Korg Forums

[pedro5]

Technically...yes it will.
However,Korg may set that aside if no other problems occur in doing so,but will be at their discretion.

Just some thoughts....
I don't think the battery replacement itself would come under warranty as it's usually a "consumable" item,but perhaps the service center would do so if the unit was in for repair,as
a goodwill gesture.
Can't help wondering if there will be a load of Kronos soon be going into service centers just for battery replacement....or...as many keyboards would be out of warranty by then,some owners may attempt doing so themselves, which could possibly lead to other problems for those who get it wrong etc.

No doubt we shall get some useful feedback from owners here,in due course.

[GregC]

[TheWolf]

Well, as Dan has mentioned many times, there are no user serviceable parts inside the Kronos. So, for replacing the battery, you should bring or send the Kronos to a service centre. Opening your Kronos yourself may void the guarantee -- especially if there are obvious traces of incompetent tampering. Theoretically.

But as we all know, theory and practice are the same only in theory but not in practice.

So, as long as you do everything carefully and correctly without causing any new issues and leaving no evident traces, you should be fine. Consider using an anti-static grounding strap to be on the safe side. Use wooden toothpicks instead of a metal screw driver to get the old battery out of its socket.

[GregC]

[TheWolf]

Well, your hypothesis may to be correct -- with some caveat (see below). I just set the date of my Kronos X way back into the past, rebooted and -- lo and behold! -- my spanking brand new Kronos claimed that the battery is low and needs to be replaced by a Korg service centre. Resetting the date to the current one, made the warning about the low battery disappear after the next reboot.

The 2.1.0 update checks the current date set in the Kronos. If the current date is earlier than Tue Oct 1 04:31:11 UTC 2013, it resets that date before continuing with the update. So, Korg apparently expected some machines to have an incorrect date.

So, if the warning about the internal battery being low appears, check the current date setting first and reset if necessary. The claim about the battery being low may indeed be spurious. However: if you get the same warning again after a few days or weeks, then your battery is indeed low -- causing the clock to lose its time from time to time while the Kronos is disconnected from AC power.

[princeabo]

please, i want to replace my Korg M50 battery but am finding it difficult locate where the battery is located. someone should kindly direct me.
thanks.

[danatkorg]

[latnjazfan]

Forum Friends: Thanks for all of the information!!

I reset the Kronos clock and the message didn't reoccur.

So I guess everything is fine for now.
_________________
Love my Kronos 73. Got it October 2011. March 2016 bought SpaceStation v.3 and Behringer Sub-Woofer.

[Stephen Butler]

Dear Folk:

If you are reading this far in the future, I'm sure your historians will have told you about the Covid-19 pandemic which raged across the world, writing this year off completely, and liable to do the same throughout much of next year (2021) as well.

My Kronos has been a great friend to me over this period they call 'lockdown' here in the UK - indeed, I've had mine since September 2012, some eight years ago, and I think I have had it on (matron!) every day since then. My Kronos and I have been through a lot together.

But, just yesterday, I got the first reminder that nothing lasts forever, that age creeps up on us all, when a notice appeared on my screen indicating that the internal battery was on its way out, and I should change the date back and possibly think about replacing the battery.

This came after, for the first time, my Kronos made a much louder gear-crunching sound than usual while booting up, and finally the splash screen froze with a small message about the system having failed.

I had to switch the thing off, and restart it, after which it was fine, other than this message. I reset the time and date on the workstation.

This morning, unfortunately, I have had to go through precisely the same routine again; if anything, the crunching noise was even worse than yesterday. I do not expect this situation to get any better, and am wondering whether to book my baby in for surgery, and whether the said surgery will cost more than it is justifiable to do so.

I realise some of this is a bit beyond the scope of this thread's topic, but all of this seemed to happen at once, just yesterday.

Just FYI, I'm going to miss my Kronos not being there, even for just a few days, but it is beginning to become necessary, I fear.

I do hope that all of those who participated in this thread of seven years ago are still with us, and can offer a thought as to whether it might be financially more prudent to change the battery or get a new synth, in view of the fact that, due to my Kronos' advanced years, this may be the first of many such medical issues to hit my Kronos.

I have recorded more than 1,900 songs and bits of music on this behemoth, and from the day I bought it, I knew that the Kronos and I would be BFF. To this day, there has not been a keyboard or workstation that can surpass it - not even the big soft shandy-drinking baby keyboard they call the Nautilus. I hope more than I have hoped for anything before that this Nautilus thing will not even think about replacing the Kronos.

Well, I shall sign 'Off' now, the basic message of this post is I think my battery is stuffed and is it worth replacing it?

Cheers,
Stephen x
_________________
Stephen Butler

www.vipersquadron.com
www.stephen-butler.com

[voip]

Battery replacement is relatively straightforward, although it involves removing most of the bottom screws. The battery lives on the computer motherboard inside the Kronos, and is an easily obtainable CR2032.

.

[KK]

[John Hendry]

Getting rid of a working Kronos due to the message coming up you need to replace the battery on the motherboard is a bit like getting rid of the fastest car made just because the tires are worn out... except the cost is much lower especially if you do the replacement yourself. The battery in my KronosX is over 10 years old and I just got the message coming up this week which brought me here. So I'll be looking at replacing the fan as well with a quieter one taking advantage of opening it up as it's always been too noticeable up against a wall in a quiet room using open back headphones.

But don't feel bad, I know of an 88 Key KronosX sitting next to an 88 key Triton Pro sitting next to a 61 key M1 with all in need of the battery being replaced.... except the Triton doesn't have a battery and the owner just assumed it did and when the Kronos battery went flat he assumed his much older Triton was in the same state. And making the illusion worse when his M1 battery died it lost it's sounds as a result and he assumed they were all in the same state and would soon have no sounds as well. He replaced the battery in the M1 himself only to learn he also needed to reinstall the sounds which requires the M1 MPC-00P Pre-load Data Memory Card no longer available, or a computer with an MPU 401 midi interface or compatible sound card, or another solution to connect a midi cable to a computer and upload the program data off the Internet. He's a bit of a caveman and one of those guys that never embraced the computer age and relies on his cell phone instead. He lives over 2000 miles away from me now otherwise I'd have helped him out and upgraded his KronosX with the sub system update every KronosX owner should take advantage of.

So the Kronos battery is a small issue compared to the M1. However with PolyAT and midi 2 finally available with Korg's name on it after over a decade the Kronos is finally becoming outdated.... UNLESS Korg offers Kronos owners the ability to have their Kronos keybed upgraded as Korg did for the Nautilus to add Polyphonic Aftertouch.... or rather PolyTouch as ASM calls it. Since Korg is now licensing ASM's excellent PolyTouch (which has release velocity) this seems like a real possibility. At any rate I'm fairly certain that Korg's next flagship workstation replacing the Kronos will have Poly AT with Release Velocity and surpass the Kronos beyond any keyboard made to date.

What was once wishful thinking is becoming reality showing it really is getting better all the time. You just have to wait it out in good faith and pay attention... it works so far as far as I can see despite a few bumps in the road getting from there to hear. (e{a})/t=E
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Think Peace...

[kday]

Whenever your battery wears out, and you replace it with a new battery you must reset the time clock in the Kronos to eliminate the Battery Low indicator still coming up after replacing the old battery.

I replaced the old battery for a new one after the first original battery wore out, and still got the "battery low" indicator saying my new battery was also low. I knew a new battery couldn't be low. So I ended up replacing the new battery to put in another new battery thinking the first new battery could've been dead possibly, and still got the battery low message. This is how I discovered that the clock has to be changed/reset whenever you replace the battery or maybe update the OS.

It's a hard lesson to learn and Korg doesn't tell anyone about this because they don't support user battery replacements to make that announcement, but Korg and service centers does know that if you don't reset the system clock, the message will not go away after replacing an old dead battery.

[John Hendry]

Yes I know but thanks, my date is showing 2009 so will get a resent dated CR2032 and check it with an accurate multi-meter just to be safe. Since I'll have it apart, I've been looking at the main thread on replacing the Kronos fan and it's 24 pages going back well over a decade. Lots of ideas and experiments but no mention of 14.7 psi atmospheric air pressure at sea level and how a fan moving air in an enclosed area creates a low-pressure area that acts like a suction cup which will hold heat in as it increases unable to vent out.

Korg added vent holes on top rear section solving the problem on later Kronos models after the original Kronos and the KronosX, but that solution allows water or beer spilled on it to get inside so I don't mind adding two holes on the bottom for a filtered air intake on one side and an exhaust fan on the other to circulate air keeping internal pressure equal and avoid the heat buildup I'm seeing. So based on what I've read so far looks like I'll be adding a quite 5v CPU fan, a few passive heat sinks, and a lower volume CFM rubber mounted 12v fan replacing the stock fan cooling the SSD assisted by an additional exit fan to quite it down while improving cooling by letting the warm air out and stopping the heat buildup.
_________________
Think Peace...

[voip]

The original Kronos, and Kronos X, could hardly be described as hermetically sealed units, with equally tightly sealed internal compartments. Far from it. The main apertures for air movement into, or out of the instrument, are around the keybed, between the keys, and also the slots forming the slider apertures and, to a lesser extent, the button apertures. In addition to this, the metal case of the Kronos itself acts as a heatsink, with internal air coming into contact with the case and being cooled. The temperature of the case will be a reasonable indicator of the temperature of the air inside the Kronos. My Kronos X case barely gets warm to the touch, so around 30 degC. The internal fan facilitates air movement around the interior of the case and, by this process, generates small pressure differentials internally, which have a tendency to draw outside air in through one half of the keyboard, and other apertures, and then out again through the other half. Thermal images of the Kronos suggest this is indeed what happens.

The Kronos and Kronos X or, inded, the later Kronii, are not perfectly engineered to optimally move air around components that require cooling, but it seems to get by just fine. The stock fan was rather noisy, so that got changed quite early on.

.