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Author
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Topic: This is how to connect an external drive to VS and PC!
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tjdesmond
Planeteer
Member # 2451
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posted 11-25-2001 03:51 PM
*I posted this back in April. Due to the recent queries about SCSI, backup, the overpriced CDRII, and the missing search function, I've bumped it up.*Hey everyone,
As promised, what follows is about a year of research on my part. I refused to give Roland $600 for a CD burner that should cost $200. This is for those of you that already have a (1) decent sound card for mixing down your VS songs to .wav files to burn to CD and (2) a CD burner. This will allow you to move complete VS songs to an external drive, and then to your PC for archiving purposes. It DOES NOT allow you to edit VS songs on your PC. I got a 4.3 gig external SCSI hard drive off of ebay for $50.00. The SCSI card (you need this to connect to your PC) cost me $49.00 at CompUSA. So, for less than $100, I am accomplishing the same thing as the $600 CDRII. Plus, I can use the external SCSI drive for more recording time. Not to mention, if you send your mastered VS songs out to your PC's soundcard for CD burning, you don't have to mixdown to 2 tracks! Feel free to email me off list if you need help or more details (tjdesmond@hotmail.com). Peace. Connecting an external SCSI hard drive to the VS880EX 1. Connect the hard drive to the VS using the SCSI port.
2. Set the SCSI ID on the hard drive. This is usually on the back of the drive and can be set to any number. Choose any number except 7. 7 conflicts with the VS.
3. Plug the hard drive in and turn it on.
4. Plug the VS in and turn it on. You MUST turn on the external hard drive first. Also, never connect or disconnect any SCSI device while the power is on.
5. Press "system" until you see "SYS DriveInitialize".
6. Press "yes".
7. Select the SCSI drive you just hooked up. Make sure it says SCU and not IDE. If you choose ANY IDE drive, you will be reformatting your internal drive and will lose any songs you have on the VS.
8. Hit "parameter >" till you see "physical format". Choose "on" if your drive is brand new or it's the first time you're using it with the VS. This will almost double the time it takes to initialize the drive, but it will scan the surface of your hard drive to make sure there are no errors. Its well worth the extra time setting up than losing that scorching guitar solo later.
9. Hit "parameter >" till you see "partition". Choose 1000MB. This is the largest partition the VS will recognize. The VS will only recognize 4 partitions per hard drive. Therefore, you really don't want to use any drive larger than 4 GB.
10. Hit "parameter >" till you see "surface scan". Once again, choose "on" if your drive is brand new or it's the first time you're using it with the VS.
11. Hit "yes".
12. It should now say something like "SYS Init. SC4" (if you set the hard drive to 4). Hit "yes". It will ask you if you are sure, hit "yes". It will ask you if you want to store the current song. Hit "yes" if necessary.
13. The VS will now begin initializing the drive. This takes a very long time. It took me close to 5 hours to complete the procedure using a 4 gig hard drive.
14. When it's done, the VS will read "complete". Hit "enter" and the VS will restart back to play condition. Now your external hard drive is available using the "system" button. You can switch between drives. IDE is your internal and SC is your external. So, if you have a 4 gig external set to SCSI 3. You now have 4, one gig drives SC3:0, SC3:1, SC3:2 and SC3:3 hooked up to your VS. Now that you have an external SCSI drive initialized by the VS, you can move songs to your PC for storage on its hard drive or to burn to CD. This is useful if you already have a CD burner in your PC and a decent soundcard. By sending your mastered VS songs out the digital outs to your PC's sound card, you can burn .wav files to CD. Also, you can copy all the VS files from the external SCSI drive to your PC's hard drive to archive your songs (including all markers, scenes, effects, etc.). In short, if you have a decent sound card and CD burner in your PC, you can use an external SCSI hard drive and SCSI card to accomplish the same thing as the CDRII.
Connecting an external SCSI hard drive to your PC 1. Connect the external SCSI hard drive to your PC via a SCSI card. I purchased an AP10 PCI SCSI card for $49.00. If you can hook up a modem, you can install this card.
2. Turn on the external hard drive.
3. Turn on your PC. You MUST turn on the external hard drive first. Also, never connect or disconnect any SCSI device while the power is on.
4. Go to "My Computer". You will now see drive icons for every partition created on the external hard drive by the VS. They will be labeled "Vs-880st25b" with a drive letter. So, if you hooked up a 4 gig external drive, you would see four icons that look like 4 separate hard drives. You can now cut/paste all VS files to your hard drive or burn to CD for storage. Simply reverse the procedure to bring the song data back into your VS for further editing. If you burn the VS song data to CD, make sure you uncheck "read only" on all the files before you hook the drive back up to the VS. Otherwise, the VS won't recognize the files. Note: This procedure will allow you to store complete VS song data. It's like "backing up" to a DAT or the CDRII. It does NOT mean you can edit the VS song data on your PC. [ 11-25-2001: Message edited by: tjdesmond ] [ 11-25-2001: Message edited by: tjdesmond ] -------------------- --Des
Low Spark--http://www.lowsparkband.com
Posts: 203 | From: Nashville, TN | Registered: Jun 2000
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Hano
Planeteer
Member # 3419
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posted 11-26-2001 04:54 AM
Great post DES, BRAVO. Hano Now I'll do a sneaky TEST [ 11-26-2001: Message edited by: Hano ] -------------------- VS Family * VS Studio's * Hano in MP3 *
Posts: 6101 | From: Leuven - Belgium | Registered: Dec 2000
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tjdesmond
Planeteer
Member # 2451
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posted 11-27-2001 05:20 AM
JFN,
Great question! I haven't tried using the SCSI-USB adapter. It may work, but I can't say for sure. You can get a PCI SCSI card for your PC for about $70 (search for SCSI card at http://www.compusa.com). It'd be less than the adapter. Its really easy to install (if you've ever installed an internal modem or sound card its the same principal).My experience with my setup has been excellent. I have not had any difficulties at all. [ 11-27-2001: Message edited by: tjdesmond ] -------------------- --Des
Low Spark--http://www.lowsparkband.com
Posts: 203 | From: Nashville, TN | Registered: Jun 2000
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Strider
Planeteer
Member # 4935
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posted 12-01-2001 03:31 PM
I have a little different situation here because I'm on a Mac not a PC. I'm interested that the PC is able to read the VS system format, and if so that might work for those of us whose Macs can read PC formatted disks.But, actually, I have a very simple question at this point, or rather a few simple questions. 1. Why partition into 1 Mb drives? That doesn't give much space per partition. Why not just fill up the external HD? 2. Does Roland give a limit to the size of external HD it will recognize with the VS 880 EX? I can''t find any SCSI drives available that have capacity less than about 18 Mb. Well, new that is. 3. Will any SCSI HD work, or does Roland specify attributes of external SCSI drives that they say will work? Or do they have a list of approved drives, or something like that? All I want to do at this point is expand the capacity of my VS880EX so that I'm not backing up and restoring off of CDs so often. -------------------- it's turtles all the way down
Posts: 56 | From: SF Bay Area | Registered: Nov 2001
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tjdesmond
Planeteer
Member # 2451
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posted 12-02-2001 03:07 PM
Strider,I put my responses under your questions in CAPS. Hope this info helps. I don't know that much about Macs, but I think the VS song data files are FAT32 format, which should be recognized by MacOS. Any Mac people out there that can confirm this? 1. Why partition into 1 Mb drives? That doesn't give much space per partition. Why not just fill up the external HD?
THE VS WILL ONLY RECOGNIZE A MAX 1 GB PARTITION.
2. Does Roland give a limit to the size of external HD it will recognize with the VS 880 EX? I can''t find any SCSI drives available that have capacity less than about 18 Mb. Well, new that is.
MAX IS 4, 1 GB PARTITIONS. SO, YOUR REALLY DON'T NEED ANYTHING MORE THAN 4 GB. I'D SEARCH EBAY FOR OLD DRIVES RATHER THAN PURCHASE A NEW 18 GB DRIVE WHICH IS ONLY USING 4 GB.
3. Will any SCSI HD work, or does Roland specify attributes of external SCSI drives that they say will work? Or do they have a list of approved drives, or something like that?
I HAVE ONLY TRIED MY SEAGATE, BUT IN THEORY, ANY SCSI HARD DRIVE SHOULD WORK.
Posts: 203 | From: Nashville, TN | Registered: Jun 2000
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tjdesmond
Planeteer
Member # 2451
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posted 12-18-2001 05:38 AM
Hey Folks,
Thanks to some great detective work by Matt H., here is a line on some cheap 4 GB SCSI drives for your VS.http://www.globalmicro.com ST15150N BARRACUDA 4.3GB 7200RPM SCSI 50 PIN
$28.00! This is the EXACT drive I have used and it works like a charm. You will need to purchase an external bay for it, but you can't beat the $28 for the drive! -------------------- --Des
Low Spark--http://www.lowsparkband.com
Posts: 203 | From: Nashville, TN | Registered: Jun 2000
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uptildawn
Planeteer
Member # 5063
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posted 12-20-2001 10:41 PM
Hi..... I'm new here. I've been trying to figure out a way to use my pc in this way ever since I got it (this is my first computer, so I'm pretty green yet). I have a question or two......tjdesmond -- I checked out the scsi drives at globalmicro and it got me to thinkin'. Since I've already invested heavily into larger IDEs for my VSs, isn't there a housing/converter for those Toshiba IDE drives that will let me use one of them as a external scsi type drive? Or can you think of a way to rig it to use this way? Or have you known anybody who has successfully done it?
In your first posting about this you said you could do data backups on the pc..... How have you been able to get the pc to recognize the information on the hard drive and store it on the pc?
I tried getting the pc to recognize a data file fom a cdr. It knew something was there, but couldn't do anything with it. Do you know why that's any different?
I know this is a lot to answer, but I'd appreciate ANYTHING you can tell me that will help.
Thanks in advance.
DT -------------------- uptildawn
Posts: 540 | From: Iowa | Registered: Dec 2001
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tjdesmond
Planeteer
Member # 2451
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posted 12-21-2001 06:48 AM
Welcome DT!
I'll give this a shot.You can only hook up SCSI drives to the SCSI port on the VS. You could certainly "swap out" IDE drives on the VS's internal bay, but I don't think that's a very good idea. Too much jostling in there could wipe out a hard drive (and all your work!). Something as simple as low static electricity off of your clothes could fry your drive, I've seen it happen. With external SCSI'
s, at least you know they're in a case and are meant to be handled. I'm surprised your PC didn't recognize the CDR. Your PC should show you files and folders. The file types are "fat32" (I think). There should be two .dat files and then a folder for each song containing more .dat files. The song folders are labeled something like "song01" (Sorry, I'm not at my computer so I can't be certain). So, if this makes sense, your PC should see the files on the CDR, but you really can't do anything with them except store them. Does this make any sense? If not, just hit me back. Peace.
Posts: 203 | From: Nashville, TN | Registered: Jun 2000
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uptildawn
Planeteer
Member # 5063
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posted 12-21-2001 08:11 AM
Okay......Let's see if I have the second part right first.
When I load the cdr I should be able to click on the (D) drive and open it to reveal the contents of the cdr. I can do that.......
When I open the drive I see nothing in the window. No folders, no icons of any sort. Properties shows the correct size of space used.
Select session option in right click menue even gives it a title similar to the one I gave it in the Roland, but there doesn't seem to be anything there that I can use in any way.
I can make copies of the cdr to my burner. That's about it.As for the first part of your answer....
I'm afraid you didn't catch the drift of my question....
What I want to do is use one of my extra IDEs by putting it in some kind of case that will somehow allow the Roland to use it as a scsi drive. Would this be a simple matter of using the right adapter plugs from the IDE drive to the outside of the case (scsi), or is it much more complex, involving electronic conversion to switch its function from IDE to scsi format?
If this question sounds uninformed, IT IS. I used to know electronics pretty good, but I hardly ever do anything to keep up with the knowledge and you know how fast the pace is........
Thanks for your help
DT -------------------- uptildawn
Posts: 540 | From: Iowa | Registered: Dec 2001
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uptildawn
Planeteer
Member # 5063
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posted 12-31-2001 06:35 PM
[ 12-31-2001: Message edited by: uptildawn ] -------------------- uptildawn
Posts: 540 | From: Iowa | Registered: Dec 2001
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tjdesmond
Planeteer
Member # 2451
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posted 01-02-2002 10:57 AM
Glad we're getting closer here!You cannot connect two computers via their SCSI ports, just won't work (in fact, it would kill your computers). That's why I use an external SCSI drive as the "middle man" between my VS and PC. All its basically doing is providing me the medium to transfer the files. Song copy from VS to SCSI. Hook SCSI up to PC. Copy/paste from SCSI drive to folder on PC. Song data from point A (VS) to point B (PC) by using the external hard drive. You can certainly do the same thing with a Zip drive, but you're limited to the size of the Zip. So, you may be moving one song at a time (just shoot me). I would not use an extra IDE drive on your VS. Swapping them in and out could cause damage and excessive wear and tear on your VS. As far as burning goes, I use the burner in my PC to create audio CD's too. I take the master outs on the VS into my soundcard, record as .wav files and burn to CD. I can also burn a data CD with all of my VS song data files that I transferred with the external SCSI drive. This makin' any sense?  -------------------- --Des
Low Spark--http://www.lowsparkband.com
Posts: 203 | From: Nashville, TN | Registered: Jun 2000
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Scotius2001
Space Cadet
Member # 5124
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posted 01-02-2002 03:29 PM
I've been looking into the digital i/o solution myself. Believe it depends on what kind of sound card you have. I have a soundblaster live! value and most of the soundblaster series can be adapted with a digital i/o/ add on. If you're considering the Zip drive option, you might want to look into a Syquest Syjet 1.5G removable. You'd get quite a bit more memory and I've seen the on ebay for around $50 with the cartridges going for aroun $10 a piece. They are on Roland's list of compatible drives. Just make sure its SCSI and external. -------------------- Scotius
Posts: 19 | From: West Hills, CA | Registered: Dec 2001
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