New S-550 user with Mac floppy disk questions - sgroup

David Roth

27 Sep 27 Sep

11:31 p.m.

Hi Duncan. Using the Mac and the USB floppy drive, when you put in a floppy disk what does the Mac say or do about it? Does it try to initialize it? Or it ignore it? Or does it give an error? If you have a spare floppy disk, I would try to format the disk with the Mac and the USB floppy drive to any format it would handle, just to make sure the hardware and the connection it working properly. You might then be able to use Disk Utility to format it MS-DOS or perhaps FAT. There might be some tools for the Mac to be able to format this to MS-DOS, I'm not sure. For the longest time I believe floppy disks came new formatted for MS-DOS. If you are able to format (any format) a floppy disk with your Mac and verify that you can put some files on it, then you have a working system to proceed. If you can't do that, then it could be the drive has a hardware problem and in that case, I would try connecting it to another system (Mac or PC) and see if it works there to determine there isn't a problem with that specific Mac. David Roth On Sun, Sep 27, 2015 at 6:35 PM, Duncan Malashock <duncanmalashock(a)gmail.com

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wrote:

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Hi Sgroup, How's it going? First time posting to the group, so thanks for having me. I recently purchased an S-550 and love the sound. I'm mostly interested in using those great samples that I'm sure you've all heard in the Sunday Paper <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-_YmUmAMwU> demo. I'm hoping that the seasoned experts among you may be able to help me make that a reality. My unit came with two system disks, and it seemed like only one of them loaded completely. Through doing program changes I was able to get a couple samples working (one of a string section and one of an orchestra hit). I'm finding it very difficult to see what samples are available through the front panel. I had hoped the Sunday Paper samples were pre-installed, but it seemed trying to load the samples I was after was going to take more work. So my next step was to try to write disk images to floppies to use in the S-500. I tracked down 10 DD 720K disks (old stock, not the new ones which I've heard are unreliable), and the RSB sample library in .OUT format <http://llamamusic.com/s50s550/unusual_samples.html>. I'm on a Macbook Pro running OS X Yosemite, so SMAC doesn't seem like a possibility, and the Sabrent USB floppy drive I bought doesn't seem to read the DD disks. So right now I'm stuck. Thanks for reading this far. Can anyone help me find a way to write these disk images to the floppies using my Mac? Many thanks for any help. All best, Duncan _______________________________________________ Sent by the sgroup mailing list sgroup(a)sgroup.ca For subscribe/unsubscribe: http://lists.sgroup.ca/mailman/listinfo/sgroup See http://www.generalconcepts.com/sgroup/ for more information.

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David Roth

28 Sep 28 Sep

12:04 a.m.

Hi Duncan. Perhaps it needs some special driver or additional software needs to be installed for the USB floppy drive to work on the Mac? I'm guessing, since it doesn't even recognize the drive at all, that could be the case. But it might not have what is needed in the firmware so the Mac can communicate with it. Even though I'm a Mac user, I have an old Gateway computer a neighbor wanted to recycle that has a built-in 3.5 floppy drive. I've installed CentOS Linux on it. I used the Linux 'dd' command to read Roland sampler disks on it. I then use the software to read and extract the sound files. This product, which I have no experience with at all, claims to support Mac OS 8.6 or above: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16821103402 David Roth On Sun, Sep 27, 2015 at 11:42 PM, Duncan Malashock < duncanmalashock(a)gmail.com> wrote:

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Hi David, Thanks for your reply. To answer your question, the disk drive I bought doesn't mount the disks on my Mac. It's as though I'd never put them into the disk drive. I naively thought it would support 720K DD as well as HD disks. After re-reading its Amazon page <http://www.amazon.com/SABRENT-External-Floppy-Drive-SBT-UFDB/dp/B000ALM3RC> it seems unlikely that it would. I was going to return it and look for a Mac-compatible drive that does support 720K DD. But I thought I'd ask the crowd here first, since you might have suggestions on which drive to buy or whether it's even possible to write the disks in the correct format on Mac OS X Yosemite (neither of which I'm sure about after reading the various webpages on the S-550). Best, Duncan On Sun, Sep 27, 2015 at 11:31 PM, David Roth <davidalanroth(a)gmail.com> wrote:

Hi Duncan. Using the Mac and the USB floppy drive, when you put in a floppy disk what does the Mac say or do about it? Does it try to initialize it? Or it ignore it? Or does it give an error? If you have a spare floppy disk, I would try to format the disk with the Mac and the USB floppy drive to any format it would handle, just to make sure the hardware and the connection it working properly. You might then be able to use Disk Utility to format it MS-DOS or perhaps FAT. There might be some tools for the Mac to be able to format this to MS-DOS, I'm not sure. For the longest time I believe floppy disks came new formatted for MS-DOS. If you are able to format (any format) a floppy disk with your Mac and verify that you can put some files on it, then you have a working system to proceed. If you can't do that, then it could be the drive has a hardware problem and in that case, I would try connecting it to another system (Mac or PC) and see if it works there to determine there isn't a problem with that specific Mac. David Roth On Sun, Sep 27, 2015 at 6:35 PM, Duncan Malashock < duncanmalashock(a)gmail.com> wrote:

Hi Sgroup, How's it going? First time posting to the group, so thanks for having me. I recently purchased an S-550 and love the sound. I'm mostly interested in using those great samples that I'm sure you've all heard in the Sunday Paper <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-_YmUmAMwU> demo. I'm hoping that the seasoned experts among you may be able to help me make that a reality. My unit came with two system disks, and it seemed like only one of them loaded completely. Through doing program changes I was able to get a couple samples working (one of a string section and one of an orchestra hit). I'm finding it very difficult to see what samples are available through the front panel. I had hoped the Sunday Paper samples were pre-installed, but it seemed trying to load the samples I was after was going to take more work. So my next step was to try to write disk images to floppies to use in the S-500. I tracked down 10 DD 720K disks (old stock, not the new ones which I've heard are unreliable), and the RSB sample library in .OUT format <http://llamamusic.com/s50s550/unusual_samples.html>. I'm on a Macbook Pro running OS X Yosemite, so SMAC doesn't seem like a possibility, and the Sabrent USB floppy drive I bought doesn't seem to read the DD disks. So right now I'm stuck. Thanks for reading this far. Can anyone help me find a way to write these disk images to the floppies using my Mac? Many thanks for any help. All best, Duncan _______________________________________________ Sent by the sgroup mailing list sgroup(a)sgroup.ca For subscribe/unsubscribe: http://lists.sgroup.ca/mailman/listinfo/sgroup See http://www.generalconcepts.com/sgroup/ for more information.

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Duncan Malashock

12:17 a.m.

According to this thread there aren't any Mac-compatible USB floppy drives that work with 720k disks: http://www.vintagesynth.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=60681 On Mon, Sep 28, 2015 at 12:07 AM, David Roth <davidalanroth(a)gmail.com> wrote:

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PS: Contact AppleCare and ask them to recommend a USB floppy drive they know will work with your system. - David On Mon, Sep 28, 2015 at 12:04 AM, David Roth <davidalanroth(a)gmail.com> wrote:

Hi Duncan. Perhaps it needs some special driver or additional software needs to be installed for the USB floppy drive to work on the Mac? I'm guessing, since it doesn't even recognize the drive at all, that could be the case. But it might not have what is needed in the firmware so the Mac can communicate with it. Even though I'm a Mac user, I have an old Gateway computer a neighbor wanted to recycle that has a built-in 3.5 floppy drive. I've installed CentOS Linux on it. I used the Linux 'dd' command to read Roland sampler disks on it. I then use the software to read and extract the sound files. This product, which I have no experience with at all, claims to support Mac OS 8.6 or above: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16821103402 David Roth On Sun, Sep 27, 2015 at 11:42 PM, Duncan Malashock < duncanmalashock(a)gmail.com> wrote:

Hi David, Thanks for your reply. To answer your question, the disk drive I bought doesn't mount the disks on my Mac. It's as though I'd never put them into the disk drive. I naively thought it would support 720K DD as well as HD disks. After re-reading its Amazon page <http://www.amazon.com/SABRENT-External-Floppy-Drive-SBT-UFDB/dp/B000ALM3RC> it seems unlikely that it would. I was going to return it and look for a Mac-compatible drive that does support 720K DD. But I thought I'd ask the crowd here first, since you might have suggestions on which drive to buy or whether it's even possible to write the disks in the correct format on Mac OS X Yosemite (neither of which I'm sure about after reading the various webpages on the S-550). Best, Duncan On Sun, Sep 27, 2015 at 11:31 PM, David Roth <davidalanroth(a)gmail.com> wrote:

Hi Duncan. Using the Mac and the USB floppy drive, when you put in a floppy disk what does the Mac say or do about it? Does it try to initialize it? Or it ignore it? Or does it give an error? If you have a spare floppy disk, I would try to format the disk with the Mac and the USB floppy drive to any format it would handle, just to make sure the hardware and the connection it working properly. You might then be able to use Disk Utility to format it MS-DOS or perhaps FAT. There might be some tools for the Mac to be able to format this to MS-DOS, I'm not sure. For the longest time I believe floppy disks came new formatted for MS-DOS. If you are able to format (any format) a floppy disk with your Mac and verify that you can put some files on it, then you have a working system to proceed. If you can't do that, then it could be the drive has a hardware problem and in that case, I would try connecting it to another system (Mac or PC) and see if it works there to determine there isn't a problem with that specific Mac. David Roth On Sun, Sep 27, 2015 at 6:35 PM, Duncan Malashock < duncanmalashock(a)gmail.com> wrote: > Hi Sgroup, > > How's it going? First time posting to the group, so thanks for having > me. > > I recently purchased an S-550 and love the sound. I'm mostly > interested in > using those great samples that I'm sure you've all heard in the Sunday > Paper > <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-_YmUmAMwU> demo. I'm hoping that > the > seasoned experts among you may be able to help me make that a reality. > > My unit came with two system disks, and it seemed like only one of them > loaded completely. Through doing program changes I was able to get a > couple > samples working (one of a string section and one of an orchestra hit). > I'm > finding it very difficult to see what samples are available through the > front panel. I had hoped the Sunday Paper samples were pre-installed, > but > it seemed trying to load the samples I was after was going to take more > work. > > So my next step was to try to write disk images to floppies to use in > the > S-500. I tracked down 10 DD 720K disks (old stock, not the new ones > which > I've heard are unreliable), and the RSB sample library in .OUT format > <http://llamamusic.com/s50s550/unusual_samples.html>. I'm on a > Macbook Pro > running OS X Yosemite, so SMAC doesn't seem like a possibility, and the > Sabrent USB floppy drive I bought doesn't seem to read the DD disks. So > right now I'm stuck. > > Thanks for reading this far. Can anyone help me find a way to write > these > disk images to the floppies using my Mac? Many thanks for any help. > > All best, > Duncan > _______________________________________________ > Sent by the sgroup mailing list > sgroup(a)sgroup.ca > For subscribe/unsubscribe: > http://lists.sgroup.ca/mailman/listinfo/sgroup > See http://www.generalconcepts.com/sgroup/ for more information. >

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Bruce Tovsky

3:11 p.m.

always nice to see these great old roland samplers talked about! my old friend stefano daino might still have some support features in his “DSP-QUATTRO” software. a brief glance at his webpage turned up zero info, but a inquiry might drum up something. he used to be able to pull samples to and from disk and do sysex if memory serves. it’s been many years since i spoke with him about this, so it might be vapor… cheers b

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On Sep 27, 2015, at 6:35 PM, Duncan Malashock <duncanmalashock(a)gmail.com> wrote: Hi Sgroup, How's it going? First time posting to the group, so thanks for having me. I recently purchased an S-550 and love the sound. I'm mostly interested in using those great samples that I'm sure you've all heard in the Sunday Paper <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6-_YmUmAMwU> demo. I'm hoping that the seasoned experts among you may be able to help me make that a reality. My unit came with two system disks, and it seemed like only one of them loaded completely. Through doing program changes I was able to get a couple samples working (one of a string section and one of an orchestra hit). I'm finding it very difficult to see what samples are available through the front panel. I had hoped the Sunday Paper samples were pre-installed, but it seemed trying to load the samples I was after was going to take more work. So my next step was to try to write disk images to floppies to use in the S-500. I tracked down 10 DD 720K disks (old stock, not the new ones which I've heard are unreliable), and the RSB sample library in .OUT format <http://llamamusic.com/s50s550/unusual_samples.html>. I'm on a Macbook Pro running OS X Yosemite, so SMAC doesn't seem like a possibility, and the Sabrent USB floppy drive I bought doesn't seem to read the DD disks. So right now I'm stuck. Thanks for reading this far. Can anyone help me find a way to write these disk images to the floppies using my Mac? Many thanks for any help. All best, Duncan _______________________________________________ Sent by the sgroup mailing list sgroup(a)sgroup.ca For subscribe/unsubscribe: http://lists.sgroup.ca/mailman/listinfo/sgroup See http://www.generalconcepts.com/sgroup/ for more information.

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