Synthesizer

[Pepe]

Some new pictures. The overall condition is near-mint. I'm still very happy, especially since I found out that there are two trimpots on a small separate circuit board on the back of the main board that can increase the resonance of the filters. Now it can almost sound as evil on demand as the older models with the first filter circuit.

[Old_Iron]

Looking at those knobs and reading their functionality I feel completely lost, it's like advanced physics to me.

I can only imagine the possibilities of sound creation such machine can offer.

Once again, congrats Pepe, it's a beautiful music instrument.

[Pepe]

Thank you, Old_Iron!

Looking at those knobs and reading their functionality I feel completely lost, it's like advanced physics to me.

That's what I thought as well before I received the reissue model KORG MS-20 Mini. At first I thought that I would never really understand it all or use all the functions. It was the same with the KORG MS-50. But in both cases I soon realized what can be done. And in both cases I thought that it was sad that some functions aren't implemented.

I can only imagine the possibilities of sound creation such machine can offer.

A very famous song with the MS-20 was "Flat Beat" by Mr Oizo. Really nasty sounds and quirky effects are its strength. That's one way how this synth can sound. This filter circuit is so good that the MS-20 can also sound deep and fat, a bit similar to a Moog synthesizer.

With the envelopes and triggers you can create quite complex stuff. A few days ago I found a nice sound setting that was a deep synth bass that could be converted into a synthetic voice with the small switch under the modulation wheel (that triggered the Envelope Generator 1, which caused that the sound was pitched two octaves up and the High Pass Filter with resonance was enabled as well).

The coolest things are possible in combination and interaction with the MS-50.

[Old_Iron]

So cool.

There are some videos on Youtube about it, including a tutorial for a virtual MS-20:







And the virtual MS-20:

https://www.arturia.com/products/softwa ... v/overview

[Pepe]

Today, my brother picked up a Roland α Juno-2 analogue polyphonic synthesizer for me in Cologne. Two keys don't work, the rest is said to work perfectly. I'm going to receive the synth in the next few days.

[laurie]

Today, my brother picked up a Roland α Juno-2 analogue polyphonic synthesizer for me in Cologne. Two keys don't work, the rest is said to work perfectly. I'm going to receive the synth in the next few days.

Nice!! The next project...

[Pepe]

I'm pretty certain that it will be an easy fix.

[laurie]

I'm pretty certain that it will be an easy fix.

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[Pepe]

Since yesterday the Roland alpha Juno-2 is completely repaired. The last thing that I replaced was the faulty slide potentiometer that refused to work in stereo under 75% of the maximum volume.


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I replaced the big electrolytic capacitors and the tantal capacitor of the power supply board as well as the almost 40 year-old and already leaking button cell battery. I also soldered in a new luminous foil for the display. This is almost invisible at daylight, but it is very helpful in the dark as you can see in the pictures.

I cleaned the contact points on the long boards of the keybed with a special eraser that was recommended in a German synthesizer forum and I cleaned the rubber contacts with luke warm water and a toothbrush. After this procedure all the keys worked properly again.

Of course I disassembled the whole synthesizer to clean every part. I removed most of the traces of the tape residue and now it looks pretty good again. The keys were all extensively polished with my favourite plastic polish.


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The only remaining flaw is that the aftertouch only works a little bit if you press on the keys with the full body weight. Sadly this is very common in most of the alpha Juno-2 units. There is a way to repair this, but it includes to remove the complete felt strip under the keys and maybe I will get that done by a repair shop one day.

This is how this instrument looked before the cleaning and maintenance. It was a very, very tough job to get rid of all that tape residue, especially at the parts that you can see in the second picture.

[BearBoy]

That looks fantastic, Pepe. Great job!

Are you going to try to track down a PG-300 for it?