This Yamaha DX7 had intermittent connection issues with the audio output; if the cable was touched the audio would either drop out or come back. After some troubleshooting I came to the conclusion that the terminals within the jack had been pushed back over the years so they didn’t make proper contact with the cable…
It is very common that the power switch in the Roland SH-101 becomes bad, which was also the case in my friend’s unit. This can cause various strange issues, the unit powers up as it should but when the button is touched various strange issues can occur. This can be resolved either by opening up…
I bought this Korg Poly-61 as “for parts or repair”, it basically did not work at all. From the description of the Ebay listing I suspected that it had a battery leak. These old NiCad batteries can do quite a lot of damage as it eats the copper away in the traces in the board…
In this video I show the installation of a HKA Design Roland TR-505 ROM Expansion. This expansion gives you three extra sets of samples that you can switch between. Apart from the regular TR-505 kit you will have samples from Linn LM-1, LinnDrum and Oberheim DMX. The installation is really simple and the trickiest part…
I this video I show how I replaced the existing permanently mounted power cable on my Korg Poly-61 with an IEC C14 power socket. The reason for this was that the old cable was pretty crusty and also it had a British connector (I’m in Sweden and we use Schuko style connectors). If I were…
Here I show how to remove the keys from the keyboard of a Korg Poly-61 and how to attach them again. This procedure should be the same for some other Korg synths from the same era, e.g the Polysix. The keys in this one were really dirty, especially on the underside so I washed them…
In this video I show how I repaired the joystick on my Korg Poly-61. It had been crushed during transport and pushed into the chassis so it did not work.
This Korg Poly-61 had issues with around 10 of the buttons where they did not generate any notes. The keyboard in the Poly-61 uses membrane buttons which have a rubber dome with a conductive plate which is pushed down on the circuit board. The conductive part tend to go bad over the years so in…
Replacing all push buttons on the front panel of a Korg Poly-61 as the buttons were very unreliable; some had to be pressed really hard and some of them generated multiple presses). I am using the dust sealed (IP67) Omron B3W-4050 buttons. The strems on these buttons is ever so slightly thicker than the orignal…
My banged up Yamaha DX7 needed a new display as it was a bit dim and I also wanted a backlight I did not want to pay €20+ for a new display kit. In this video I show how I did this. Perhaps this would have been easier to just buy a kit but I…
