Help! Korg Wavestation 'crashed'

[Captain Waves]

My trusty old Korg Wavestation crashed last night after a particularly long & intense session. ( lots of SYSex loads & saves & inputting of too many notes & intense wavesequencing in a 5 hour session)

I was actually just changing patchs when it just got stuck with the 'KORG' Logo on continually & 'wavestation' flashing continually underneath in sequences of 3 flashs.

I wonder is there some way of rebooting the OS? Some sequence of holding down buttons when powering up eg?
Maybe a way to enter diagnostic mode?
Anyone familiar with this problem. I tried all the obvious & none of the 'Error' warnings mentioned in the manual showed, just the same as described. Looks like a 'system crash' to me.
I v never had a single problem with this synth since Ive been using it from the mid 1990s. I changed the battery last autumn. (fall)

I know that there is a technician out there ( probably many) who know how to reboot the synth when powering up.

I would greatly appreciate some help to get it working again without having to take it far away ( too far from here) .
I know I can download the software version & I will do that asap, but I still want to get my synth working as normal as its such a familiar & musical 'friend'.

Edit (later)

FYI

I tried the 'Wavestation initialisation' procedure which consists of:

(Initializing the Wavestation keyboard, EX, and A/D)

1. Turn the power on.

2. Wait for the Korg logo to come up.

3. While the logo is still flashing, press the down cursor and the "4" button simultaneously. This will take you to the SPECIAL SCREEN, most of whose options are for development and debugging purposes and will destroy user data.

This didnt work for me in this instance & unfortunately makes no difference to the screen or WS status.

[Chevytraveller]

try this

bottom of the page

You will probably need to restore your patches from a backup afterwards

[Captain Waves]

Thanks for the rapid response Cheytraveller,

& thats a useful page to have.

I already tried that ( many times tonight)& its still stuck unfortunately.
Someone on another forum suggested I take the battery out & put it back in again & then do a system initialisation as there might be a short. I very much doubt it though, but the person who advised me knew that I had changed the battery last September so hence that line of enquiry.

[muzines]

Yes - take the battery out for about five minutes, then replace.

It will work - I recommend you perform a reset from the special page just to clear things out afterwards, then reinstall your patch data.

The battery thing will work, and is the often way of performing a full clear reset when the WS won't boot and the special page won't help.

[Captain Waves]

Yes - take the battery out for about five minutes, then replace.

It will work - I recommend you perform a reset from the special page just to clear things out afterwards, then reinstall your patch data.

The battery thing will work, and is the often way of performing a full clear reset when the WS won't boot and the special page won't help.

Nice one Desmond,
Great advice , thanks a lot!
(void(0) = suppose3d to be cool gremlin with shades on, but didnt work?)
You've given me back some 'hope' in this situation, as I had just about given up & resigned myself to another broken synth standing against the wall waiting for an expensive service trip.
Ill do that when I get a chance & report. ~Thankyou

[Martin Walker]

Good luck Captain Waves!

(I feel like I’m talking to a superhero )

Martin

[zenguitar]

(I feel like I’m talking to a superhero )
Martin

Or a VST !!

Andy

[Captain Waves]

Good luck Captain Waves!

(I feel like I’m talking to a superhero )

Martin

Thanks Martin, I am a superhero ! ( as are you Im sure)

It worked !! Yay ! Im delighted & over the moon!

thanks to Desmond & Chevy & all for help & general goodwill.

Taking the battery out forces the system to reinitialise as Desmond said.
Luckily I had backed up my patches before it crashed. I love my Wavestation!

Hey Martin, you actually helped me out greatly back in the late 1990s( I think)( when I had a different & not remembered username)
here on the old forum.
You gave me advice about my Wavestation ( loading sysex files & patch librarians etc then which was much appreciated .

My old G3 Imac blew up just around the millenium turn ( the radiation fallout turned me into a superhero )& I lost a lot of stuff including my original S.O.S. username & all my computer files etc void(0)
pretty rough at the time, but quite amusing 11 years later.

Thanks Desmond , Chev, Martin!
be well/ have fun -- Paul

[Martin Walker]

Good luck Captain Waves!

(I feel like I’m talking to a superhero )

Martin

Thanks Martin, I am a superhero ! ( as are you Im sure)

It worked !! Yay ! Im delighted & over the moon!

Very pleased to hear it - hope your return trip is a safe one

Martin

[PJKeys]

Thank goodness for this thread! Picked a lovely one up just yesterday...been loading in some sysex files this evening & the EXACT same thing happened to mine.

Blipped off to boot page on a performance change

Tried the initializing (still flashing Wavestation & nothing else)

Back off, battery removed for 5 mins & hey presto....Panic over!

Thanks! Greatly appreciated

[Martin Walker]

Glad you’re sorted PJKeys!

The Wavestation is indeed a mighty beast

Martin

[Keith_in_AZ]

I wish that there was a way to transfer patches/programs from the Wavestation VST to the hardware Wavestation. VST's and the supporting OS come and go, but the hardware is (nearly) forever.

[Martin Walker]

A bucketload of the VST patches/programs use the sounds from the ‘extra’ ROM samples included with it. Personally I sold my hardware Wavestation when I got the VST version, as it sounds almost identical (apart from being cleaner because my PC’s D/A chain is better) but offers far more sounds

Martin

[Captain Waves]

Hi everyone, hope you are all well.

I came across this old thread just now by chance , it came up in a goo gl e search. So I thought I would drop in & add my own conclusions to this issue in case it may help someone.

Im trying to resist superhero rhetoric!

Ok as I read through the thread & noticed that another poster had the same issue as mine originally re my Wavestation crashing & getting stuck on changing patches ,& your follow up to that Martin , I thought I may as well post what I think are the reasons why this happens. (Which is what Martin alluded to basically in his last post re: 'Keith-in-AZ' wishing to export patches from the WS vst to the hardware WS , 9 years ago).

My Wavestation is an original (1st generation)Wavestation ( albeit it with nice new SILENT blue/white display that took me about 9 hours to fit 2 years ago), not a Wavestation EX, & therefore without the WS EX upgrade voice chip , which includes the extra voice ROM data, eg. piano & drum waves etc.
So when an original Wavestation owner ,( non EX) tries to load system exclusive patch files that contain patches based on the waves from the WS EX, AD, SR etc that use the updated patch data /waves, that the original Wavestation does not have onboard & therefore cannot access, then this is where that problem arises from.

The sysex files will load usually, but if you are on a patch with the missing waveforms or change to a patch with the missing waveforms then the Wavestation ( 1st gen.) will crash & get stuck & not boot as described.

My WS has been in storage for a few years & I just unpacked it today & have been enjoying going through some of the familiar patches . Im glad I still have it , its just a lovely musical instrument, especially if one takes the time to avoid the cliches & program original sounds.

I have the vsts ( Wavestation) since they came out & love the 'random generator' on the latest version, however the original keyboard W.S. is just a different & more rewarding experience for me ,as I get more inspired when using hardware instruments generally. It would be very nice if there was a way of transmitting the 'random patch generator' , from the latest VST W.S. into the keyboard, or at least sending that random generated patch to the hardware. There probably is in 'Midiquest' or some similar editing software.

Anyway a relatively trivial blast from the past, just thought I would say hello as I havnt been in here for quite a while.

[muzines]

So when an original Wavestation owner ,( non EX) tries to load system exclusive patch files that contain patches based on the waves from the WS EX, AD, SR etc that use the updated patch data /waves, that the original Wavestation does not have onboard & therefore cannot access, then this is where that problem arises from.

The sysex files will load usually, but if you are on a patch with the missing waveforms or change to a patch with the missing waveforms then the Wavestation ( 1st gen.) will crash & get stuck & not boot as described.

I don't remember that being the case - I can try here on my original WS if I remember tomorrow. I suspect this has more to do with the OS version running on the WS. Mine has v3.19, the latest/last, and that software "knows" about the EX version. I'm not sure what happens offhand when an EX-referenced PCM wave from a patch/ws is loaded in this case, but I suspect it's just silent or substituted for another PCM wave.

If however you were running an early version, ie V2.xx or earlier, then yes it's entirely possible you could get crashes after transferring sysex data like this, as V2.xx was made before the EX was in the pipeline, so possibly doesn't do appropriate range checking. Having said that, V2.xx was rather crashey after *any* sysex transfers, so it's a low bar, anyway...

Welcome back!

[Martin Walker]

Welcome back Captain Waves!

I must admit when re-reading this thread that it started so long ago I was actually surprised upon scrolling through all my answers

Still, good to hear all your extra info, and I must admit (to my eternal shame) that I hadn't noticed the random feature on the latest Wavestation VST, which I've just launched and had a play with.

Nothing randomly remarkable popped up yet, but thanks for that!

Martin

[Captain Waves]

Hi Martin & Desmond ,

Thanks for the welcome, that cheered me up!

You may well be right Desmond that it has more to do with the OS . I dont even know what OS mine is.

I know the W.S. is just an early rom player synth but I like it a lot, probably more from the familiarity of many years of use & inspiration when I didnt have much else to work with at the time in the 1990s, which wasnt a bad thing as far as getting to go deep with the Wavestation.

The random patch generator in the latest VST does produce mostly not such interesting results , but one patch in every 10 or so can be interesting to my ears, or at least takes it in a direction I wouldnt have thought of going that can yield great results as random patch generators tend to do. I love random patch generators! ( the one on my Prophet VS being my personal favourite)

[Captain Waves]

Desmond, thats interesting that yours having the latest OS original W.S. "knows" when EX patches are loaded! Im sure mine is OS2 . I must check. ( It 'doesnt know')

I was thinking of buying the EX rom chips for mine, but with your info there, it probably wouldnt work unless I upgraded the OS first.
Im not interested in the patch data of the EX rom , as in acoustic pianos etc, I like my WS as is, apart from having to open it up & remove the battery briefly to get it to boot if I load patches that it cant see.