It's already a computer! And actually, Yamaha made some computers in the MSX standard. Lots of Japanese manufacturers made MSXes, and Yamaha's were more musical than most. I think there was some sort of crossover stuff, either a musical keyboard for the MSX, or a computer keyboard for the synth. Something along those lines.
Good idea, but I'm afraid to say that a magnetic strip is the same as a cassette and therefore has to be stored as audio. We don't know how to decode the play-cards yet, because it's not like all cassettes that store data are encoded in the same format. Credit cards are stored in one way, and play-cards are probably stored as another way.
The 8-Bit Keys Remix is now available to listen to on my youtube channel! :). You can also download the song from my Soundcloud which has a link in the description. Thank you very much David for using my remix in your video! Really appreciate it!
My childhood babysitter was also a Sunday school teacher, she owned one of these keyboards and I would end up playing it whenever I visited. Wish I'd been able to take formal music lessons. Thanks for bringing back a precious childhood memory.
The Yamaha MR-1 uses the same cards. My father brought one home when I was 8 years old in 1985. I still have the MR-1 and a bunch of cards. I actually learned how to play on that "organ" and once I learned all the cards, I started making up my own songs. Eventually I became a professional musician and I travel the world playing music (mostly Hammond organ). Pretty crazy that it all started with those goofy songs on magnetic cards.
There was an old timer who would set up the keyboard gigs at the big Sears and entertain everyone during the holidays. That keyboard was made to play Christmas tunes... Being a tech geek, that card system fascinated me to no end. I ended up finally getting a Casio PT50 but always dreamed enough lawn job money could get me that Yamaha...
The Square reader has a microcontroller inside it which sends digital information about an attempt to read a credit card, so what you captured is not the raw data off the card.
I had forgot all about it, but I instantly knew what you were going to do with the note sheet. My cousin had a keyboard like this when I was just a small kid. Instant flashback. What a great video!
"So the only thing left to do now is to disassemble it." There was no way around it. It was inevitable. You had to. We understand, Dave. We understand.
Thanks again my man! I haven't checked out your entire catalog here but I'm hoping now that you have some videos about Commodore computer music! And your playing was very nice, but the end of your video is probably kind of indicative of exactly how inspirational this keyboard is in general. Some of those rhythms sounded like some righteous cheese, as did a couple of those tones, anyway. Thanks again!
Are you using one of the old (unencrypted) Square readers? If you're using one of the newer ones with a chip inside, it's going to try to interpret the card data and encrypt it, which is going to completely mangle anything that isn't a credit card. I looked at your audio and it looks way too consistent in speed to be a raw recording of a manual swipe. The data itself looks pretty random but each of the first 3 blocks has the same header, and in general I don't think there's anywhere near enough data in here for a full song. I think we're seeing an encrypted message from the Square reader here, not the actual stripe data. Each of the first 3 blocks has ~1500 bits of data, of which only about ~1000 are not static padding, and ~200 at the beginning of each block are the same. The fourth block is at half the bit rate and contains exactly the same data as the third block. That makes no sense at all.
Really great content. Your channel and Markus Fuller's channel encouraged me to record the part exchange and internal cleaning of my Keyboard, which I will soon post on RU-vid because there is no decent video about it in Brazilian Portuguese.
Hey David, those square card readers output encrypted information. I recognize that sound because I did the same thing myself. You will need to disable the encryption or use a different reader like the older readers which are just a tape head connected straight to the headphone out. The one you are using is like mine. I'm trying to mod it so it plays the raw audio from the head.
A keyboard I've been watching you to get your hands on is a Yamaha PSS-680. While it didn't sound particularly good, like a 2-3 operator FM synth. But it had a lot of great accompaniment options which was rather great for ideas. Also it was like a 61 key keyboard. Mini keys, yeah, but still great. BTW, mini keys are often what you see on "toy" keyboards, but a lot of pro synths and controllers now have just 2-3 octaves of mini keys. I guess studio desk space is at a premium.
Great video, interesting synthesizer too. I just got a DW-8000 myself and fixed a broken key and a messed up key contacts myself. It was really fun to pull apart, clean up, and repair. Completely inspired by your videos. Tons of fun. I really like the DW-8000 too.
Bo Stout The DW-8000 is fantastic. One of my favorites (if not my favorite) of what I own. The keyboard doesn't feel great, but the sound is great, with its analog VCFs and VCAs, and the interface is actually pretty easy to use
I do have Yamaha PC-100 which is similar to this one, and it's amazing indeed. There is also one more feature -- if you play the melody along with lights, the *tempo will actually adjust* to the tempo you play this melody, in real time!
Nice. I already knew about this one, but still haven't seen one in person. It's a lovely looking keyboard, sort of like a miniature PS-6100 or PSR-6300 (this one was released later, though) in terms of aesthetics. If you have a MK-100 and a PS-55 and/or a PC-1000 you basically have the entire sound "library" that this family has to offer. The PC models also feature that Play-card system, IIRC (as does some other smaller models).
I just thought of something. If this thing is expecting sound from that read head, you should be able to solder a jack directly to that to allow for external input, or to read the output of the cards maybe? Imagine if you could write a program on some old computer of the era that would be able to encode to that format. that would be crazy.
Indeed.. With a little work, it wouldn't be that hard to read all of these cards to a modern PC for archival, and then be able to send them back to a modified keyboard. It should also be possible to decode the data and play the music on just about any computer.
Hah, I suppose it is strange for most people to have equipment like this. Maybe you won't believe me, but I use it for my custom building access control system I'm designing :)
great video as always. interesting stereo of your voice, autopan or stereo mix? congrats regardless well, the trade-off of the multi-track recording was the instruments and playcard showcase :)
Damn it, I had just talked myself out of buying one of these. But there is enough instruments in it that sound good with the style of music I make that i'm going to have buy one.
