Inside the Kronos 2 - First pics.

enigmahack · Post by **enigmahack** » Thu Apr 02, 2015 12:13 am

I'm in a hurry to leave, so I'll just toss these here for now.

Long story short... I don't know what the motherboard is. By the looks of it, it seems as though it was a specially designed motherboard from ASROCK based on their AD2550B though the basics are slightly different. I couldn't find out if it was a Atom processor, since there's no model number on the motherboard. The reason I say I think it's custom is because there is stuff "missing" where a normal motherboard would have stuff.

See for yourself. I took the pictures while the store was installing the hard drive - I would have gotten more but they shooed me away, since they did have a job to do, I obliged.

Here's a link to the AD2550R though for comparison. I think it could be the same "version" or revision of motherboard, just customized for Korg.

http://www.asrockrack.com/general/produ ... ifications

Sorry, no descriptions on the imgur pics either, but hopefully you tech-music-heads can figure it out for yourselves.

I can't get any more pics since it's all closed up now... So hopefully folks will be able to deduce magic from what I've found.

http://imgur.com/gallery/Wy5ZM

BTW: No April Fools here folks. This is the real deal.

Maybe someone can take some time and search through the Mini ITX Motherboards further than what I have. I suspect it's something like an ATOM 1.8 or 2.0 ghz processor... But who knows.

Bertotti · Post by **Bertotti** » Thu Apr 02, 2015 12:21 am

Any chance it is based off the i5 3360m boards?

DaveBoulden · Post by **DaveBoulden** » Thu Apr 02, 2015 1:36 am

It looks more like one of ASRock's industrial boards to me. Maybe the IMB-140D?

http://www.asrock.com/ipc/overview.asp? ... -140D+Plus

enigmahack · Post by **enigmahack** » Thu Apr 02, 2015 1:46 am

DaveBoulden wrote:It looks more like one of ASRock's industrial boards to me. Maybe the IMB-140?

http://www.asrock.com/ipc/overview.asp? ... 140+Series

Looks to be very close, except the Kronos 2 board doesn't have the r232 serial port, or a couple other ports. Your guess was way closer though, everything about this board screams custom... But I'm almost willing to bet that the IMB-140 would probably even work.

enigmahack · Post by **enigmahack** » Thu Apr 02, 2015 1:48 am

Okay, looking more closely at things like the battery position, the PCB layout and tracer patterns, I'm positive its this one, just with specific parts removed probably in manufacturing to save money... But I'm willing to bet money that this one would actually work:

http://www.asrock.com/ipc/overview.asp? ... 40D%20Plus

Who's feeling adventurous? Lol

DJ Kronos · Post by **DJ Kronos** » Thu Apr 02, 2015 4:43 am

First off, thanks for taking the pictures and posting them for everyone.

I was wondering if you watched them open her up. What was involved in gaining the access that is depicted in your pics? Did they just remove the bottom cover?

drdave2002 · Post by **drdave2002** » Thu Apr 02, 2015 7:55 am

Did you notice the 4GB dimm and a free slot..... could that mean Korg may look to add this at a later date?

rob_tky · Post by **rob_tky** » Thu Apr 02, 2015 8:05 am

drdave2002 wrote:Did you notice the 4GB dimm and a free slot..... could that mean Korg may look to add this at a later date?

I'm guessing at this stage that means that price of 2+1 GB vs 4GB is almost the same

Broadwave · Post by **Broadwave** » Thu Apr 02, 2015 9:14 am

DaveBoulden wrote:It looks more like one of ASRock's industrial boards to me. Maybe the IMB-140D?

I have to agree - Ohhh... Nice heatsinks!

I doubt if you could just chuck in the 140D, I should imagine the BIOS is a custom job at the very least.

But, it's handy to know in case the Kronos' MOBO gives up at any time.

Pedja · Post by **Pedja** » Thu Apr 02, 2015 11:07 am

drdave2002 wrote:Did you notice the 4GB dimm and a free slot..... could that mean Korg may look to add this at a later date?

No, that doesn't mean any RAM expansion, because Atom is x32 CPU and Kronos OS is based on x32 Linux. 32-bit OS (Operating System) can address only 3 Gb of RAM, all more memory will be a waste. In the future when Korg will decide to port to x64, it will be new motherboard, and a new CPU and new OS. We will see (Kronos 3).

Purusha · Post by **Purusha** » Thu Apr 02, 2015 11:44 am

The custom bit might just be a no-fit for the connectors.

That-is, a standard board design from that manufacturer with connectors not placed on the board.

It'd probably be the cheapest and fastest way of achieving this.

Bachus · Post by **Bachus** » Thu Apr 02, 2015 11:45 am

rob_tky wrote:
drdave2002 wrote:Did you notice the 4GB dimm and a free slot..... could that mean Korg may look to add this at a later date?
I'm guessing at this stage that means that price of 2+1 GB vs 4GB is almost the same

Kronos has a 32 bit OS, adding more then 3GB is pointless, unless you program the rest of the memmory outside of the OS.. its just a matter of inventive programming...

I dont think Korg haowever plans to do so, neither do i expect them to upgradde the OS to 64 bit.. So the extra memmory slot is fairly useless if there is allready 4 gigs in the first slot

Purusha · Post by **Purusha** » Thu Apr 02, 2015 11:47 am

It might not be pointless if the 32 bit kernel supports PAE.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_Address_Extension

Bachus · Post by **Bachus** » Thu Apr 02, 2015 11:48 am

Bertotti wrote:Any chance it is based off the i5 3360m boards?

Very unlikely... Why would they add an i5 if the avarage currentday atom processor is allready faster then the orriginal cpu of the Kronos...

As interesting as it seems, having faster hardware does not really add any functionallity as the Kronos is capped by its software limitations(max voices/instrument) and not directly by hardware specs..

enigmahack · Post by **enigmahack** » Thu Apr 02, 2015 11:58 am

Just a couple of things to note:

1 - The Atom processor *IS* 64 bit.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Atom_%28CPU%29

2 - The Linux OS running Kronos is only 32 bit.

3 - I think Purusha is right about the custom fit for the connectors or lack thereof. I think they might have been removed to either save space, or cost (It's very likely that since Intel wasn't producing the old D525 or D510 boards anymore, Korg struck a deal with ASRock to get a motherboard that supported the Intel Atom processor with the correct northbridge/southbridge chipset that was already supported by their kernel/OS.)

4 - There shouldn't be any need for a custom BIOS. There is nothing that the Kronos does during boot time that seems to require anything special. This has been shown to be true with both the D510 (Kronos 1) and D525 (Kronos X) Motherboards.

5 - PAE could work, however it's not just up to the Kernel. The processor needs to support PAE as well:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_Address_Extension

The good news is that Atom processors indeed DO support PAE, so it's definitely possible for Korg to enable PAE in their Kernel.

6 - I would imagine that the 1x4GB ram stick vs 2x2 is not only for cost, but simply taking up space in a warehouse - You could store more ram in a small location during the building process by using this, also ensuring that no user accidentally gets 2gb of ram, or that something goes wrong during installation. It's easier/faster to troubleshoot 1 not-working stick of ram than 2. (ANNNND if Korg ever decided to enable PAE [see above] then all Korg Kronos 2 users would gain immediate benefit right out of the box.)

7 - Those motherboards don't support more than 4gb of ram ANYWAY. Tossing another 4gb stick would probably cause a boot failure since the board isn't capable of handling 8gb of ram.

Anyway, just thought I'd toss in what I have figured out since last night.