A customer recently brought in their Yamaha P-105, complaining of no sound. Occasionally, it would emit a scratchy noise, but even that was inconsistent. After opening it up, I found the culprit: the amplifier chip on the DM board had burned out. The amplifier chip is a small surface-mount device (SMD) mounted directly on the … Read more
I recommend customers with worn-out floppy disk drives upgrade them to “Floppy Disk Emulators.” There are a couple of these on the market. However, the easiest to install and use is the Nalbantov USB Floppy Disk Emulator. I install these regularly in Yamaha Disklaviers, but they can also be installed in keyboards. If you order … Read more
One or more keys play at full volume even though I’m hardly pressing them! Keyboards use very sensitive contacts to determine how fast you’re pressing the key (or the velocity). A keyboard with dirty contacts (such as the one pictured below) will misjudge velocity, and will cause the key to play at incorrect or, often, … Read more
In 2022, I had a customer ask me how to change the voltage on his Nord Electro 3 from North American to European. I made this brief write-up to help him. This also includes how to replace the Electro 3’s fuse. If you’re a world traveler, this might be worth printing out and keeping in … Read more
A customer recently came to me with a Casio PX-5S that displayed “Error: No Media” after booting, and which wouldn’t produce any sound. The Problem The customer had already researched the issue themselves, and they had determined they needed a firmware update. He’s not alone, and Casio helpfully provides the following message to those with … Read more