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I recently acquired this keyboard/midi-controller, desiring good heavy-key real-piano feel action. Before, I always had a real piano, or an e-piano and did not have any sort of experience with having to plug it into a computer nor using DAWs or VSTi software.
Eventually, I sort of figured it out and ended up using Native Instruments Kontakt... and it worked quite well (once I figured out how to fix the latency problems). I also tried using Ableton, but never figured out how that is supposed to go into the mix - Kontakt seems to be doing everything I need. (Perhaps if I wanted to record the music? I did have a plan to try and layer different instruments on top of each other at some point.)
Then, something went wrong with the keyboard. I would press a key and the PC would get a whole array of MIDI messages, random keys turned on and off, creating a cacophony of sounds. Pretty much the same problem as this guy:
[I can't post links since this is my very first post. It's the first google result from searching "Fatar Studiologic SL-880 Keyboard MIDI issues (In excruciating detail...)"]
I tried different power supplies. I tested the keyboard on my PC and on my laptop (to make sure it wasn't the PC's fault).
I opened it up and cleaned up all the contacts as some other old forum post suggested. Nothing helped.
Eventually I brought it into a musical instrument repair store. The guy there replaced a bunch of bits and cleaned the keyboard up and says that now it's working perfectly. However, he is using a Keyboard Expander (which I'm not sure exactly what that is. Is this the same as a midi module? This is also all occuring in Germany, so perhaps it's a mis-translation) to test it, without any PC connections. When I came in to test it with my laptop, I was still getting the very same problem.. The repairman insists that the reason is that it's an old keyboard, and the laptop is "too new" and I need to use an expander to use the keyboard. I told him that it used to work perfectly, but he just shrugs, he doesn't know what the problem could be or how to fix it.
How can this be?
I know nothing of keyboard expanders, but I am actually consider it. All I want, in the end, is a nice clean piano sound. If I can accomplish this (without spending too much money) without having to plug my keyboard into my PC, that would be quite nice. I tried to research how the modules and expanders work, which one I should get to have a good piano sound, and was left rather confused and overwhelmed by the large amounts of information and options (some modules need extra hardware, and some are self-contained. Some are huge devices that cost a fortune, some are cheap and compact, etc.)
Tomorrow, I will be picking the keyboard up from the shop (with a hefty 50 euro "repair" bill). Maybe, once I get it home.. it will just work with my PC and the repairman's fiddling did accomplish something. If not... what should I do?
Is it really possible for the keyboard to fail with my PC but work with an expander? What is a good cheap expander that would give me a clean piano sound. Could someone suggest a simple guide to all these MIDI controller/expander/module/DAW stuff that would get me caught up?
Much obliged.
Eventually, I sort of figured it out and ended up using Native Instruments Kontakt... and it worked quite well (once I figured out how to fix the latency problems). I also tried using Ableton, but never figured out how that is supposed to go into the mix - Kontakt seems to be doing everything I need. (Perhaps if I wanted to record the music? I did have a plan to try and layer different instruments on top of each other at some point.)
Then, something went wrong with the keyboard. I would press a key and the PC would get a whole array of MIDI messages, random keys turned on and off, creating a cacophony of sounds. Pretty much the same problem as this guy:
[I can't post links since this is my very first post. It's the first google result from searching "Fatar Studiologic SL-880 Keyboard MIDI issues (In excruciating detail...)"]
I tried different power supplies. I tested the keyboard on my PC and on my laptop (to make sure it wasn't the PC's fault).
I opened it up and cleaned up all the contacts as some other old forum post suggested. Nothing helped.
Eventually I brought it into a musical instrument repair store. The guy there replaced a bunch of bits and cleaned the keyboard up and says that now it's working perfectly. However, he is using a Keyboard Expander (which I'm not sure exactly what that is. Is this the same as a midi module? This is also all occuring in Germany, so perhaps it's a mis-translation) to test it, without any PC connections. When I came in to test it with my laptop, I was still getting the very same problem.. The repairman insists that the reason is that it's an old keyboard, and the laptop is "too new" and I need to use an expander to use the keyboard. I told him that it used to work perfectly, but he just shrugs, he doesn't know what the problem could be or how to fix it.
How can this be?
I know nothing of keyboard expanders, but I am actually consider it. All I want, in the end, is a nice clean piano sound. If I can accomplish this (without spending too much money) without having to plug my keyboard into my PC, that would be quite nice. I tried to research how the modules and expanders work, which one I should get to have a good piano sound, and was left rather confused and overwhelmed by the large amounts of information and options (some modules need extra hardware, and some are self-contained. Some are huge devices that cost a fortune, some are cheap and compact, etc.)
Tomorrow, I will be picking the keyboard up from the shop (with a hefty 50 euro "repair" bill). Maybe, once I get it home.. it will just work with my PC and the repairman's fiddling did accomplish something. If not... what should I do?
Is it really possible for the keyboard to fail with my PC but work with an expander? What is a good cheap expander that would give me a clean piano sound. Could someone suggest a simple guide to all these MIDI controller/expander/module/DAW stuff that would get me caught up?
Much obliged.
Last edited:
It's what the repairman (who is German) who called it an Expander (while speaking English to me).