That’s right. We get a lot of calls and e-mail from synth owners in a panic because they just turned on their keyboard or module and all the sounds are gone. They want to replace them as soon as possible for that gig on the weekend or tonight’s recording session.

Many of them ask…..”What Happened”???

What happened was that their synth’s “Internal Battery” died. That’s right… All hardware synths come with a battery that is inside the casing. Most have “Lithium Battery’s” similar to a cell phone or digital camera. Those little round ones that are about the size of a U.S. nickle. They are designed to last about ten years and when they die whatever you have in your synth’s memory is wiped out.

It’s great if you have your data backed up. Of course if you don’t then your in trouble, so make sure you back up your sounds. However, even if you do have your data backed up you will have to replace the battery or else the synth will not hold the data in it’s memory. As soon as you turn off the synth everything gets wiped out again.

What you have to do is open up the synth and take the casing off so you can get inside and replace the battery. That can usually be done pretty easily with just a philips screw driver. Some synths are easier to get inside then other ‘s so if your not quite sure about how that works then best to call a service tech who can go in and do it for you. In general it’s a fairly simple job that you can probably handle without having to pay a tech to do it for you.

Once you have the synth’s casing off then look around for that little nickle shaped lithium battery that I talked about. Simple remove it and then look for the model number that should be on the face of the battery. If the model number is not on the battery then contact the company who manufactures the synth (if they are still in business) and ask them what it is. You can also try doing a search on google or any internet search engine. You never know what your gonna find on that!

The good news it that it’s usually pretty easy to get a replacement battery for most synths. Places like Radio Shack, J&R music or many computer stores carry a wide selection of lithium battery’s. They only cost a few dollars so you can be back up and running without having to go too deep into your pockets.

Once you’ve replaced your battery and put the casing back on then just load everything back in and you will be back in business. Many newer synths can be “re-initilized” from the synths front panel which will get you back to the factory settings. Check your owners manuel to see if your synth can do that.

If for one reason or another you have not backed up your stuff then contact us and we will try to help you out. We have a large inventory of patch data from many vintage synths going back nearly twenty five years and there is a good chance that we have a great collection of sounds that you can use to get you going again. It may not be the same data that you originally had, but it will certainly get you back on track and there is a good chance that you will find a big improvement over to what you had in there originally. After all it’s from “The Patch King”!!!!

The morel of the story is “BACK UP YOUR DATA”. You never know when your synth’s battery is going to die and best to be prepared. There are several ways to back up your stuff depending on your synth. Vintage synths produced during the 70’s and early 80’s usually did it to a data cassette tape although with the advent of MIDI in the mid 80’s that all changed and the newer synths let you use “sysex – system exclusive”. That store’s the sounds on your computer hard drive. More info on how to save and load sounds via midi can be found at another article we have put together called SYSEX MADE SIMPLE. Be sure to check that out if your interested in saving your sounds on your synths hard drive.

If you need any more info please contact us and we will be happy to help you out.

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