Kawai Q80

HxC Floppy emulator support for all others Keyboards/Samplers...
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MartinM
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Joined: Thu Jan 31, 2013 5:46 pm

Kawai Q80

Post by MartinM »

Moinmoin zusammen (Hi all)

I am new to this forum, tried to search and learn a bit, but still have some questions:

I want to replace the 3,5"drive (TEAC 235F U248) of a Kawai Q80 (not EX!) MIDI Sequencer.
Giebler, who made a DOS-program to manage theese floppies, state that their software does not run under Windows from NT on, so it certainly is not the standard 720k/1,44M format.
The KAWAI manual for the Q80 does not tell anything about the disk format. The Q80EX manual however states, that in addition to "normal" 720kB floppies, 2DD disks in MSDOS format with 8 sectors resulting in 640kB per disk may also be read for compatibility reasons. The stepper noise during the formatting process in the Q80 clearly indicates 80 tracks.
This and the TEAC documentation leads to my assumption of the Q80's disk format:

2DD (does this mean FM / 250kB/s / 300RPM with the TEAC 235F?)
80 cylinders
8 sectors per track
FAT system

My system of choice will be the 3,5" version of the SD emulator. As I understand the documentation, it will work perfectly.

But has anybody tried the Q80?
And will I have to prepare the single virtual disks on a PC or is it possible to format virtual disks on the HxC Emulator directly by using the format command of the Q80?
If not, what happens if I try?

Thans in advance for answering

Martin
Jeff
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Re: Kawai Q80

Post by Jeff »

To be sure of all these parameters just take an Q80 floppy disk and read it with the HxC Floppy Emulator software :
https://hxc2001.com/download/floppy_driv ... 2_beta.zip

After this send me the HFE file.
MartinM
Posts: 9
Joined: Thu Jan 31, 2013 5:46 pm

Re: Kawai Q80

Post by MartinM »

Moinmoin Jeff,

Thank You, will do so and return

Martin
MartinM
Posts: 9
Joined: Thu Jan 31, 2013 5:46 pm

Re: Kawai Q80

Post by MartinM »

Moinmoin Jeff,

funny things happened...
Disks could be dumped, most detected features seemed OK, but lots of bad sectors, changing numbers of sectors per track, and the process was sloooowwww (about 30 Minutes per disk, 10 retries)
Anyway, You will know more about it. I zipped hfe files of a fresh formatted disk (single step) and a disk in use (single and double step), emailed them to hxc2001hxc2001.com.

I know that no two floppy drives will be equal, but the Q80 does not show any problems and I tested the disk drive at the PC with no problems using several disks formatted and written by other PCs I have access to.
Thanks again and fruitful evluation.

Martin
Jeff
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Re: Kawai Q80

Post by Jeff »

MartinM wrote:Moinmoin Jeff,

funny things happened...
Disks could be dumped, most detected features seemed OK, but lots of bad sectors, changing numbers of sectors per track, and the process was sloooowwww (about 30 Minutes per disk, 10 retries)
Anyway, You will know more about it. I zipped hfe files of a fresh formatted disk (single step) and a disk in use (single and double step), emailed them to hxc2001hxc2001.com.

I know that no two floppy drives will be equal, but the Q80 does not show any problems and I tested the disk drive at the PC with no problems using several disks formatted and written by other PCs I have access to.
Thanks again and fruitful evluation.

Martin
Got the dump. They seem very corrupted... Can you to try to dump it on another pc ? Or if possible send me a floppy disk ?
MartinM
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Re: Kawai Q80

Post by MartinM »

Moinmoin Jeff,

I will send You a disk, if You mail me the postal address to martin.mersmann@web.de.
Currently I am looking for another disk drive to test in the Q80, maybe the current drive is misadjusted:

When I played around with the track analyzer I found the directory entries in file doublestep.hfe:
- track number 79
- side number 0
- x / y 107000ms / 27,56us (they repeat later on)

I did not find them on track 78, but I found them again (a "bit" more corrupted) on track 77

- side number 0
- x / y 109,400ms / 28,730us (they also repeat later on)

The correct entries btw are:

DR-550II.SNG
Trash808.SNG
FJDance.SNG
Abrakad.SNG
Sof Sand.SNG
Bas-Rock.SNDG

I hate to be an "interesting case"... ;-)

Martin
Jeff
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Re: Kawai Q80

Post by Jeff »

MartinM wrote:Moinmoin Jeff,

I will send You a disk, if You mail me the postal address to martin.mersmann@web.de.
Currently I am looking for another disk drive to test in the Q80, maybe the current drive is misadjusted:
Yes this seems to be the case. Just try on another PC ?

Anyway my address is :

Image
MartinM
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Re: Kawai Q80

Post by MartinM »

Moinmoin,

meanwhile Jeff received a working HFE-file and confirmed the compatibility.
I just ordered at Lotharek and will return with results.

Martin
MartinM
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Re: Kawai Q80

Post by MartinM »

Moinmoin,

I installed the device yesterday and it works perfectly well :D
All that has to be done at the "real computer" is to prepare the SD-card, if HFE-files exist, everything works as with disks. Add it to the list of supported devices.
Thanks to all, especially Jeff and Lotharek!

Martin

PS.: I am definitely not a talented photographer, but put a picture in the showroom area.
Jeff
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Re: Kawai Q80

Post by Jeff »

MartinM wrote:Moinmoin,

I installed the device yesterday and it works perfectly well :D
All that has to be done at the "real computer" is to prepare the SD-card, if HFE-files exist, everything works as with disks. Add it to the list of supported devices.
Thanks to all, especially Jeff and Lotharek!

Martin

PS.: I am definitely not a talented photographer, but put a picture in the showroom area.
Thanks for your feedback !
MartinM
Posts: 9
Joined: Thu Jan 31, 2013 5:46 pm

Re: Kawai Q80

Post by MartinM »

Moinmoin zusammen,

and these are the HxC-settings for Q80:

- Drive select D0 (as for the genuine Floppy drive)

Floppy Emulator settigs:
- User Interface: go as You please
- Standby:
- I recommend Backlight 255 = always on for display, as the Q80's main display is always on
- 5 seconds for device standby work well for me
- I checked "Load last loaded floppy" for comfort
- Check "Disable disk drive selector", as the Q80 only has one disk drive
- Uncheck all "Force Loading STA"
- HFE File Interface Mode: Check "Auto"
- AUTO BOOT Mode: uncheck all, as the Q80 boots from ROM anyway

Or simply use HXCSDFE.CFG and EmptyDisk.hfe from the attached file Q80_HxC.zip

Martin
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synth-emu
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Can't save Kawai Q80 files.

Post by synth-emu »

Great drive emulator, but I'm unable to save to SD Card. I can load the Q80 files from the "QuickInstall_Floppy DiskImages.zip", directly to my Q80, but unable to save my files to the SD Card. The LED lights blink rapidly to confirm the drive and the Q80 are communicating with each other, when utilizing both the load and save functions (the lock switch on the SD card also further confirms my Q80 is communicating fine, by giving me a "Write Protected" message) . I have the SDF Floppy Emulator 3.5" installed and the media brand is a 2GB PNY SD card. Is there something I'm doing wrong? Any help is appreciated.
Jeff
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Re: Can't save Kawai Q80 files.

Post by Jeff »

synth-emu wrote:Great drive emulator, but I'm unable to save to SD Card. I can load the Q80 files from the "QuickInstall_Floppy DiskImages.zip", directly to my Q80, but unable to save my files to the SD Card. The LED lights blink rapidly to confirm the drive and the Q80 are communicating with each other, when utilizing both the load and save functions (the lock switch on the SD card also further confirms my Q80 is communicating fine, by giving me a "Write Protected" message) . I have the SDF Floppy Emulator 3.5" installed and the media brand is a 2GB PNY SD card. Is there something I'm doing wrong? Any help is appreciated.
I don't understand : what happens when you try to save something ?
synth-emu
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Joined: Wed Apr 10, 2013 3:49 am

Re: Kawai Q80

Post by synth-emu »

During "saving", the LCD drive displays very rapidly:

RA T:002/080WETO

then

WR T:000/080WET1

and finally

T:000/080WETO

I've tried reformatting and copying the .hfe and .cfg files again, but still get the same result.
Jeff
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Re: Kawai Q80

Post by Jeff »

Ok so this means that the emulator doesn't received anything on the input data line, probably due to an hardware problem somewhere.

-Can you try to change the floppy ribbon by another one ?

-Have you the possibility to try the emulator on another machine (a PC for example?) ?
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