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Posted: Sun Jan 16, 2011 1:26 am
by Bald Eagle
Jan1 wrote:Sharp wrote:Did Rich mention anything about upgradeability of RAM? (Would be a shame if Korg didn't allow this.)
We spoke about it but I'm only in the position to say what it does now, not what it will or wont do in the future.
Regards
Sharp.
Thanks for keeping us up to date Sharp.
According to the specs at the Intel site the dual Atom uses DDR2(/DDR3) for memory, so depending also on the motherboard it should be possible to use a 2 GB or even a 4 GB stick as RAM memory.
Most models of the Atom processor have a 32 bit address space giving a max of 4GB of RAM. To save a few dollars I would bet that Korg used a 32 bit processor. A lot of this space will be used by the OS and synth engines. Add the 1GB that they have already allocated for user sample RAM and the 4GB space might already be maxed out making an upgrade impossible.
Posted: Sun Jan 16, 2011 1:44 am
by bax
Bald Eagle wrote:Most models of the Atom processor have a 32 bit address space giving a max of 4GB of RAM. To save a few dollars I would bet that Korg used a 32 bit processor. A lot of this space will be used by the OS and synth engines. Add the 1GB that they have already allocated for user sample RAM and the 4GB space might already be maxed out making an upgrade impossible.
Agreed - although I would guess that the Kronos OS can't be so much larger than the OASYS that between it and the preload space you would take up a full 2Gb. Yeah there are two more synthesis engines and some additional I/O driver overhead for the streaming but that is probably measured in Mb... I gotta believe we should still have the ability to have a contiguous 2Gb space left for user sampling - they probably had a hard price point they wanted to reach for marketing purposes (< $3000 USD) and elected to leave the extra RAM out. Unfortunately this board may be a little more tricky to crack open than the OASYS, hence the hesitance to say anything about user-upgradeable RAM.
But, who knows for sure...unfortunately not me.
Thanks!
bax
Posted: Sun Jan 16, 2011 2:48 am
by TheCube
Found something about upgrading the RAM 
KRONOS continues the OASYS tradition of super high fidelity audio and ultra-low-aliasing oscillators. The rich feature set in KRONOS is an evolution from the OASYS. Here are a few of the standout new features:
•Virtual Memory Technology (VMT) – allows the HD-1 and SGX-1 models to access gigabytes and gigabytes of included sample data from the SSD. Excellent for massive long drum samples, etc
•Total sample library over 12 gigabytes- including huge new rock and jazz ambient drum kits, vintage keys, and sound effects banks. With VMT, all these samples are available all the time, simultaneously, with no long load times.
•Seamless Sound Transition- lets you sustain voices across combi, program and mode changes, preserving the entire previous sound with all effects.
•Load an entire rack of 16 effects with little effect on voice polyphony
•Set List- allows you to organize your combis, programs and songs into a unified set list. Combined with SST makes for truly seamless performances
•Drum Track- a library of great sounding grooves at your fingertips, great to play along with
•Over 1GB onboard RAM, upgradeable for more- for loading samples or sampling your own sounds
•Audio/MIDI connectivity over USB
•Lightweight and portable
•Many many other features and improvements
•Very competitively priced
Link to Blog: http://www.planetz.com/?p=917
Posted: Sun Jan 16, 2011 3:15 am
by EvilDragon
Awesome, if true!
Now let's just hope it's off-the-shelf DDR2...
Posted: Sun Jan 16, 2011 6:44 am
by zzzxtreme
EvilDragon wrote:Awesome, if true!
Now let's just hope it's off-the-shelf DDR2...
being atom, it should be ddr2 or ddr3
Loading M3 PCGs
Posted: Sun Jan 16, 2011 7:39 am
by ak
Is it possible to load M3 PCGs to the new Kronos?
Posted: Sun Jan 16, 2011 7:46 am
by Sina172
...
Posted: Sun Jan 16, 2011 8:43 am
by TheCube
EvilDragon wrote:Awesome, if true!
Now let's just hope it's off-the-shelf DDR2...
As he was writing "I work at Korg Research & Development.", He should know.
Posted: Sun Jan 16, 2011 9:50 am
by Jan1
TheCube wrote:Found something about upgrading the RAM
•Over 1GB onboard RAM, upgradeable for more- for loading samples or sampling your own sounds
Link to Blog: http://www.planetz.com/?p=917
That's great.
A 4GB DDR2 ValueRAM memory stick from Kingston costs around €100, and that buys you a lot more memory space to work with.
Posted: Sun Jan 16, 2011 11:09 am
by Jan1
Most models of the Atom processor have a 32 bit address space giving a max of 4GB of RAM. To save a few dollars I would bet that Korg used a 32 bit processor. A lot of this space will be used by the OS and synth engines. Add the 1GB that they have already allocated for user sample RAM and the 4GB space might already be maxed out making an upgrade impossible.
From what I read in the specs at Intel all dual core Atoms support 64 bit instructions, and the KRONOS uses a dual core Atom.
Posted: Sun Jan 16, 2011 11:42 am
by Kontrol49
Where can we purchase one of those Revolving A frame Stands
Posted: Sun Jan 16, 2011 12:15 pm
by Megakazbek
Jan1 wrote:From what I read in the specs at Intel all dual core Atoms support 64 bit instructions, and the KRONOS uses a dual core Atom.
That doesn't mean they rewrote the OS to use 64-bit adressing.
Posted: Sun Jan 16, 2011 3:21 pm
by bax
Most Intel architecture processors over the last 10 years or so support 64 (and even 128-bit) instructions sets. This doesn't have much to do with whether a given OS is 32-bit or 64-bit - only that the processor could support those kinds of instructions. My guess is that they left their OS 32-bit so they didn't have to reinvent the wheel or change major portions of the OASYS codebase. That means a memory address space of (total) up to 4Gb of RAM - this would typically include any memory allocated for any graphics cards or other hardware that needed to have its onboard memory useable by the OS, so that 4Gb total is typically lower in practice once you factor that kind of stuff in. I'd bet 2Gb would be easily attainable if they didn't change anything in a major way from the OASYS OS architecture.
Posted: Sun Jan 16, 2011 3:46 pm
by McHale
Sharp,
Simple question: How easy is it to rearrange your "songs" in the SET LIST screen? We play a different set list every show and I would like to rearrange the set list to reflect that. Is it easy? Is it possible? How is it sorted?
Posted: Sun Jan 16, 2011 3:48 pm
by Jan1
Well, isn't it true that both OASYS and KRONOS have Linux as their OS?
As far as I know, Linux offers physical address extensions which enable accessing physical addresses over 4 GB (for 32-bit OS).
Single applications still are bound to that 4 GB limit, but the KRONOS features several different applications running on Linux, in which case > 4GB would make sense if there is a PAE feature.