6.1 What's the story on static electricity blowing the output transistors?
There has been some discussion about the sensitivity of the K2000 to static
electricity. Some on the K2000 list have experienced failures due to blown
output transistors. The output transistors used in the K2000 were designed to
prevent loud popping sounds when the unit is turned on. These transistors are
static-sensitive and may blow if the correct procedure for hooking up cables
to your K2000 is not followed. The correct procedure is simply this: always
plug one end of your 1/4" audio cable into a properly grounded external
amplifier or mixing board *before* plugging the other end into your K2000
output jack. This will ensure that there is no electrostatic potential
difference present on the leads of your cable when you plug it into your
K2000. There have been rumors that Kurzweil is developing a hardware retrofit
kit to make the output transistors less susceptible to static discharge, but
as yet there is no official confirmation of this from Kurzweil.
mijn K2000 had dit probleem, maar het resultaat was eerder een hoge brom en dus geen ruis.
6.2 My LCD is dim, is it defective? Can I replace it with a better one?
Many people complain about the brightness (or lack thereof) of the K2000 LCD.
Sorry folks, but the one that Kurzweil uses just isn't that bright, and
there's not a whole lot that you can do about it. To our knowledge, there are
no hardware replacements available for it. Try using a little external light
above and behind your LCD if you need to increase its readability. Also, you
may notice that display contrast changes after the unit heats up; this is not
a software bug, but rather a characteristic of the display hardware.
6.4 My board seems noisy? How do I make it quieter?
The consensus seems to be that most of the noise that you hear is probably due
to a combination of noise introduced by the onboard effects chip and improper
use of gain staging. The quietest output is obtained when using the direct
(dry) outputs, rather than the mix (wet) outputs. Noise can also be minimized
by paying proper attention to maximizing signal-to-noise ratio. Review the
gain stages in your algorithms to make sure that your individual patch outputs
are as "hot" as possible without inducing any unwanted clipping (send the
message "get gainstag text k2000" to
listserv@jhuvm.hcf.jhu.edu for more info
on gain staging). Also, when operating in multitimbral mode (e.g., driven by
an external sequencer) make sure that MIDI volumes are set as high as they can
be while maintaining the relative volume balance of your individual tracks
(ideally, at least one of your tracks should achieve MIDI volume 127 at least
once - if not readjust the overall volume balance of your tracks in the
sequence).