No noise or delay between patches

[fanoftom]

Hi Guys!

I no longer hear noise when changing patches on my Fantom X. I spoke to Roland UK and they replaced some hardware. This eliminated the noise and there is hardly any delay switching patches making live gigging a stress free affair!!
I have always had great support from Roland UK!!

All the best!!

[abcd1234]

Wowwwwww,

What did they do? Did you call them?

Sam

March 14th 1984
Music student at Dalhousie
Fantom-X 7

[abcd1234]

By the way, you said Roland UK, but in your profile is said that you have been connected form US (though your location is stated as England). Why Roland UK?

Sam

March 14th 1984
Music student at Dalhousie
Fantom-X 7

[DogZilla]

Sounds like they replaced the Fantom-X with a Fantom-S

[pianodick]

fanoftom, did you send your fx back for these repairs or were they done locally for you? What OS did your machine come back with? How long did the turnaround take? Did it cost you anything?

"It is not the anticipated and perfectly performed musical note that singles out for recognition any particular musical performance." ©2004 Pianodick

[John01W]

Ya, I wish my XR didn't have this problem. Through the pa, it's quite deafening at times, can't have that.

[nsheldon]

After updating to OS 1.03 I don't notice any loud noise when switching patches any more. 1.01 fixed most of that problem but it still happened. 1.03 improved on the problem even more, though there is the occasional small noise after a patch change (not nearly as loud or frequent as with OS 1.00). The delay is still quite noticeable though depending on the patch (and MFX) being selected. Perhaps fanoftom has his MFX turned off and forgot to turn them back on.

Regards,

Nathan Sheldon
http://www.nathansheldon.com/

[fanoftom]

Hi guys!

I am from the UK not the US! My local dealer sent it to Roland and they fixed the problem under guarantee. They said it's a recognized hardware problem with the earlier fantom x. I had the first one that came in the shop, apparently!
I haven't forgotten to turn the effects on!! There is an improvement in general response. Roland said the earlier fantom x was sluggish because of the extra graphics..
The turn around was 2 weeks. It should have been 5 days but.......
I do have the latest operating system and did have the latest operating system before the repair.

All the best!

[abcd1234]

That's great,

I just sent an e-mail to Roland Canada (haha! Roland.ca has e-mail support but that's just for Canadian residents) and asked them about this phenomenon!!

I will post their reply here, as soon as I receive that.

Sam

March 14th 1984
Music student at Dalhousie
Fantom-X 7

[Arjan]

I wonder if the Roland UK people have any clue whatsoever. I seem to remember that it was Roland UK who claimed that the out-of-sync problem was a hardware problem too. And yet it seems to have been fixed with the latest OS.

I also doesn't make any sense that this problem would require a hardware fix. It's not like there's any kind of mechanical or electrical switching or re-routing going on. It's all software. I bet that 99.999999% of all problems related to the FX are software related and thus can be fixed with an update.

I think Roland UK sees firmware updates as a 'hardware' thing. They used to be in a way, my old D-10 and D-70 have EPROMs that require the EPROM to be replaced for an OS update.

L8r,
Arjan

22 oktober ToyZ & Kayak LIVE in Speakers, Delft
Listen to http://www.toyz-web.com/mp3/Remember_verse.mp3

[Vintage Chyld]

Hi, I've never actually have had this problem could it be only earlier units ?

It's such a wonderful world...minus the ignorance.

[abcd1234]

I don't agree with Arjan that it's ALL about OS. I have no idea about the noise, but the delay is beacuse a slow processor. As fanoftom said, maybe the Fantom S processor was not fast enough for the new color LCD.

By the way, if that's not about hardware, why fanoftom's keyboard is now working properly?!


Sam

March 14th 1984
Music student at Dalhousie
Fantom-X 7

[nsheldon]

I think you're probably right Sam. Though the noise problem seems to be minimized with the latest Fantom-X6/7/8 OS update (1.03) and did reduce the problem on my Fantom-X8 (which I got as soon as it was available here in the US), there is definitely a CPU issue with the Fantom-X series. Just in sequencing my latest work which comprised of 7 tracks of data, during playback there was a palpable slowdown of the OS. Switching screens and making changes while the sequencer was playing was noticeably slower than when not playing back the sequence. There were no timing problems (thankfully), but I only had 7 tracks playing. What if I had 16 tracks playing, or if any of the Patches used samples with the tempo sync enabled? It probably would have taken a whole measure or two just to switch screens during playback.

However, I don't plan on taking my Fantom-X to the shop to have this repaired for two major reasons. 1) Roland turnaround time here in Fresno, CA, USA is super slow (would probably take over 4 weeks to complete the work), and 2) convincing the tech that this was a warranty-covered problem would be difficult at best. It's not worth the effort or the time without the Fantom since everything is working well enough for me to use it.

Regards,

Nathan Sheldon
http://www.nathansheldon.com/

[MIDIguru]

The delay in switching patches is all about turning off an effects processor, switching algorithms, and turning it back on. It simply isn't possible to have gapless playback without having double the resources to overlap effects during a transition.

As for hardware being the cause of these problems. Where is Roland going to come up with a new processor so quickly? It's not like they can upgrade to the latest Pentium and see a 20% speed boost. Most of Rolands synthesis chips are custom silicon made only for Roland gear. These chips take years to develop and cost millions to design.

I think it all comes down to Roland putting less prioriy on updating the display and more on stable playback. As it is I think Roland is pushing the limits of what their hardware can handle. That's why the number of insert effects didn't increase with this generation.

Just think: we could have gotten more stable playback or a few more inserts if we sacrificed the color display.

[abcd1234]

Well...

I am in Halifax (NS) and my keyboard should be sent to Toronto - if they reply the email and say that they will repair my FX - but for me it really worths to wait even one month.

Also I want to do that ASAP because I feel that Fantom-Z is on the way. Actually when I saw G-70 features I felt that Fantom-Z will be announced very soon. In my opinion FS and FX have been made in rush and just to keep the market which was affected by ES and EX.

G-70 has 192 mb ROM, 7 insert effects, touch screen LCD... and this features will be included in the next workstation of Roland to be a strong competitor for Yamaha and Korg, for sure.

Also I think it's not true that Roland is updating each keyboard every year. They will do that to reach the ultimate model of that series. If you look at G-1000, Xp-80, VA-76... you will see that they haven't been replaced with a new keyboard for at least 3 years. and my feeling says that the next Fantom will be the one which will last for 2-4 years.

Just wrote my today thoughts,
sorry if that was off topic,

Sam

March 14th 1984
Music student at Dalhousie
Fantom-X 7