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This almost brand-new looking synthesizer arrived in February. With the original box and manual. A real beauty in this state!

The power supply board was dead, so I had to hunt down a replacement board of a KORG Trinity. The Z1 is alive again - and it sounds fantastic!

I already had the monophonic KORG Prophecy a few years ago and I really liked it. The Z1 is pretty much the same, but with a few more synthesis algorithms and 12 voices of polyphony.

It is just how I imagined it to be and it fills a gap in my instrument array!

That is SWEET

I was GASing for this synthesizer for over ten years. In January I told my wife that my this year's goal was to finally purchase a Z1. Estimated price: 550 EUR. So I started selling a few things to make that possible.

Then the local ad with the dead Z1 in mint condition with box and manual showed up ("... suddenly didn't want to power on anymore ...") and I rushed to the phone. The seller wanted 50 EUR plus shipping. I offered him 100 EUR, he was happy and wished me good luck with the repair.

A professional guy from a local Repair Café inspected the power supply board at his home and he told me that it was irreparably broken (burnt transformer coils, other parts faulty as well). I gave him 40 EUR as a donation for the Repair Café (he didn't want to take any money) and started searching for a replacement board.

After a few weeks a guy from Switzerland offered me his working KORG Trinity power supply board (an upgraded version with more power) for 70 EUR including shipping. I was shocked to see that he chose the cheapest possible shipping option without tracking, but it arrived and it was well packed. I assembled it and it was an instant success. The synthesizer was alive again and I basked in sonic bliss.

So in the end it was 210 EUR in total. For a synthesizer in like-new condition that had normally cost me around 700 EUR. I am very happy. Even the seller is relieved that this instrument lives on again. A story with a happy ending for everyone.

Great score, Pepe. Looks pretty much brand new. Good work saving it

Not really well versed in synths, so I went to yt to see what the Z1 is capable of and it earned my respect.

Very nice piece of gear, congrats Pepe, for the price it's like winning the lottery.

A short clip with my KORG X-911 Synthesizer, showing a function (an obvious one) that I recently discovered:

https://www.instagram.com/p/CdVF53_M-m7/

I do like that sound ! It tracks pretty well too.

It does, indeed! Well, at least with the right playing method, pickup, damping ... The circuit for the guitar tracking is the same as (or a variation of) the single MS-03 Signal Processor unit. Much better reliability than the External Signal Processor circuit of the MS-20.

I often heard people ranting about the tracking of the X-911, but I have played octaver pedals with way worse tracking. For people like me KORG did a brilliant thing back then!

I love these old Korg synths. I used to have an M! that I resurrected and I really regret selling.

Nice one pepe!

Pepe wrote: ↑

Mon May 09, 2022 4:53 pm

It does, indeed! Well, at least with the right playing method, pickup, damping ... The circuit for the guitar tracking is the same as (or a variation of) the single MS-03 Signal Processor unit. Much better reliability than the External Signal Processor circuit of the MS-20.

I often heard people ranting about the tracking of the X-911, but I have played octaver pedals with way worse tracking. For people like me KORG did a brilliant thing back then!

I’ve never got on with that ESP section of the MS-20. I set it up exactly as shown in the manual but still struggled to get it tracking properly. In the end I ended up buying a Roland GI-10 Midi Converter & GK2A pickup for a Yamaha Pacifica to connect to my other synths via midi.