My New Ketron SD90 will be delivered to me on Wednesday this week. I will post updates about the SD90 in this thread and try to answer any questions asked here about the SD90. I loaded up the SD90 with all 3 Gold Packages, the AMAMSONIC package, and added a 120 gig SSD drive to it. So to get started:
1. I will use the SD90 with my Roland A-800 Pro 61 key midi keyboard.
2. On gigs I will be using a single Bose L1 Compact speaker.
3. I will experiment with using all my song setups from my Ketron SD7 which I owned for about 3 years.
4. It will be interesting to see if the SD90 can be controlled using the buttons and sliders
on the A-800 Pro keyboard. (I don't know how to make this happen yet)

Stay tuned for my personal evaluation and experience with the SD90.

Deane

I took a quick look at the SD90 manual. Only a few pages. It is more like a brochure rather than a manual. I suppose you can refer to the SD9 Tutorial that I think AJ wrote as he had done for the SD40.
Anyway, it seems that you won't be able to use the buttons/knobs on the A-800 to control the SD9. I don't think the A-800 Pro sends sysEx the SD9 needs. I understand the Akai MPK series 2 can send sysEx. Some legacy Novation controller keyboards and control surfaces can program and send sysEx. I use some midi foot controller surfaces to send sysEx. One of them is the Gordius Big Little Giant 2.

Good luck Deane!

Torch,
Thanks, I know NOTHING about sysex commands or how to use them but thought it would be neat if that could be done with the SD90. I believe the sliders and buttons on my A-800 Pro are not necessary for me to get the most from the SD90 but it would be nice.

Deane

Deane, We have the same unit coming in this week also. Oddly enough we also have an A-800 but not our controller keyboard of choice. Took a quick look at the manual and you should be able to setup sysx messages on the A-800 for things like Stop/Start, Break, Fill. We don't have plans of trying that but might give it a test run.

Check out the A-800 Pro editor for more:

Thanks Curt, I will look at my A-Pro 800 Manual. A question for you. Why is the A-800 Pro not your midi controller of choice?

Deane

This is a post for those of you who are well schooled in the process of using SysEx midi commands.

I have used Dan's vArranger for over 5 years with my Roland A-800 Pro 61 Key controller. Within Dan's software is a method to assign functions to sliders and buttons of your choice and is very easy to use. So, my question is this: are all SysEx midi commands the same or do various devices use different SysEx commands to do the same thing?

I was wondering if my current setup on my A-800 Pro just might function properly with the Ketron SD90.

Deane

Good question - We are a big user of Native Instruments Komplete and a few other VST’s that support NKS. So, we use a Komplete Kontrol S61 MK2 controller. That h/w s/w combo gives us very nice integration with Logic Pro X which is the DAW that we use. They just released a 88 note version that would be a nice upgrade.

Komplete controllers

If you have been using the A800 with another Ketron SD* unit I would expect some of them to work while you may find that you have to “fine tune” some of them for the SD90.
Now you have me thinking about dusting off my A800 and giving it a go!

Curt,
My requirements for any keyboard or module are very simple. I do not use DAWs or VST software. Really don't know what they do. I am a pure "Arranger" player and that is all I need from my equipment to play my gigs. If the styles are super and the voices are real then that is what I want - therefore, Ketron has become my goto equipment - it gives me what I want and need for my gigs.

I will try to document what I discover about all this as time goes on.

Deane

Curt what is Daw of choice and why?

Not that I am an expert on SysEx, but I had to deal with it for my SD40. By the way, a great find by Curt that your A800 Pro can indeed assign sysEx messages. Good for you. Sorry that I gave you the wrong information. Since the Sd90 already has a number of buttons/slides that you can easily access, you might want to assign sysEx for SD90 functions buried in menus. System Exclusive Messages are device/manufacturer specific. However, all the SysEx messages for the Audya and MidiJ Pro seem to work on the SD40. You can refer to http://www.synthzone.com/forum/ubbthreads.php/topics/456202/1 for more info.

Chris
PS: You're right that vArrnager being software is so flexible. I use $10 Bluetooth gamepad to assign functions or change voices in addition to a Bluetooth keyboard. That's a lot of control.

Logic Pro X

We were Cakewalk users for 15+ years and went through multiple sales and turnover between parent companies with them. When Gibson dropped the product, we switched to Mac and Logic. We do quite a bit of work with Ric (he’s the guy playing in the recent Ketron demos we released). He is also running Logic. That makes it very easy for us to transfer projects back-n-forth and keep them in the native Logic format. By doing that all the various parameters either of us set are automatically set the same. We live approx 1,000 miles from each other and for the most part, have the same h/w and s/w. Some of our projects are all MIDI, and some are a mix of MIDI and audio. Having the same software in both studios keeps things simple.

Since I switched to Logic, Cakewalk has a new owner yet again. It’s now a free download, and the new owners have been releasing updates on a regular basis. Although we now use Logic on a daily basis, we keep a current copy of Cakewalk around allowing us access to hundreds of projects that we have worked on with Ric over the years that are saved in the native Cakewalk format.

If you are running Windows you can learn more and download the full version of Cakewalk here

Curt thanx for the reply,
.....I too used Cakewalk years ago for a long while but have since changed to Mixcraft 8 pro for most of my DAW duties,......
https://www.acoustica.com/mixcraft/mixcraft-pro-studio.html

I will certainly look into the new cake walk since I am not a Mac user at all for anything....thank you for the link to the download.

Ok, an update about the SD90 - well it did arrive today on schedule. Unfortunately I returned it to AJ 3 hours after receiving it. For whatever reason the touch screen did not work properly and it was not possible to select anything from the touch screen.

I did hook up my Roland A-800 Pro controller but was not able to get any results because I was not able to get into the Menu options to see what I had to do.

I want to say thanks to AJ who spent about 30 minutes on the phone with me and eventually said to ship it back and he would either replace it or make sure it worked before returning it to me. AJ will get it back on Monday so I probably won't get it back for about 10 days.

I will keep everyone updated and as promised will post on this thread how the SD90 works out when I get it back.

Deane

Deane: Sorry to hear about the initial problems with the SD90. I’m sure AJ will get the problem taken care of.

Looking forward to your review when it returns.

jingleman

Donny: my hunch is you’ll stick with mixcraft. I messed around with the free cakewalk, but it feels clumsy compared to MC.

jingleman

I thought Donny was big on Audacity. What happened there, Donny?

Hi Deane,

I am sorry that the touchscreen of your Ketron SD90 module did not work. I received mine on Augest 14, 2018 and it has been working as expected. I added a Ketron FS-13 footswitch for the convenience of style progress control and vocal harmony on/off. I am in the process of setting up a Korg Kronos 2 88 keyboard with the intention of eventually pairing it with the SD90, pending the arrival of the Jaspers 4S-150S A-Frame keyboard stand.

AJ is great help in pre and post sale support. I once received his Whatsapp reply message at 2:33am Central time. I have full confidence that AJ will be able to take care of the touchscreen issue for you.

Thanks,
Paul

Affirmative tried it 5 min and deleted it.... No comparison to Mixcraft 8pro.

...

Sorry not me .... I've been a Mixcraft user for years.. It's a great Daw.

Deane... Don't worry AJ will make it right... Hang in there...! O. Ce correct you'll be blown away by the live sound!
That said my SD7 is running stable and sounds amazing with the new update which addressed a few bugs and added a few new things too..... I'm glad I got it back.....

Ok, I will need some help and advise when my SD90 is returned to me. Curt, you are playing around with the A-800 Pro controller. What must I do, besides connect the Midi cable and set the Midi out of the controller to Midi 1, to get things to work with the SD90?

I will not ever use VSTs or DAW software. All I need to happen is to split the keyboard for left hand accompaniment and RH voices. I will not use the sliders or buttons on the controller to control the SD90. It sits very close to the keyboard.

Thanks to anyone who can help educate me about this

Deane

Hi Deane,

I use a Casio Privia PX560 88-key stage piano with the Ketron SD90 module. I did not have to do anything on the PX560, just left it in piano mode, made sure that it output to MIDI channel 1, and the SD90 used MIDI channel 1 as input. Then a MIDI cable was connected between the PX560's MIDI out port and the SD90's MIDI 2 in port. The setup time was just a couple of minutes. Most of the setup time was actually the waiting time for SD90 module to boot up.

I did not even have to worry about its split point because the split point is configured/defined on the SD90. If you want split point other than the default one, you change it on the SD90.

Thanks,
Paul

You dont have to split the keyboard..
There is a template for attaching it to a piano inside the sd90
If you choose that, it automatically setsup

And you can use the splits inside the sd90..

Thanks guys for the input. Paul, I did EXACTLY what you described when my SD90 arrived but did not get any results. Nothing happened at all when pressing the controller keys - but when I pressed the START button on the SD90 the drum track would play. AJ thought my controller was not sending on Midi 1 but I did set it to Midi 1. Also, we tried both Midi Inputs on the SD90 with no results and also used a different midi cable. Really odd. I have used other modules with this controller before - Roland BK-7M for one with no problem. There is one unanswered question about if I was using what AJ called Global Midi 1. I did not see any options on the controller for using other than the Midi 1 channel I selected.

Deane

I'm wondering if a ribbon cable or similar inside became disconnected before or after factory assembly or custom hard drive installation..

Had a new power amp arrive d.o.a. after previously owning same model very reliable. Opened it up and cable unplugged. Plugged in and works fine. I saw a review another customer returned one for same reason no power out of box..good product poor final quality control.

Sparky589,
I think you are on to something. AJ did mention that a cable might have broken or come loose when we were trying to trouble shoot the problem with the touch screen. I sure hope the SD90 is not that sensitive to being moved around or transported because it will be my only "goto" setup for all my gigs.

Deane

This indeed sounds like a loose cable..
Espescially since AJ installed the Ajamsonic on it..
And so tested it..

There is a lot said about Ketron in the past..
But falling apart when transporting is not one of them
I would not worry about that

Deane - I don't currently have the A-800 connected up. As others have mentioned, by default, you should get a factory assigned split point depending on which MIDI config you have selected in the SD90. Give me a few hours to hook things up, and I'll report my findings. Might even mess a little with assigning a couple of the pads on the A-800 to operate Stop/Start, etc. Be back shortly -

Thanks Curt, any help or advice you offer is appreciated.

Deane

Quick follow up - I did get the A800 hooked up to the SD90 today. While I was at it shot a short video. Let me do a few edits on that. Should have it uploaded for you sometime on Saturday.

Deane - Here you go. Give this a shot when you get the SD90 back. Super short example of the A800 and the SD90. Hopefully, it helps. If not, ask away. We'll get your issue figured out.

https://youtu.be/-GLuvp0nYbc

Curt that was an awesome demo well done.
We need more of this kind of helping on various things.
I'm sure Deane will do just fine now...
Good luck to all.

Thanx for sharing!

I remember when I first wanted to use my A800pro via 5-pole midi, I couldn‘t get any reaction until I changed a specific setting, I don‘t remember exactly, but it had to do with USB on/off or similar.

Curt. The video is great.
Thanks
Deane

I don’t know if you noticed, but ketron support in the US has gone from non excisting to best in town wthbAJ, Kurt and Frank.

That is a fact. I have always gotten support and very quick answers from AJ when needed. Even when I have made calls on holidays or weekends he has responded quickly. I often wonder if Ketron Italy appreciates what he is doing for their company.

Deane