Xpantastic!

Hi Steve,

That's fantastic!

stevelenham wrote:
> Unfortunately it would appear that Japanese-made synths use a single-
> piece display/panel PCB, so aren't compatible with this upgrade. Can
> anyone tell me what proportion of units were made in Japan?

You're right, my (Japanese) Xpander has a "pot board" with the
display, the rear panel sockets and the front panel controls. (I've
added a photo to the "Photos" section of the group.) So instead of
an entire replacement board, one would need to desolder the old
displays and mount the new displays with cables back to your master
board, with the signals from the CPU broken out of the ribbon cable
to the pot board... Or design a replacement for the entire board.
Not very nice, either way.

I don't know if there's even enough clearance on the PCB around the
old VFDs to squeeze the new displays in there...

Oh well, touch wood my displays will last for a wee while yet. Then
I can start to worry.

Cheers, and I hope the production run goes ahead and that it is a
success for you.

I haven't been able to find out how many Xpanders were produced in
the US and Japan, but I'd be interested to know myself.

Cheers,

John :^P
-- 
John Pallister
john@...