New user needs bootstrapping help ..

[minphase]

Hi ... er, fellow emulations,   I've just unpacked a lovely EmaxII rack from ebay.  Bit disappointed to discover upon unpacking that it's a mono/1M emaxII 2202, but considering it cost $100, I can always use it for parts later, if necessary.

Anyhow, it powers up fine, nice bright LCD.  Seller had some discs (yay) but they are all blank (hiss), so I've no way of progressing.  I know about EMXP (cue angelic music, a million blessings on the house of esynthesist), but I don't have any non-usb floppy drives around.  I'm a mac guy. 

So ... is anyone willing to burn me, I mean, methodically magnetize a 3.5 floppy for me with the latest (2.14?) emax II operating system?  I've emailed the commercial source (e-dude on ebay) but haven't received any response.  I'm most happy to pay anything reasonable.  It is a pain to get to the post office, I know.  I'm expecting an scsi zip drive to arrive next week (another ebay conquest).  I suppose an alternative would be if someone could make me a bootable zip disc, assuming that one can boot from scsi.  If someone has some samples on a bootable zip disc, I'd be happy to pay them back with ... swag, blank zips, good karma, paypal, etc.   I'm on the west coast of the US, between Seattle and Vancouver BC, in case that has any relevance (maybe chance to meet and talk shop with someone?  Copy some floppies and drink Coke like it's 1985?).

Very best, minphase  (Kevin to my Mum)

 

[minphase]

Hi list,  scratch that.  I've found a friendly computer shop in the town that will let me screw around with their ancient machines in back, so I should be able to create a floppy with EXMP and the images in the yahoo group.  Thanks!

[seamonkey]

Well let me take a moment to welcome you here.
I don't have an Emax ll but a recently purchased Emax SE Plus(still in the shop) , or I'd be more than happy to help you out.
I'm sure you'll soon be enjoying the beautiful Emu sound that comes from playing and sampling these one of a kind instruments.

[minphase]

Thanks for kind welcome, seamonkey!    This is a friendly site, and I'm struck by the depth of expertise here.  One thing I've noticed in past is that people that put a lot of work into keeping vintage beasts alive tend to be both pretty knowledgeable and patient, and that patience generally translates into a lot of mutual support (and tolerance for sincere newbs).   Fixing things is good for the soul and seems to lead to sharing -- I see this a lot on motorcycle forums, too. 

Cheers, minphase

[Elmbeatz]

...
 I see this a lot on motorcycle forums, too. 
...

Cool, motorcycle forums are the other places on the web I visit, too.
What are you riding?

[vitosky]

Hey minphase you are successful to make to start the emax2 rack?

[minphase]

Hey kids,

Elmbeatz - I live up in the northwestern corner of Washington State in the US.  I'm a citizen of Canada, the UK, and recently, the USA, so figure that one out (I can't.  Maybe I'm just collecting English language nations?  heads-up, Kiwis).   I ride a Ducati Monster, the littlest one, a 696.  It's pretty flat around here, but I'm about an hours ride away from mountains here (Mt.Baker) or in British Columbia.  There's a beautiful highway from Vancouver up to Whistler.  I used to do a lot of cycling, when I lived down in California for a while ( Silicon valley in 20s and 30s), but now I'm a 40 year old Dad, and I'm starting to find internal combustion more interesting than I used to, especially the kind on two wheels.  Probably a Multistrada some day, hope to evolve into touring as the kids get older. 

Hi Vitosky!  I'm waiting for more bits to arrive in the post -- an 8M emax2 rack that will come with some discs, and also an E2, and some zip drives (usb, scsi).  Once all that stuff arrives, I'll sort out an EMXP-based system for bringing them all up and testing them out.  If that basic awakening works, then I'll probably make them both into solid-state beings over the long term with the HxC floppy emulator/SD, and perhaps build an emuser.  Or maybe my wife will kill me first for spending all our money.  Whatever.

What I understand from reading about the life cycle of an emax2:
0. boot with floppies stage.
1. emax -> scsi zip/usb zip -> exmp for file management.  ( the zip disc stage of life)
2. add emuser ub-422,  fill internal scsi drive with stuff, trade files with the world. (I'm LOVING JMP70s stuff. Chapeau!)
3. replace internal scsi zip (electromechanical spinning things) with a scsi-solid state drive (I see some scsi CF drives?)

( I think the end stage of an emax2 is to have a solid state scsi drive, <500MB, top her up occasionally from exmp?)

after that, use emuser for keeping the scsi CF drive happy.

and for the E2
0. boot from floppy stage of life.
1. add HxC SD floppy emulator.  ( slow but solid state?  fill SD via EMXP)
2. add emuser?
3. Is there a faster way to load samples than HxC?  I think that is bottlenecked by the floppy controller?  Pretty astounding device, anyhow!! 

( I think the end stage of an e2 is to have HxC / SD drive, top up from exmp via SD card swapping with a pc?)

I suppose making some sounds, and possibly, even recording some songs, could possibly happen in there somewhere.

Sorry for turning this into a bio and chicken-counting-pre-eggs-hatched list.  But I'd love to know if that's a reasonable cycle, or if there's a solid state HDD solution for E2 that would be faster, and easier in terms of workflow.  I'm looking for the best practices here, with preservation the top priority (no moving parts) and workflow just under that.

Best, minphase

[Chevytraveller]

Hey Minphase

let me know how you get on with the floppy.. I can run one off any time if you need

I like the Emax II lifecycle

I'm at about stage 3.5
I have just gotten a couple of SCSI CF readers and a bunch of 500Mb Cards
I still use zip drives (SCSI and USB) as they are very handy at swapping and moving things between my Emax, my EMXP machine (an old Dell netbook) and my very old Mac OS9 (Beige G3 with USB card)machine running (Passport)Alchemy

 S;D

[esynthesist]

Maybe some hints for 'optimizing' your Emu's life cycles:

Emax-II:
- the EmuSer on Emax-2 is not the best way for exchanging complete sound banks because only 512K compressed banks from Emax-1 can be transferred through the Emax-2 's RS422 port, and only in one direction (fortunately towards the Emax-2)
But the EmuSer *is* a fast way though for transferring individual WAV files to the Emax-2. So it depends on what you want to do...
FYI: The EmuSer's primary targeted samplers for full sound bank transfers are Emax-1 and Emulator-II, which (often) lack SCSI and for which RS422 is the only fast alternative.
- if you install a SCSI CF/SD drive in the Emax-2, try to install one which offers card access from outside the Emax-2 (like the SCM PCD 50B). You can combine it with a slim "notebook" floppy drive, both units together fit in the original floppy drive space.
- as an alternative for EmuSer to manage the files on your CF/SD card, you can simply use EMXP to directly access those CF/SD cards... just like with the ZIP disks.

Emulator-II
- yes, definitely replace at least one of the floppy drives by an SD HxC
And copy all OMI 1-2-3 and Emu Factory banks to the SD card ! That makes more than 1700 banks available on an SD card for direct access by the Emulator-II :-)
- the fastest way for transferring banks to/from the Emulator-II is through RS422. Mac Sound Designer is the fastest (12 seconds), EMXP with EmuSer is the second fastest (19 seconds). The SD HxC needs 27-30 seconds for loading a bank, and even more to save a bank.
- besides SD HxC there's no alternative for adding solid state devices to the E-II, and the speed is the same as a floppy drive. The E-II HD is the only EII with SCSI hard drive interface, but it was a very early version of SCSI and it is being reported that almost no SCSI hard drive works on an E-II HD, and certainly not the solid state ones. (but with a bit of hacking it should be possible in my opinion...)

Good luck with all this great Emu vintage stuff !

///E-Synthesist

[minphase]

Thanks so much, esynthesist!  I was actually intending to open a new thread called 'what would esynthesist do' with a new E2 (in that forum), in order to slyly provoke a mini FAQ about best practices for preservation/workflow, given the tools we have available today in 2011 (emxp, HxC, zip drives, EmuSer, old mac with SD and 422 cable).  So you've taken the bait  Thanks!

The E2 is of course the one I'm more afraid for, in terms of floppy failure.  I've actually got an ancient Mac Color Classic which is a Frankenstein creature because it is actually an LC 575 Power mac board stuffed in a Color Classic case !!  I'm able to load Sound Designer on the very very tiny screen.  However, the E2 hasn't arrived yet (the seller is either a very clever scammer or a genuinely nice guy who is trying to figure out paypal, etc.  Wish me luck.)  So I figure the catch-22 will be whether this particular E2 has a logic board that supports RS-422.  However, HxC saves the day in that event!   

The clear winner, if I'm reading your info back correctly, for workflow circa 2011, in which solid state operation is required (for preservation) and in which people tend to have large offline libraries of samples on a computer,  is   ....   emxp on a pc, writing a giant SD card (for E2 running HxC) or CF card (for emax2, hosting a scsi-CF drive).     When it's time to do actual sample editing,  the old mac comes out of the closet.  Sneakernet with cards for everyday, mac for editing fun, sounds like the 2011 solution.

Thanks esynthesist!  Using the motorcycle-forum  analogy -- there are people that can take a rusty frame out of a lake, and restore a shining museum-grade bike (or aircraft, etc.) from seemingly nothing.  That's astounding, but posting those pictures is not necessarily very helpful to all the normal humans out here.  The kind of person that builds a tool, however, and spends so much time helping others to use it -- well, that's something of a different order.  In Zen, we call that a Bodhisattva -- you're the Emulator Bodhisattva, dude!! 

 

[minphase]

(addendum) I thought wikipedia would have a clear explanation of Bodhisattva that people could look up if unfamiliar with the term.  That article is very complicated though.  The simple idea is that Bodhisattvas are enlightened beings that have dedicated themselves to helping others, rather than just spinning off into Nirvana immediately.  Someone that stays behind to help, as it were.   Sorry for really weird, over-wrought analogy.  Maybe 'thanks for being such a helpful person!' should have sufficed here

[minphase]

Woo-hoo!   The 1MB/mono 2202 is working!  First sound was a TR-808 cowbell.  I borrowed an older PC from my next-door neighbour (thanks, Dr. Bunker!), loaded omniflop and emxp.  Everything cool, till I discovered that emax ii wants ancient DSDD floppies.  Quick run downstairs, out of about 50 floppies, I found ONE that was DSDD.  I wonder what was on that 'Math 430' disc?  Coefficients for a control system for an inverted pendulum I think.  Not anymore.   

Got lots of errors formatting disc, and was unable to write OS initially.  Used time honoured technique of just repeating same unsucessful thing   After a few tries with the same disc, able to format and then write a soundbank.  After that, the OS write was successful. 

Downstairs to old emaxii.  Would not load floppy, disc errors, etc.  Just doggedly tried again and again, blew out dusty drive bay with some compressed air.  Eventual boot into 2.14,  load of bank,  MORE COWBELL!!  It will need a lot of cleaning of sliders, but midi-in to sound output is a pretty happy test.

Thanks esynthesist for emxp, and to whomever uploaded files to the yahoo group.  One more instrument alive!

And in ebay news, the missing E2 has shipped!  My man in Texas is looking good...

 

[vitosky]

Hi Minphase in wait of your E-mu Emulator II see this video:  

" <a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/YdkfJWxSP-I&rel=1" target="_blank">http://www.youtube.com/v/YdkfJWxSP-I&rel=1</a>

[minphase]

Hi Vitosky, thanks for link.  Made me a bit misty ... that's one happy dude.

Chevytraveller, esynthesist,  can you tell me if this is correct for an emaxII:

- SCM PCD-50B SCSI CARD READER 1- PCMCIA to CF,   get this from MechWare ( http://a4000t.com/store/index.php?main_page=product_reviews_info&products_id=184&reviews_id=11 )
- emaxII can boot from a CF card, plugged into PCMCIA slot 0 of the PCD-50B.
- write an emaxII os image to the CF card from EMXP, using a cheap usb card writer.
- load sound banks onto SD card, in different slot on PCD-50B, or maybe onto boot CF (is there a reason not to?), via EMXP.

I take it that large CF cards (>512MB) are invisible to emaxII.  Are large CF cards still useable, just wasted space above 512?   

I'm not sure why I was messing with zip drives in the first place, except for the notion of getting one of the AW zips at auction (which I did, woo-hoo!  Poorer but happy).  I can still find use for a USB zip, but it looks like this $70 CF solution is way easier than messing with scsi zips. 

[esynthesist]

- SCM PCD-50B SCSI CARD READER 1- PCMCIA to CF,   get this from MechWare ( http://a4000t.com/store/index.php?main_page=product_reviews_info&products_id=184&reviews_id=11 )

Yes, that one should work; maybe you'll have to change the firmware to another version, but you'll only know this after testing it. Ted (member of Yahoo Emax Group) knows how to do upgrade the firmware...

- emaxII can boot from a CF card, plugged into PCMCIA slot 0 of the PCD-50B.

Yes, BUT you first have to format the CF card of course. So you'll have to boot the Emax-II with a floppy or from another SCSI disk, in order to format the CF card sitting in the PCMCIA<-->CF adapter. You don't really have to wait for the full "verify" process of the Emax-II - you can shut down the Emax-II as soon as the actual formatting has finished and the Emax display shows the "verifying..." message.
Note that you can also buy a PCMCIA<-->SD card adapter and use SD cards instead of CF cards
Very important to know is that ONLY the PCMCIA slot works for the Emax-II, not the other slots.

- write an emaxII os image to the CF card from EMXP, using a cheap usb card writer.

You can do that once the card has been formatted by the Emax. But the OS will normally already have been written to the card by the format process.

- load sound banks onto SD card, in different slot on PCD-50B, or maybe onto boot CF (is there a reason not to?), via EMXP.

Yes, individual banks can be transferred to an SD or CF card with EMXP, but these cards can only be used in the SCM PCD-50B in the PCMCIA slot through a PCMCIA<-->SD/CF card adapter. The native SD and CF slots don't work with the Emax/Emax-II.

I take it that large CF cards (>512MB) are invisible to emaxII.  Are large CF cards still useable, just wasted space above 512?

Emax-II supports disk sizes larger than 512MB (as opposed to statements made on some websites). But no more than 100 banks can be stored, and since the max. size of a bank is 8MB, the limit of useful storage is between 800 and 900MB. Cards of 512MB or 1GB are ideal.

except for the notion of getting one of the AW zips at auction (which I did, woo-hoo!  Poorer but happy)

You can undo your sudden poorness by selling some digital copies of this ZIP disk to us... 
You can make a full digital copy of this AW ZIP disk in one move with the "backup" function of EMXP and "restore" it then to a formatted SD/CF card... and/or upload this image to a file server for all of us !!! 
You can also extract the DM/Recoil banks individually from that ZIP disk with EMXP (or ChickenSys Translator)
(make sure not to overwrite the ZIP disk, so don't choose "restore" by mistake instead of "backup" in the first step !!)