that was done to my axe. http://www.syntaur.com/tech_vfx.htmlOne thing that they were not well known for was robust mounting of the PCBs inside of the case - even though the case is a beast in and of itself. If your case creaks and squeaks when you pick it up by the ends, it could very well be that some stuff inside just needs to be re-seated, like that edge connector that lives inside. I'm guessing you have the O.S. diskettes. If not, I can see if I can make a copy (if I can find a 3.5 around here somewhere) and stick it in the mail to you. Let me know via PM. -Scott
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Ann Arbor, eh? Hmmm..... Even though that is where that school up north is located, maybe I will take a run up there and drop it off. I will have to get permission from the Buckeye nation to do it, but I really would like to have the VFX back up and running.
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