To prospective purchasers of the Pa2x

[mrkorg]

I'm thinking about all this and trying to find a reason for the freezing etc. Can't korg implemet the protocols they used in the pa1x pro or even better advance and improve on that since this is a pa2x pro.

I think it is some circuitry problem mixed with some minor software bug. Software for the freezing and hardware for the LEDs.

This is my suggestion: To make things clearer, why don't the moderators create a sticky thread titled "pa2x pro users experiencing hardware/software problems please report here" or something on those lines, at least Korg Pa can see how many people have these problems.

[Fransman]

Dear Mr Tramannoni,

What you just wrote is a load of [... ] Korg can arrange collection of "my" Pa2x and you can keep it. It is a trojan horse as far as I am concerned.

I'm out of here.

Robert Sherratt

Wow, this is very serious business. I sure hope Rob stays active on this forum! He has put so much effort in it and helped so many peope a lot!
People of the KORG-company, come on! Don't let your best keyboard ambassadors down! This is an example of really shitty communication AND PR from your side. You should feel embarrassed. The thread on this forum can have very bad consequences for Korg. I already heard (on a Duthc keyboardforum) of people stop buying a Korg keyboard because of this.

[Lee]

I have been reading...and here is my comments:

1) Suggestion please...EVERYONE that has had a problem...PM (Pesonal E-mail Paolo T. your serial number of your PA2XPRO today. That way he can see S/N's of effected units. That's everyone that has had any freezes, LED issues. Tell him as much as you can about the problem. My gosh...why did he not request this in his recent post? Maybe I missed something and he already has ALL S/N's effected???

2) Yes, maybe now it is serious to them...to us it has been serious for a long time! We are not over reacting...this for some is a big problem. They should have been collecting S/n's talking to each of us with a problem, collecting info on when/how/ these lockups happen, and exchanging these boards for us...my gosh...do we have to tell tem how to solve this...they are the Mfg!

By procrastinating and not involving us...now the cat is out, and lots of people (more each day) know about it. It is their fault they are in this situation.

3) Rob, I respect your decision..but respectfully ask you to give another chance as now I do believe we have their attention. They should collect your Pa2. And send you a new one NOW! This is no time for them to be cheap!

4) Sharp, First thanks for everything you provide to us. I don't agree it's like tramannoni not being on te M3 forum...Jerry is the Korg USA disrubutor! and he has been involved with M3 to a great extent. He and his group get paid for every single PA sold in the US. Why not support us equally as M3...beacause it is not PRO Synth? I do beleive he cares and now will help after my phone call to Bobby Nelson (works for Jerry). We are all not a bunch of 80 year olds playing for our grandkids! Not that there is anything wrong with that.

Quote'You have the best people viewing the Arranger section, and they are the programmers who work on arrangers only. ' OK, So what good has it done us, we don't hear from them and we still have quite a few HW & SW issues . Unless there is a SURPRISE!...OS2 HAS NO FIXES/FEATURES/IMPROVEMENTS that WE have requested...only what marketing has requested. Quite honestly OS2 is a slap in the face to all us with posts on here that want/need things to either be fixed or improved. OS2 is fine...but while they were working on it...these other things got neglected.

Quote'I'm only trying to let you guys know that there are ways to go about getting help and what I see going on here with people complaining and offering nothing for KORG to go on is not one of them. Does that make sense ? ' My Gosh man what else can we do...go to Italy and bang on the door? Lots of details are hear about every issue, both HW and OS that we have. I sent a very detailed list of all the issues I had to Korg.

If they needed any additional info all they had to do is ask...there is a lot of knowledge and talent here, you, Rob, Nedim etc. and some of us others are't to shabby either.

You know if the PA2XPRO was not such a terrific instrument...it would be easy just to sell it..get something else...But, I beleive in it. So, that's one reason me and others here are figting to get some things done. The HW issue may be tougher as it is not all boards..but the other issues are not and yet monthes of posts, and no info about OS2 addressing any of them.

Exampe: A recent post indicated that they now about the 'Fill' issues and have for a long time, yet no solution...other things should have come before OS2 if not enough resource to do both.

Respectfully,
Lee

[Rob Sherratt]

Hello everyone,

Thank you very much for your messages of support and Lee thank you for the work you've done communicating successfully about this with your contacts in the USA.

My Pa2x is being collected on Monday 17th by express courier service. The labs will study the issues on my keyboard first of all and will also recall other boards if they cannot get to the bottom of the issue using my board. They have promised to come up with a diagnosis and a solution.

Let's now see what happens.

I am disappointed that I have felt it necessary to burn my bridges with Korg after doing so much with this product family over the last two years. We will see in future if a reconciliation is possible. It is currently too early to say.

Regards,
Rob

[Lee]

Rob,
I think you are being very fare....let's hope for the best for us all.

One thing I do know...if we stick together and work with Korg...anything can be accomplished.

Lee

[jerrythek]

Paolo T. writes documentation for Korg Italy, and cares about the products and users. But sending him PM and emails is not the right answer.

The issues need to be run through the local Distributor and they will get things passed on to Korg Italy. Talking about crashes etc. doesn't really help to fix them - finding a known, repeatable operation or steps that will cause a crash makes it easier to find. And it seems to my innocent/early involvement with this that that has not been able to be found.

In the US we have had no incidents or reports of LED problems until this morning. Someone called in looking for me based on the activities here at the forums. So we will certainly look into it. As is Korg France (Algam) and Korg Italy. I have confirmed they are working together to explore this.

I'm sorry to see this has spiraled out of control for so long now, and to be honest, I currently have nothing significant to offer. Except my attention to the matter. Korg IS following up on this.

Regards,

Jerry

[Lee]

Jerry,
Thanks for the update. Since Paolo was our only contact here on the forum ...we thought he was forwarding everything to Korg PA. Guess not. Or if he did, we got no feedback that they got it.
That might explain why we feel communication is so poor. However we also had a forum person (Rob) here working tightly with Korg PA, and we know all this onformation DID get sent to them. He/We were not getting any answers or even plans back from them...that's why it is zooming now...It's been far too long on all this.

Now unfortuneatly Korg will be in marketing repair mode, but only after several things get resolved (Freezes, Fills etc). Once things are solved we all will be happy to help in the marketing repairs!

Your recommendation of gong through the country distributor is much appreiciated.

Also, I am forwarding to you a text document I sent to Korg in April, through Rob..it has also been updated some. It describes issues with some sounds, fills, and some requested ideas for future OS improvements. This is my document and is not from the others here.

Thanks,
Lee

[jerrythek]

Jerry,
Thanks for the update. Since Paolo was our only contact here on the forum ...we thought he was forwarding everything to Korg PA. Guess not. Or if he did, we got no feedback that they got it.

Thanks,
Lee

Hi Lee:

I'm not saying that Paolo didn't do anything, I just saw your "call to arms" to start pummeling poor Paolo with PM messages and I wanted to head that off. Paolo is a great guy and would not ignore or bury information, I am sure of that.

Regards,

Jerry

[Rob Sherratt]

Paolo T. writes documentation for Korg Italy, and cares about the products and users. But sending him PM and emails is not the right answer.

The issues need to be run through the local Distributor and they will get things passed on to Korg Italy. Talking about crashes etc. doesn't really help to fix them - finding a known, repeatable operation or steps that will cause a crash makes it easier to find. And it seems to my innocent/early involvement with this that that has not been able to be found.

In the US we have had no incidents or reports of LED problems until this morning. Someone called in looking for me based on the activities here at the forums. So we will certainly look into it. As is Korg France (Algam) and Korg Italy. I have confirmed they are working together to explore this.

I'm sorry to see this has spiraled out of control for so long now, and to be honest, I currently have nothing significant to offer. Except my attention to the matter. Korg IS following up on this.

Regards,

Jerry

Hi Jerry,

The trouble with any intermittent hardware lockup is that it is not repeatable and stochastic. You cannot repeat it at will with a "formula" to make it happen. However it is disastrous when it does happen. Intermittent faults like these are normally caused by out of tolerance timing on digital signals connected to IC's resulting in a race condition or illegal input condition that locks the IC into an indeterminate state. It is a function of temperature and timing so it happens more when it is hot and when the keyboard is very busy.

What I said above is well known to any digital circuit designer (I am an electronics engineer).

I can tell you the following experience from everybody who has experienced the lock up (including me) ...

It happens during heavy activity, like during a live gig, normally when the keyboard is hot ...

a) Not one keyboard note or button works - the button scanning stops.
b) The LED multiplexing stops, so some LED's glow very bright and others that should be on do not illuminate.
c) The touch screen handling stops, no response to touch screen events

However the following continues to work leading me to believe there is no software or microprocessor or memory fault:

d) The display output continues to count beats
e) The style play section continues to play a style but you cannot change the chord
f) Any keyboard notes depressed at the time of the lock up continue to sound, they are"stuck on".

This should be enough diagnostic information to allow Korg hardware engineers to determine the common point of failure - presumably somewhere on the main board where all of the three peripheral boards with buttons, keys and LED's connect together via ribbon cables. My guess is that the keyboard and LED multiplex control is done in hardware and that the controller IC is latching up.

In order to reproduce the fault you need an early Pa2x, you need it hot and you need to work it hard in style play mode for a few hours, preferably also with vocal harmonies . Eventually it will lock up. Hopefully the labs will be able to recreate the lock up when they get their hands on my Pa2x next week.

I believe the Pa2x was released to the USA later than the release in Europe. It may be that the faults are confined to the early production runs, and that is why in the USA your customers have had fewer problems.

Thanks,
Rob

[rikkisbears]

Hi Guys,
I've had my PA800 lock up on a rare occasion, but not in style play mode.
Mine locked up in Style edit mode, mainly when I was fiddling round with guitar mode editing.

[robkeith]

Hello Jerry and Rob,

Jerry it is exactly as Rob describes it. I didn't talk to my distributor about it, as I thought some difinnative answers would have been provided by Korg on this the only real forum for users and Korg I know.

At times I thought must be just me, particulary after the denials of faults from the little communication we had from Korg Italy, but then it came to light that there were quite a few users with early model numbers experiencing the problem. I got the first one in Aus. I mean I stopped using the board for live gigs because I feel huge trepidation if it fails when performing, as I said its not spa baths we are dealing with, some including me use these boards to try to make a living

I am going to write to my retailer requesting an RA for my board, and asking for a later model replacement when arrives, in the hope that Music Link Aus with Korgs approval will realize that this would be the best solution to a troubling problem.

[Martinkorg]

Hi Guys,
I've had my PA800 lock up on a rare occasion, but not in style play mode.
Mine locked up in Style edit mode, mainly when I was fiddling round with guitar mode editing.

Yes Rikki, that has happened to me more than a few times actually. I've also got stuck notes during live performance in style mode. I called the dealer, but i got no comments from them at all.

[iaoranaemaeva]

Excellent analysis Rob - as always

Intermittent faults like these are normally caused by out of tolerance timing on digital signals connected to IC's resulting in a race condition or illegal input condition that locks the IC into an indeterminate state. It is a function of temperature and timing so it happens more when it is hot and when the keyboard is very busy.

Yes. An IC in good health should not suffer from "rat races" nowadays

My guess is that the keyboard and LED multiplex control is done in hardware and that the controller IC is latching up.

OK. I am surprised, however, that there's only one timing/addressing controller for all the multiplexers in the instrument (keybed, control panel buttons, Touch-screen and LED's) that are functionally very different. Maybe simply a common clock (= bad design for a high end product IMHO).

[miden]

Hello Jerry and Rob,

Jerry it is exactly as Rob describes it. I didn't talk to my distributor about it, as I thought some difinnative answers would have been provided by Korg on this the only real forum for users and Korg I know.

At times I thought must be just me, particulary after the denials of faults from the little communication we had from Korg Italy, but then it came to light that there were quite a few users with early model numbers experiencing the problem. I got the first one in Aus. I mean I stopped using the board for live gigs because I feel huge trepidation if it fails when performing, as I said its not spa baths we are dealing with, some including me use these boards to try to make a living

I am going to write to my retailer requesting an RA for my board, and asking for a later model replacement when arrives, in the hope that Music Link Aus with Korgs approval will realize that this would be the best solution to a troubling problem.

Don't know if this helps...but i got the second PA2x, after Rob, in the first batch into Oz... Mine did exactly the symptoms described above by Rob S.

I sent it back and got it replaced by one from the second batch to arrive in Oz, and the second one had not one problem at all. Perfect. (I regret selling it now, but that's another story!!)

Seems to me, that if it was perfect on the second batch, and not the first, then maybe this issue only lies with early models???

Just a thought, and one little piece in the puzzle..If Korg can isolate manufacturing dates, maybe they will be the common denominator!!

Dennis

[emir82]

Speaking of batches, i'm wondering is there a way to find out which batch or, how late or early my model is? Serial number or something?