Nord User Forum

Dear All,

We've had this Nord Piano 2 for a few years and it's been great and stable until a few days ago.

I could use your help seeing if there is anything left for me to try in software/firmware before we send it for repair. And also if you have repair recommendations for Denver Colorado. I leave for Europe in a few days and my girlfriend has a gig scheduled in the US soon after so we are running out of time.

I've been read the forums and the Nord website and haven't found anything that has helped.

1. It started out with high-frequency sounds during piano samples perhaps something like this:

nord-stage-forum-f3/sound-breakdown-t8485.html

• Imperial hpsd bosendorf sample only.mp3

It's pretty obvious in first 3 seconds of the attached sample. That's just supposed to the "Grand 1 Grand Imperial Bdorf XL 5.3" piano sample. It only happened when playing that and other piano samples. The sample synth sounds didn't produce issues. BUT, now I'm wishing it was only that bad.

2. It has only gotten worse as I've tried to examine it and now it boots to "Piano 2 Invalid OS" followed by "Update Mode Ready" and no sounds. Even after the shift-store button press on boot it won't accept an upgrade of OS to 1.2.

a. I've also tried to load OS 1.16 since that was what we had been using until I upgraded to 1.2 as part of the attempted repair. I've tried to load from Mac and PC and with different USB cables. So I feel like I've exhausted everything there.

3. Are there other extreme software/firmware measures (Heimlich, vulcan nerve pinch)?

4. Are there Denver repair shops Nord / AM&S / you would recommend? I know of one who shop who has done good work for me on amps, but I don't know about their Nord experience.

Thanks,

Stoph

Hi, I don’t know the Nord Piano but I read here several times about loose ribbon cables inside the Nords which could cause some strange behaviour of the instrument - maybe that’s also true for the Nord Piano and the first thing worth to look at by yourself if you can open the NP?

My suggestion would be to (a) reseat all cables, followed by (b) reload a few samples and see how they sound.

Several years ago, the memory contents of my NP2 got scrambled somehow. Don't know, don't care -- as a simple sound reload cured the problem.

Best of luck.

Hm, could really be, that your device was under EMC stress an some bits in the flash were changed. I‘d also give it a try and reload all samples.

Cheers,

Eumel

Thanks everyone so far.

1. I should clarify that at the moment I can't load or restore programs/sounds. The Nord Sound Manager refuses to connect to the keyboard. The Manager complains about the wrong OS and at boot the Nord itself reports invalid OS. The OS upgrader does connect to the Nord and attempts to upgrade the OS; the Nord reports erasing the old data and receiving, but fails before completion.

If some sort of "deeper" reset is possible (via Sysex or other random keypresses) that could be good.

2. I'm tempted to take try the re-seating of cables, although I'm not that hopeful with that "Invalid OS" error now.

Stoph

Hi Stoph,

did you try this procedure which is described in the update instructions in case the normal update way with the Update Utility fails?

In the rare cases where the operating system in the Nord instrument have become damaged and the unit does not start properly, the Update Utility will be unable connect to the unit. If this is the case, start up the Nord while simultaneously holding down the Shift and Store buttons on the panel. This will start the unit in the Update mode, which makes it possible for the Update Utility to access and update the operating system in a Nord that does not start properly

Not sure if this will help but maybe worth to try, in case you have not done so yet?

Hervshahn, yes, I tried the shift-store combination.

Pablo responded to my email to let me know that it sounded like a hardware problem. Presently considering the options for repair or replacement.

The problem was fixed by swapping in a new mainboard.

Glad to see that it’s done