Why the memory limitation?

[fieldflower]

There's probably a superb answer to this question, but I've been wondering why the piano and sample banks have such a small memory?
1 GB for piano and 256 MB for sample is really not much in terms of memory capacity these days. I have really slim USB's with 128 GB capacity.
So what's the reason behind this limitation? Something about the sounds being loaded and readily available? Enlighten me please...

And regardless of why the primary memory is so restricted it would have been wonderful if Nord had incorporated the possibility to have a USB plugged in as secondary memory.
Enabling to load/replace sounds on the keyboard without having a computer dangling. Having all the sounds somewhat available.

[Mr_-G-]

This question was discussed and answered many times, the last time by anotherscott just 1 or two days ago. I am sure you can get it via the search function. Not trying to be unhelpful but I bet that there is a limit to the number of times people answer the same thing.

[fieldflower]

I really did try the search function with a search on "memory", but after scrolling past 7 pages of non-relevant threads I posted this one...

Edit: And now I tried to look through anotherscott's latest posts and still can't find it.

[derrellpiper]

http://www.norduserforum.com/post96842. ... and#p96842

[anotherscott]

There's probably a superb answer to this question, but I've been wondering why the piano and sample banks have such a small memory?
1 GB for piano and 256 MB for sample is really not much in terms of memory capacity these days. I have really slim USB's with 128 GB capacity.
So what's the reason behind this limitation? Something about the sounds being loaded and readily available? Enlighten me please...

yes, it's a different kind of flash, and yes, it is related to having a changeable set of samples that is remembered between boots and is instantly available. I see someone already linked to a comment where I talked about it some. But to elaborate, an expensive kind of flash is needed if you want to be able to access it as if it were RAM. Cheaper flash (or SSD) is storage and cannot directly be accessed as if it were RAM; instead the stored data gets copied into RAM rather than used directly. Managing all this shuttling of data between storage and memory is something no one seems to have accomplished outside of a full computer hardware/OS environment (except maybe Kurzweil with its patented FlashPlay, I'm not sure how that works). And the full computer environment (i.e. Mac/Windows/Linux) is costly and also challenging for a musical instrument (trade-offs in latency and rock-solid reliability), though it can be done (i.e. Kronos, which ends up with a related downside of taking 3 minutes to boot, as it has to load a much bigger OS and "pre-load" chunks of samples off the SSD into RAM every time it starts up, so that the subsequent "streaming" can work).

And regardless of why the primary memory is so restricted it would have been wonderful if Nord had incorporated the possibility to have a USB plugged in as secondary memory. Enabling to load/replace sounds on the keyboard without having a computer dangling. Having all the sounds somewhat available.

It would take just as long to change the Nord's internal sounds from a flash drive as it does from the computer, so it still would not be something practical to do at a gig. And then, instead of the nice full-screen, relatively easy and informative interface of the Sound Manager, they would have to build sound management software into the Nord itself, which you would have to navigate with its own buttons and (relatively) tiny screen... I can't imagine preferring to do that rather than to use the Sound Manager.

[fieldflower]

There's probably a superb answer to this question, but I've been wondering why the piano and sample banks have such a small memory?
1 GB for piano and 256 MB for sample is really not much in terms of memory capacity these days. I have really slim USB's with 128 GB capacity.
So what's the reason behind this limitation? Something about the sounds being loaded and readily available? Enlighten me please...

yes, it's a different kind of flash, and yes, it is related to having a changeable set of samples that is remembered between boots and is instantly available. I see someone already linked to a comment where I talked about it some. But to elaborate, an expensive kind of flash is needed if you want to be able to access it as if it were RAM. Cheaper flash (or SSD) is storage and cannot directly be accessed as if it were RAM; instead the stored data gets copied into RAM rather than used directly. Managing all this shuttling of data between storage and memory is something no one seems to have accomplished outside of a full computer hardware/OS environment (except maybe Kurzweil with its patented FlashPlay, I'm not sure how that works). And the full computer environment (i.e. Mac/Windows/Linux) is costly and also challenging for a musical instrument (trade-offs in latency and rock-solid reliability), though it can be done (i.e. Kronos, which ends up with a related downside of taking 3 minutes to boot, as it has to load a much bigger OS and "pre-load" chunks of samples off the SSD into RAM every time it starts up, so that the subsequent "streaming" can work).

I thought it might be like that.
Thanks for explaining - it was exactly this technical knowledge I was seeking.

And regardless of why the primary memory is so restricted it would have been wonderful if Nord had incorporated the possibility to have a USB plugged in as secondary memory. Enabling to load/replace sounds on the keyboard without having a computer dangling. Having all the sounds somewhat available.

It would take just as long to change the Nord's internal sounds from a flash drive as it does from the computer, so it still would not be something practical to do at a gig. And then, instead of the nice full-screen, relatively easy and informative interface of the Sound Manager, they would have to build sound management software into the Nord itself, which you would have to navigate with its own buttons and (relatively) tiny screen... I can't imagine preferring to do that rather than to use the Sound Manager.

Absolutely, I didn't mean it as a shortcut to get bigger instant memory.
And also not to replace the computer possibilities with the Sound manager.
What I was after was a meat-and-potatoes alternative method to be able to change sounds when not having the computer there.

I prefer to do this with computer when that is handy.
But I'd prefer to not have to tote along the computer to at all be able to do it.
Just looking for a little added flexibility...

[analogika]

iPad app would be brilliant.

[anotherscott]

iPad app would be brilliant.

Yeah, that would be nice. I wonder if it's even feasible. Apple has a lot of limitations regarding USB. In general, the OS does not support writing to a USB device (you can't connect a standard USB hard drive or flash drive, for example), so I don't know if the OS would support Nord writing data to the storage media in the keyboard. The OS does support sending MIDI data over USB of course, but as far as I've seen, not file writing.

[Duplobaustein]

Kurzweils Flashplay on the Forte currently loads up to 19,3GB of samples (16GB factory plus 3,3GB user sample space). They claim, it could be hundreds of GBs as well available after bootup (30 sec).

I think it won’t be a problem to offer a bit more from Clavia as well.

[anotherscott]

Kurzweils Flashplay on the Forte currently loads up to 19,3GB of samples (16GB factory plus 3,3GB user sample space). They claim, it could be hundreds of GBs as well available after bootup (30 sec).

I think it won’t be a problem to offer a bit more from Clavia as well.

It's an interesting question, because Kurz did figure out how to do something, and patented it. Which means, for Nord to do it, they need to do it some way that's different from what Kurz did.