No VU meter

[alka]

I have an EII here that has no VU Meter and hence no threshold sampling. I can force sample fine however. Any ideas as to what might be the problem? I've gone over the schematic and nothing is jumping out at me regarding VU. I've checked the obvious sample input, channel 0 ICs but nothing helped.

Anyone else ever experience this?

[dr.c]

Damn... I've fixed hundreds of breakdown on these machines  and its the first time I ever hear about this.
Do you have an older software disquette to start the machine with, just to try ?

[alka]

I'll see if I can find one and report back. thanks.

[alka]

Booted with an OS 2.3 disk and no change in the absent VU meter. It seems like it's maybe a digital board problem as sample input monitoring and Force sampling work fine. Any thoughts?

[dr.c]

This is interresting, because the E-mu machine never had any sample monitoring...
It reminds me the authentic note on a B-737 on the maintenance book, written by the pilot, that the automatic landing was "hard".
The maintenance replied that this plane was NOT equiped with automatic landing... 

[alka]

  sample input monitoring was just my fancy way of saying I can actually hear the thing I am sampling through the mix out when I am in the Sample menu. In other words, I can hear the sample input but cannot see it on the VU meter.

[dr.c]

This not normal. You should not hear it !
I will have to look about this on the manual during the week-end.
So, to recapitulate, you say you cannot make a treshold samplng, but you can force sampling ? And you can hear the sound source (to sample) thru the Mix output ?

Geee.... I never had that one (once again), weird.... 

[alka]

Correct Dr. C. this is so strange! However, the EII manual states, "Play the sound to be sampled, which can be monitored from the Emulator II MIX OUT jack."

[dr.c]

Thre was the Paris Book Fair these days, last day today, then I'll check all this in a few days, I'm exhausted rieght now...
I had a pericarditis and a myo-pericarditis, heart and breathing stop for about two minutes a few years ago, and the medication made me take almost 200 (two hundred) extra pounds.
Efforts are hard to manage since I lost about 25% of my heart efficiency. Pfff...
So I have to take it easy... Sorry about that !

[alka]

Hey no worries Dr. C... be well! all this EII business is just secondary.. take care.

[dr.c]

Okay... I am not trying to "earn time" but I need to recapitulate.

The sampling works good in force sampling, the sampling is okay, but you cannot make an treshold sampling with the Vu-Meter because there is no VuMeter seen.

Is that right ?

[alka]

correct Dr. C! strange, huh!?

[dr.c]

Sorry, I was ill...hospital, etc...
I'll be there tomorrow (hopefully) to answer.

[alka]

Got the VU meter working! Found a cut trace on the Output board from R46 to R40. In case anyone else is having issues with the VU meter check the circuit at the very bottom of the schematic page for the Emulator 2 Output - Input Analog 7-42 (page 4 of 15).

Now on to my final issue... noisy samples. This started a couple weeks ago. Any audio fed into the machine sounds clean through the monitor but after it has been sampled / upon playback the sample sounds very noisy - almost static-y. It's not a RAM memory sound issue and the input is not being overdriven...

Even when nothing is plugged into the input jack and I sample 'nothing' there is quite a loud digital noise floor that is being sampled... maybe a bad capacitor issue?

[alka]

Static-y, noisy sample issue traced to IC12 and/or IC13 HCT244's on the output board. FYI