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Author Topic: Akai S2000 (1995) MIDI Stereo Digital Sampler  (Read 24717 times)

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Offline chrisNova777

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Akai S2000 (1995) MIDI Stereo Digital Sampler
« on: March 22, 2015, 06:58:46 PM »

http://www.synthman.com/akai/300600.html
http://www.polynominal.com/akai-s2000/index.html
http://akai.mnx2010.nl
https://web.archive.org/web/20000229173749/http://www.akaipro.com:80/products/S2000.html

Quote
The S2000 offers the same superb audio quality and programming power of the S3000 Series with a new streamlined, easy-to-use interface. But that's just the beginning. Despite its amazingly low price, the S2000 includes a SCSI interface as standard, so you can connect an external hard drive or CD ROM drive without having to buy an extra upgrade kit. The S2000 also includes Akai's MESA software, which allows graphic programming and library management from the screen of a Macintosh computer.

And unlike many other low-priced samplers, you won't easily outgrow your S2000. As your needs grow, your S2000 is designed to grow right along with them. If you need extra outputs, the optional IB-208P (Multi8/D in North America) board gives you no less than eight additional analog outputs along with S/PDIF digital I/O. Need more sound processing power? The IB-304F (ProFilter in North America) board adds an additional digital filter bank with lowpass, highpass and bandpass response as well as digital EQ and a third envelope generator.

And like the S3000XL and S3200XL, the S2000 accepts the EB16 (SampleVerb in North America) Multi Effects board, up to 16 Megabytes of non-volatile Flash Memory (V1.3~) and up to 32 Megabytes of SIMM RAM.

Of course, the S2000 is compatible with the world-renowned Akai sound library as well as Roland and E-mu Systems CD ROM libraries.

The S2000 Studio includes the Multi-8/D for 8 additional outputs and S/PDIF digital I/O, and the Sampleverb multi effects processor, which adds four effects with two multi-effects and two reverb channels.
http://web.archive.org/web/19970215072550/http://akai.com/akaipro/S2000.html
http://web.archive.org/web/19990429140601/http://www.soundsonline.com/ew*TEMPLATE%3D/ew/htp/akai.htp

https://www.sweetwater.com/sweetcare/articles/what-of-ram-hte-akai-s2000/
default config (non-expanded)


expanded to 8 outputs + digital spdif

Creating OS disks:
http://web.archive.org/web/19990424123912/http://www.akai.com/akaipro/software-SAM.html

chronological list of akai "s series" samplers (excluding mpcs)
http://www.macos9lives.com/downloads/manuals/Osmaker.pdf
http://www.sweetwater.com/sweetcare/articles/installed-fmx008-flash-memory-board-s2000-os-loaded-fromthe-2/
http://akaiscsifaq.digidude.net/akaifaq_sampler_memory.htm
http://akai.mnx2010.nl/
http://www.synthzone.com/akai.htm
http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/1997_articles/nov97/scsiproblems.html
https://amazingdiy.wordpress.com/2013/01/20/akai-s2000-internal-scsi-mod/

editable with:
millenium http://www.oldschooldaw.com/forums/index.php?topic=1163.msg1228#msg1228

Quote
EXPANSION OPTIONS

• EB16 MULTI-EFFECTS PROCESSOR
This is a 4-channel processor which can handle two channels of basic reverb and two channels of simultaneous multi-effects. The effects available include distortion, 3-band EQ, ring modulation, modulated delays effects (chorus, flange and so on), pitch-shifting, rotary speaker effects, stereo delay and reverb. Cost £399 inc VAT.

• IB208P S/PDIF AND ASSIGNABLE OUTPUTS
The existing stereo output can be supplemented by eight assignable outputs if you fit the IB208P expander option, which also includes digital I/O on phono connectors. Samples can be loaded directly from CD or DAT machines with S/PDIF compatibility, but working with sample rates of 48kHz is not recommended. Cost £399 inc VAT.

• IB304F FILTER BANK
The internal 12dB/octave, low-pass filters may be augmented by an optional second bank comprising high-pass, low-pass, band-pass and EQ filter modes. An additional envelope generator is included as part of this option. The price is not yet confirmed, but is expected to be under £500.

• MORE MEMORY
Memory is expandable using standard computer SIMM chips (2, 4 or 16Mb SIMMs only), to a maximum of 32Mb, which translates to almost six minutes of mono sampling time at 44.1kHz, or three minutes of stereo. There are two SIMM slots, and you aren't restricted to using two SIMMs at once or SIMMs of the same capacity. If the the full 32Mb is fitted, the 2Mb of on-board RAM cannot be used. SIMMs currently cost around £35 per Mb.

Akai kindly provided an extra memory SIMM, and this gave me an excuse to take the lid off the machine. Nearly everything is one large circuit board, and the SIMMs slots are easily accessible. SIMMs will only fit into their sockets the right way round, so there's no problem with accidentally reversing them, though you do have to take precautions against static electricity. Removing the lid is a simple matter of taking out five crosshead screws, and the whole procedure takes less than five minutes.

Quote
• EXTRA STORAGE
Though there is no provision for an internal hard drive, the standard SCSI interface means that any SCSI hard drive, Syquest, magneto-optical or similar drive system may be used to store sample, program and multi data. The architecture of the S2000 can only address 500Mb per hard drive, though more than one SCSI drive may be used.

Once formatted, a hard drive may be partitioned.
Each partition can contain up to 128 volumes,
and each volume (which can be thought of as being similar to an Atari ST/Mac folder), can hold up to 510 items, which may be programs, samples, multis or effects settings.
According to Akai, Iomega's new low-cost Zip drives have been checked out with the S2000 and work fine.

Two internal Flash RAM card slots are provided so that frequently used programs can be held in memory, even when the power is off. This leaves the conventional RAM memory free to be used as normal

-- http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/1995_articles/nov95/akais2000.html

some suggestions for cdroms:
hp cd-writer 9600 series
yamaha crw3200sx



Offline chrisNova777

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Re: Akai S2000 (1995) with external SCSI hd
« Reply #1 on: December 30, 2015, 01:29:51 PM »
https://www.gearslutz.com/board/high-end/524068-harddrive-question-akai-s2000.html

Quote
The hard drive can be larger than 510mb. When the S2000 formats it, it will use the first 510mb and ignore the rest. So a 1 GB drive formats to 510mb. I use a 550 IBM SCSI hard drive that is formated to 510mb, the maximum size the OS recognizes.

Get a 50 pin SCSI drive (I raided my old Mac parts bin for mine). You can copy the OS to it and it will boot from the hard drive. Make sure you set the SCSI ID to 5.

Offline chrisNova777

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Re: Akai S2000 (1995) sampler with powermac for editing
« Reply #2 on: December 31, 2015, 03:13:06 PM »
http://macintoshgarden.org/apps/akai-mesa-ii
Modular Editing System for Akai



Quote
Modular Editing System by Akai (MESA). The MESA program is supplied free with the S2000, S3000XL, S3200XL, CD3000XL and the DPS12i and DPS16 Digital Personal Studios.

At its most basic level, MESA allows graphic editing of every parameter in the new "S" Series samplers. The program comes with a variety of pre-configured control layouts so that you can be up and running immediately. MESA also includes a versatile Layout Editor that lets you design custom control layouts optimized for the exact way you work.

However, MESA is much more than just a graphic editor. With MESA you can create and edit programs and translate sounds from differnet audio file formats such as AIFF and SD2 (Mac version) and .WAV files (PC version).

MESA also includes a File Manager for saving, organizing and accessing sound data on a variety of external storage devices and a graphic Wave Editor for editing sound data as well as recording data from an audio CD in the Mac's internal CD ROM drive.

MESA's modular design makes it easy to update by simply adding a new product module to the appropriate folder. Newly supported products include the DPS12/DPS12i and DPS16 Digital Personal Studios.

MESA for the DPS12/DPS12i and DPS16 features complete control of all mixer parameters and transport controls. Also included is a MIDI dynamic automation recorder that allws you to graphically edit the automation data for each track independently, a MIX Scene manager, Beat Map manager and a Tempo manager. It's even possible to access the recorders basic setup properties such as timecode settings, sampler rate, etc.

Features:

Supplied free with the S2000, S3000XL, S3200XL, CD3000XL samplers and the DPS12i and DPS16 Digital Personal Studios
Allows graphic editing of every parameter of the new S-Series samplers
Comes with a variety of pre-configured control layouts so that you can be up and running immediately
Includes a versatile Layout Editor that lets you design custom control layouts optimized for the exact way you work
Includes a File Manager for saving, organizing and accessing sound data on a variety of external storage devices
Includes a graphic Wave Editor for editing sound data as well as recording data from an audio CD in the Mac's internal CD ROM drive (waveform editing not supported on the DPS12i/DPS16)
Compatible with AppleScripts for the automation of repetitive tasks. A large selection of pre-written scripts are included with MESA. Custom scripts can be created with any AppleScript editor.

Offline chrisNova777

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akai ib304f profilter filter board
« Reply #3 on: August 24, 2016, 03:09:47 AM »
http://www.mpchunter.com/s3000xl/akai-ib304f-profilter-filter-board/

Quote
This board allows an Akai owner to access a number of different digital filter modes that are not available in a stock Akai sampler, which only includes a resonant low pass filter. The IB304f filter operates at 24 dB/octave and includes low bass, high pass, band pass and EQ settings, and it also adds a third envelope to an Akai sampler’s filter structure. If you own an Akai sampler that is compatible with this chip, you simply cannot harness the full power of the machine without these filters installed. It is an essential option, full stop


Offline chrisNova777

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Re: Akai S2000 (1995) MIDI Stereo Digital Sampler
« Reply #5 on: June 12, 2017, 05:09:49 PM »
mutec made a 3rd party flashram card expansion
They made the FMC-01 (8MB) and the FMC-02 (16MB).
mutec-net.com


Offline chrisNova777

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Re: Akai S2000 (1995) MIDI Stereo Digital Sampler
« Reply #6 on: April 06, 2018, 07:06:38 PM »
https://jimatwood.wordpress.com/2011/05/17/akai-s2000-sampler-connections/

Quote
Last weekend I picked up a used Akai S2000 Sampler for $20 bucks and thought I’d have some fun with it. I’ve actually never owned an Akai Sampler before and I understand the S2000 is likely to be last on everyone’s list of samplers to buy, but I thought I’d give it a shot. Below are some thoughts about the Akai S2000 based on my experience over the past few days working with it.

SCSI External Drives and Media for the Akai S2000
I have been successful at attaching an Iomega 100MB Zip Drive and a Fujitsu 230MB MO drive to the Akai S2000 without any problems. I can format, load, and save samples, programs, etc. to these drives. I have not been able to successfully create a boot disk with the a zip or MO disk yet and still must rely on the Floppy Drive to boot up OS Version 2. This is not a problem, but it would have been nice to be able to boot up with an MO disk like I can with my Roland S-760.

I haven’t had any success getting any SCSI external CD-Rom Drive to work with the Akai S2000 yet. I have 4 different CD-Rom drives of various ages and none of them seem to work. However, it is possible the CD-Roms drives do work, BUT, the Akai Disks are not readable. I have been burning Akai S2000 CD-Roms with Nero and none of them work with the Akai S2000 even though they work with ESC ( Extreme Sampler Converter ) software on my Windows 7 computer. So the Akai S2000 does see and attempt to access the Nero burned Akai CD-Rom, BUT it always displays an AKAI SCSI Disk not found error. So my thinking is that Nero or something messes up the CD-Rom Copies after burning. I am not sure. ( Note that I am well aware of changing the HD SCSI under Global to access the various external drives ).

Importing WAV Files to the Akai S2000
The only way I have found to effectively and quickly import WAV files into the Akai S2000 is with a program called Akaidisk. This program works really well and I found it to be quite fast. You are limited to importing 1.44MB worth of samples at a time, but that is fine for me as I primarily work with muli-samples rather than loop based phrase samples. I run Akaidisk off a Windows 98 computer that I have for working with older samplers and synthesizers. Akaidisk works perfectly and it’s currently my preferred choice of getting sounds into the Akai S2000. In fact it’s the only way that works for me at the moment.

Software Editors for the Akai S2000
So far, I have been unable to get any software editor to work with the Akai S2000 on Windows 98. I do not have a Mac and my other computers are using Windows 7. Akai Mesa for PC and Chicken Systems Millennium which I’ve heard great things about do not work at all on my Windows 98 computer. Mesa actually “sees” my S2000 Sampler, but I then get “Time Out” messages whenever I try to do anything. Millennium just crashes whenever I open the program. Toss!

I am aware that it may be easy to fry or pop the SCSI related fuse in the Akai S2000, but since my Zip and MO drives work via SCSI I feel that is not the case. Akai Mesa PC on Win98 does see my Akai S2000 but whenever I try to access it by creating a Program for example, I get the “Time Out” error. Why the Akai S2000 is timing out every time, I am not sure. I have tried all sorts of SCSI Drive and cable combinations with zero luck. My computer will simply not work with the Akai S2000.

A few other Akai S2000 points.

1. I do not find working with the Akai S2000 menus to be all that difficult at all. Many people say it’s a pain or very slow, but when I want a particular set of samples mapped on the keyboard within the S2000, it’s pretty fast. I find goofing around with the technical problems I mentioned previously to be more time consuming. Heck, working with my Roland Fantom XR Sampler Rack isn’t all that faster especially when using the software.

The key is to find a workflow and make it happen. For now, Akaidisk and Win98 with either a zip or MO drive connected to the Akai S2000 works fantastic. I do wish I could find a working CD-Rom drive that works, but perhaps later I’ll find one. ( Or like I mentioned a way to properly burn Akai Disks ).

2. On a positive note, the Akai S2000 has a lot of great functionality. It sounds great and it’s actually very easy to program. For $20 bucks, I think it’s a bargain!

3. It’s likely I can get the HxC SD Card Floppy Drive Emulator to work with the Akai S2000 no problem. I have two HxC SD card Emulators and will have to try this. Akai S2000 floppy disk images can be created with OmniFlop for the HxC Emulator. The Akai S2000 should be able to boot from the HxC and access any disk images placed on an SD card. First one would create a Floppy Disk with files using Akaidisk and then use OmniFlop to create an Akai Floppy Image. Drag and Drop these files onto the HxC and load them up into the Akai S2000. I’ll have to test this but I’m sure it will work well.

4. I haven’t tried using the Akai S2000 with any external hard disks yet but I’m sure it will work since I have a Zip and MO Drive working. I’d rather stick with removable media however as it’s more reliable then having a Hard Disk break down on me. I also find older Hard Disks more noisy. See update below.

Stay tuned for more updates on my adventures with the old but familiar Akai S2000.

UPDATE – Importing Akai CD Rom Programs and Wav files into the Akai S2000 Sampler.

Today I was able to successfully import Programs from Akai CD-Roms using Translator, BUT, only running on Windows 98 Second Edition. I’m finding more and more that Windows 7 is not good at all for working with old synths and samplers. I have found that pretty much Windows 98 works with most tasks that I need to accomplish. I was able to use an Iomega 100 or 250 External Zip drive for reading and writing the Akai S2000 programs/samples. I was also able to use MO drives of 230MB or 640MB in size as well. Fantastic!! I can now virtually convert and import anything into the Akai S2000 Sampler this way. Now on my Windows 98 computer I can see anything on Akai formatted CD-Roms, MO Disks, Zip Disks, and Floppies. Brilliant!

I also found like with the Ensoniq EPS Classic that you need quality cables and a good solid Mixer to get the best sound out of the Akai S2000. If you don’t, you are likely to get unwanted static or noise.

Offline chrisNova777

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AKAI IB208P output expansion for Akai S2000 (1995)
« Reply #7 on: January 14, 2019, 05:50:45 AM »
AKAI IB208P (Multi8/D) - S/PDIF + Assignable Outputs


Offline chrisNova777

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Re: Akai S2000 (1995) MIDI Stereo Digital Sampler
« Reply #8 on: May 27, 2019, 12:46:41 AM »