My Minimoog Voyager just spontaneously BROKE out of nowhere!

[Jinsai]

PLEASE HELP!!!! I brought my 50th Anniversary Edition Minimoog Voyager over to my friend's place and hooked it up to his P3 Sequencer (analogue sequencer by Sequentrix). The Sequencer works perfectly with his other synths, but it completely destroyed my Moog.

I guess it was sending some crazy sysex data to it (that maybe the Moog couldn't understand?) and screwed it up. I don't know. Are these things calibrated before they're shipped off, and is that calibrated setting locked? Is there a way to completely reset my Minimoog and recalibrate it or whatever is necessary? I don't know, but I'm currently devestated.

PROBLEMS THAT I'VE IDENTIFIED

1. The Master Volume knob now no longer has any effect. The screen still displays the change in value, but there is no difference in the sound.

2. The headphone jack now produces no noise.

3. When the Moog is turned on, it makes a crazy "blurrrr geeeeee waaaaaaah" noise.

4. Whanever a patch is loaded up, the synth plays and holds the note (as though there were a stuck key). The keyboard seems to be indefinitely in HOLD mode (and yeah I've tried flipping the EXT/Keyboard On Red switch on the bottom right). This held note will sustain the last note played.

5. Alot of my presets sound different, as though the filter has been adjusted and made slightly more resonanty and I could swear that the cutoff filter has been brought down on each one.

6. I'm not sure how to check this, but I'm pretty sure that the Touch Screen is sustaining and holding on a specific point (which might explain number 5)... I dunno.

7. Various knobs seem to be behaving erratically... Some seem to not even really work at all anymore, but I can't be sure because it's such a pain to get around the interface now that it constantly emits this horrible drone.

THINGS I'VE TRIED TO DO TO FIX IT (NONE OF WHICH HAVE WORKED)

1. I tried installing the newerish OS 2.5 System Software (I was previously running 2.1 when this stuff happened) via Sysex librarian. No change.

2. I tried downgrading back to 2.1, didn't work... so I upgraded back to 2.5. Still screwed up.

3. I took it down to a synth shop and they let me hook it up to their Voyager floor model. I tried to do a direct transfer of the System Rom, Boot, Preset Sounds, Panel Presets, EVERYTHING. I went through and compared the settings on every parameter manually and still nothing changed.

4. I went to that submenu inside of the Copyright Information submodule and tried to reset the Master Volume and Headphone Volume preset relativity parameters. Nothing.

5. I pretty much went through everything and tried every combination of On/Off parameters accross the board.


I have no idea what to do. Do you think trying to use the Mac OSX software program that interfaces with the Moog will help? I think I'll buy it anyway because I'm GOING to get this fixed. Please help.

[Qwave]

... I guess it was sending some crazy sysex data to it (that maybe the Moog couldn't understand?) and screwed it up. I don't know. Are these things calibrated before they're shipped off, and is that calibrated setting locked? Is there a way to completely reset my Minimoog and recalibrate it or whatever is necessary? ...

The Voyagers are only known to be calibrated with real hardware trimmers inside. There is no info about these public available.
SysEx uses a header data which is unique for manufactor and model. So it is impossible for the P3 to send SysEx that Voyager would react to. And I think you can't create SysEx strings on the P3 that the Voyager will understand. So if it happened while playing the P3 into the Voyager it night have been Midi CCs. But then it should have gone by now after all those things you tried to cure the Voyager.
Other things you might test:
- crazy pot-mappings
- loading a new set of OS 2.x readdy factory sound (I am not sure if the factories on the Moog page are now converted for the 2.0 OS). Try the RME factories.

And then you might need help by the Moog techs. Maybe your unit is faulty.

[RL]

You should contact Moogmusic. It's a hardware problem of the output VCAs I guess.
Good luck!
RL

[GregAE]

<< Do you think trying to use the Mac OSX software program that interfaces with the Moog will help? I think I'll buy it anyway because I'm GOING to get this fixed. >>

Nope. The Editor software won't fix the problem, nor will it help you in troubleshooting. It has a lot of nice features, but fixing broken Voyagers isn't one of them.

RL's right - contact Moog Music for assistance. They will probably give you an RMA number and instructions for sending it to the factory.

[Lengai]

You could send it in for the version 3.0 upgrade.

[Amos]

This sounds like an electrical event, not a digital/sysex problem. An IC on the analog board has failed; this IC supplies audio to the headphone output and processes the main volume CV (so the main output VCA is stuck open now).

The touch surface could be an additional problem, but this may be hard to determine until the first problem is fixed. The first problem can be fixed by any competent electronics technician. I was alerted to this thread by Imar Sanmartí, who is a more-than-competent technician.

The touch surface if damaged is also relatively easy to repair, in most cases.

Cheers,

Amos

[peter ripa]

how did this resolve?
im having almost the same problem since recently

note is always on, although its not in any part of the envelope (which seems to be working fine) but rather independant of the envelope.

R output is alot louder

heapdhone jack doesnt work

seems likely its an ic in the output stage. apart from that its rather out of tune but that is prolly another problem

[Amos]

Hi Peter,

when this problem happens, the IC designated U49 on the analogue board needs to be replaced. It is an LM837 type IC.
Also, resistors R301 and R303 need to be changed from 47 Ohms to 330 Ohms.

Changing the resistors as I specified here should prevent the problem from happening again in the future.

You may contact me for more information, or give my e-mail address to your repair technician, and I will be happy to help.

Kind regards,

Amos

[hangmansshadow]

Hi i've the same problem no output on headphones no master volume control note keep active and high volume on output, i've taken some measures over ic49 lm837n and all the four output of the opamp are at -5v below ground. do you think that only this ic is broken or there are something else?
thanks for reply

hangman

[aerophone]

Hello,

I have not exactly the same, but similar problem with my new Performer - sometimes when it's switched on, it produses some low sound that varies when you change patches, and it seems like some key is stuck. PANIC doesn't help. So I switch it off and on again, and everything is okay. That happens nearly every time Voyager is switched on, so I need to switch it on twice to make it behave in due order.

I also noticed that even during a normal performance keys are being stuck more often then I would expect them to, but PANIC function helps to resolve it without swithcing off.

Could anyone understand the nature of these issues? I thought it may depend on voltage, because I possibly have too much devices connected to one outlet.

Thank you in advance.

[reekster]

I have exactly this same problem. I read on another post that some were shipped with the wrong IC's. Trying to contact support has been more than frustrating.