Got myself a Drumulator

[mirland]

Well - the title says it I purchased a Drumulator v.2.1 yesterday from a well renowned local studio here in Denmark. It's in rather good condition though missing the button for Casette - save. What I was thinking is: What would be the wise thing to do now? Open it up, clean it, order spare buttons and some eprompts?

I have my eye on a set of eprompts on eBay right now.

[bedouin]

If it's working as it should there's no reason to do anything.

[captainjc]

As I recently posted, I just got one with the Latin Percussion eproms. They sound really good. Bit of a TR 727 vibe. Also came with African Percussion, but those are missing some pins so gotta do some rewiring. Excited to hear what that one must be like.

I was a bit bummed to find out that you can't really mix and match sound chips in the drumulator. The 12 sounds are spread across 4 chips and then there's a 5th OS prom that tells it where the sounds for each button are on the sounds chips. As a result if you try to mix and match the sound chips, you will get multiple sounds triggering with one button hit, or delays between a button press and the sound, etc.

[ambivalent]

For peace of mind I'd replace all the tantalum capacitors. I think there are six in total.

Replacement button details can be found here: http://www.emulatorarchive.com/Archives/DrumMachines/DrumulatorOverview/DrumulatorRepairs/drumulatorrepairs.html

[mirland]

I am not really sure I feel like re-capping the Drumulator right now But I will replace the battery and am thinking about replacing some of buttons which are not 100% quick responding.

I have just ordered a midi sync box however! It will be so cool to sync the Drumulator to my Monomachine.

[lubb]

I do not think it is necessary to change buttons which are not responding 100%. I tried to clean them instead (with both my Drumulator and SP12 and 1200 machines) with optimal results. Here is how (quoted from E-mu SP forum):

Take a super small and thin flathead screwdriver (or knife) and gently pry off the button (don't worry they snap out pretty easily)

Underneath the button is a little springy metal piece. Lift out the metal piece and clean the under-side of it with a pencil eraser. (there will most likely be a dot of dirt where it makes contact - clean it off)

Underneath the removable metal piece is a little non-removable metal contact. Clean this with the pencil eraser also.

Then lay the removable metal piece back where it was and snap the button back in place.