Disklavier Floppy Disk Backups, ESEQ and MIDI Formats

This post is intended to help you read from, write to, or replace Yamaha Disklavier floppy disks.

Some of my customers choose to upgrade their older Disklavier’s floppy drive to a Nalbantov USB drive, and want to know how to copy songs from their old Disklavier floppy disks onto a USB. Some of them just want to be able to back up their disks in case they need to make new ones later. Or maybe, you’re just trying to figure out how to write to disks your Disklavier can actually read!

The content on the original floppy disk is protected by copyright and is the property of its respective owners. These instructions are provided to assist owners of legitimate copies in converting the files for personal use on their own Yamaha instruments. Unauthorized copying, sharing, distribution, or commercial use of the converted files is strictly prohibited. By using these instructions, you agree to comply with all applicable copyright laws, licensing agreements, and Yamaha’s terms of use. I disclaim any responsibility for misuse of the information provided.

If you want your floppy disks files saved on a more modern media, you can also mail your floppy disks to me (please reach out to me at [email protected] or through my Contact page). Nalbantov also has a disk transfer service, and they can be very useful if you encounter particularly challenging disks. Make sure to use the AlexPiano for a 5% discount on orders from Nalbantov.

If you’re adding new music to a floppy disk or Nalbantov USB and have an older Disklavier (such as the popular MX100II), you’ll need to make sure the files are in Yamaha’s proprietary ESEQ format. Using the tools below, you can convert your MIDI files to ESEQ so that they will be in your Disklavier’s native language.

Obtaining Files from your Yamaha Disks

Yamaha floppy disks are a great source of songs that you know will be formatted correctly for your piano. However, floppy disks often don’t age well, and are very susceptible to sunlight and magnetic fields. (This is one more reason to back them up!)

Disklavier floppy disks cannot be natively read by your computer without special software. They will appear as unformatted disks.

There are several tools that will allow you to read them: I use the Player Piano Floppy Backup Utility 1.4, created by Mark Fontana. It’s freeware, but he requests donations. You can download it from him, or you can download ppfbu_v1.4_setup.exe from me. It can read and save directly in ESEQ format, even if the disk it’s reading from is in MIDI. It appears to run acceptably on Mac / Linux using emulators, although this can add complications.

There are other tools out there. Most notably, there was a Hack-a-Day project by Tom Nardi that uses a Python script to copy the data off the floppies. His disklav.py tool is available on GitHub.

If you copied the files in ESEQ format, there’s an extra step before your Disklavier can read them. See below!

Obtaining even More ESEQ Files from the Internet

In addition to the originals you might have, you can sometimes find these on eBay or at local music stores. Older disks on eBay are seldom tested, so there’s some risk of receiving junk disks.

There are several large online repositories in both ESEQ and MIDI formats. Some of these are of dubious legality. One legitimate resource was kuhmann.com, which had quite a large repository. I have a copy of their entire database. (I worry a lot about these older resources disappearing! They disappeared. Kuhmann’s inventory does appear to be available on the Wayback Machine, but his original website is now off the internet.)

You can also source files from Yamaha’s website, although this a more expensive option. Many of their MIDI files have multiple instruments (or even limited piano), and are more designed for their keyboards and other MIDI devices. However, they do have an entire category of Piano Solos, and these are what you’ll want to search for when selecting files. When you download these, you get their associated MIDI files, which are comfortably sized for floppy disk purposes.

Converting MIDI files to ESEQ

If you want to use MIDI files with your older Disklavier, you can, but you have to convert them to ESEQ first. There’s software to do this conversion. You can either get it from http://www.carolrpt.com/MIDItools.htm or you can download the whole DKVUTILS suite from me.

Once you download DKVUTILS.ZIP from my site or theirs, you’ll need to extract it. The program that converts MIDI files to ESEQ files is MID2ESEQ.EXE. This program runs only on Windows, and does not seem to run with emulators. Reach out to me and I can assist with conversion.

MIDI files that have only one track are called Type 0 files. MIDI files with multiple parts are Type 1. Occasionally, the piano will be spread between two tracks. In that case, you’ll find the piano is playing only half or so of the notes it should be. You can convert Type 1 to Type 0 files using the tool gn1to0.exe. This is a slightly cumbersome tool, but will either run on Windows or on Linux/Mac using Wine.

ESEQ Files and creating your PIANODIR.FIL

If you have a Yamaha that’s capable of playing ESEQ only, you might also need to create a PIANODIR.FIL index. I have instructions here on creating a PIANODIR.FIL index.

If you are using a Nalbantov, any USB stick you use MUST be formatted either FAT16 or FAT32.

Please also note that the ESEQ filenames should be strictly eight characters long, have no spaces, and be entirely uppercase, including the FIL extension BEFORE creating the PIANODIR.FIL file. I’ve created a script to automate this proper naming process, discussed in my creating a PIANODIR.FIL index instructions.

Formatting 2DD Floppy Disks

Some people choose to use the original floppy disk drives in their 90s-vintage Disklaviers, rather than converting to a Nalbantov. First, it’s important to make certain you’re using the correct floppy disks. The more “modern” 2HD floppy disks require stronger magnetic fields to write, and may not always be compatible with older Disklaviers. The slightly older 2DD drives, however, will work. You can tell the difference readily: 2HD disks have openings at both corners of the Disk, while 2DD disks will have only one.

Some have reported covering the hole with electrical tape will trick the Disklavier into believing the disk is a 2DD disk. You may or may not be able to write to it using the Disklavier, but you should be able to read from it using this trick, provided your 2HD disk is formatted as a 2DD disk.

I formatted mine on my Pop!_OS Linux machine with the instruction sudo ufiformat -f 720 -v /dev/[yourdevice]. If you’re using a Windows machine, the instruction is format a: /t:80 /n:9. Pictured below, you can see what this command looks like on my Windows XP floppy transfer box. This command does work in Windows 10 and 11, but requires you to be using an external floppy disk drive that allows this format. Not all of them do.

At this point, you can transfer your .FIL files and PIANODIR.FIL file to your floppy disk. Put them in the root directory, and do not use any folders.

If you have a bunch of MIDI files and you’d like to put them on a floppy disk, then first format the disk as shown above. Then follow the instructions to convert your MIDI files to ESEQ and create a PIANODIR.FIL.

Potential ESEQ Problems

If you’re using a USB stick in a Nalbantov, it must be formatted FAT16 or FAT32. Nalbantov supplies a video on how to format your USB stick.

If you’re using an actual floppy disk, it must be a 2DD disk formatted to 720 KB. See the above section on identifying the disk and formatting it correctly.

Earlier Disklaviers can be finicky about their ESEQ files. Sometimes, they’ll work without any trouble, even without a PIANODIR.FIL file. However, particularly in earlier Disklaviers (such as the DK5R), you’ll need to be more careful with the naming conventions, and you’ll definitely need that PIANODIR.FIL described above.

I’m very grateful for the research of Mike Isreal (in the comments below), who did experimentation with his own Disklavier. Before creating a PIANODIR.FIL for your disk, make certain that all filenames are precisely eight characters long, and that both the filename and extension are in all-caps. The filename must contain no spaces.

Some have commented that it appears you can also omit the .FIL extension (at least in some cases). According to Nalbantov, there might be cases where a fully lower-case filename and extension are called for, although I have not run into that particular case yet.

Some of this is caused by the choosiness of the Disklavier itself, but it seems likely to me that a lot of the free tools we’re relying on probably add their own complications. If you are experiencing any trouble, please reach out to me for assistance. You can also Unable to Back Up a Disk that Still Plays

If you have a Yamaha Disklavier floppy disk that plays in your Disklavier, but you’re unable to copy the disk using any of the tools described above, you can make a scan of it using a Greaseweazle. See my article on making archival copies of disks with a Greaseweazle.