Yamaha PSR 9000 V2 Problem with Disk Drive and HD

[Borislav]

The keyboard has not been used in many years. When i turn on the keyboard it works, but the hard drive cant read the midi files that was stored.

The internal disk driver on the keyboard also cant read midi files from my floppy disks, but if i use an external disk drive to my pc, i can read my midi files.

How can this be repaired so i can read(use) midi files from the floppy disks on the keyboard?

Is the HD and DD replaceable, if so what type fits this model keyboard.

Is there any way to connect an external disk drive to the keyboard without USB?

[GeirH]

Hi Borislav,

Both the floppy drive and the hard drive can be replaced. Standard computer parts were used, but the technology is now old and outdated. This means that you'll likely have a hard time finding parts that still work.

The HDD bay fits a 2,5" IDE device, the form factor commonly found in laptops at the time. Maximum drive height is 12,7 mm, so thicker high-capacity drives won't fit. The drive bay has an old ATA-style ribbon connector. The operating system on the PSR9000 only supports up to 8 GB capacity and 2 GB partitions (a larger drive can be used, but only those 8 GB in 4x2 GB partitions) can be used. The PSR does not know how to configure all drive types out there, so some may not be recognized properly, even if they have the correct form factor and interface.

I don't know much about the FDD, but I believe it is a standard 2DD/2HD drive.

Apart from sourcing old drives, there are other options. On the HDD side, adapters exist that will let you hook a flash memory card to the internal IDE port. On the FDD side, there are so-called floppy emulators, that use specially formatted USB thumb drives to load/save your data.

These adapters and emulators are specialty items, not sold through the wider channels, so eBay or Amazon is where to look. There's a learning curve to all off this, not least because meaningful documentation isn't to be expected, so you will have to rely on web forums like this for any kind of help. Hopefully, the people here can point you in the right direction.

- H -

[GeirH]

A slight correction for clarity:

The operating system on the PSR9000 only supports up to 8 GB capacity and 2 GB partitions (a larger drive can be used, but only those 8 GB in 4x2 GB partitions) can be used.

The operating system on the PSR9000 only supports up to 2 GB partitions, and a total of 8 GB capacity (e.g. four 2 GB partitions). A larger drive can be installed, but only those 8 GB can be used.

- H -

[mikf]

Unless your hobby is rebuilding vintage keyboards I wouldn't think trying to repair a very old arranger is worth the cost or effort.