MCD Sweet 16 Memory Card Review

MCD Sweet 16 Memory Card

Brian over at Sector101 just sold me a modded Yamaha MCD64 Memory Card known as the MCD Sweet16. I’m pretty excited about it because these cards are extremely hard to get. I plan to use this MCD Sweet16 with my Blue LCD Modded Yamaha SY-77 Synth. She’s a beauty!

I have another spare MCD64 Memory Card which I can then use for my Yamaha V-50 Synthesizer. I really like that synth but needed a memory card to hold more patches. Below is more info about the MCD Sweet16 Project that Brian has been working on. Once I get the MCD Sweet16, I’ll update this post with additional information and thoughts about the card. Stay tuned!

I should also add that this card cost me $160 bucks with shipping to Japan. If you do the math that works out to $10 per card since there are 16 cards in one MCD Sweet 16. One Yamaha MCD64 Memory Card alone can cost around $100 in excellent condition. Thus I think this card overall works out to be a pretty good deal. I also don’t have to carry around 16 cards and swap them in and out. I just rotate the dial on the MCD Sweet 16 to the desired card number. Fantastic!!

The MCD Sweet16 project is the modification of a standard Yamaha MCD64 or MCD32 RAM card to allow it to store sixteen banks of MCD64 memory.

Sector101 MCD Sweet16 card specifications:

* After modification the MCD card will contain 1024KB of memory (1 MegaByte).

* The 1024KB memory allows storage of sixteen MCD64 card banks with each bank selectable by rotary switch.

* Each 64KB bank is totally independent of any other bank so each 64KB bank can be formatted by a different synth or module that uses a standard MCD64 RAM card.

* Either a standard MCD64 or MCD32 card can be converted to an MCD Sweet16 card giving 16x 64KB banks.

* The card Write-Protect switch needs to be removed to allow positioning of the rotary switch. This is necessary to allow the modified card to fit rack modules such as the TG500 and RM50. After modification the card will be permanently write-enabled. Only the contents of the currently selected bank will be modified when writing to the card.

* The card battery compartment is unaffected so the simple battery replacement procedure is the same as with a standard MCD64 or MCD32 card.

Yamaha SY77 Music Synthesizer

Yamaha SY77 Music Synthesizer

The day following my purchase of the Yamaha V50, I took a drive over to another used music store that I usually visit about twice a month. I was stunned to see sitting on top of a shelf a vintage Yamaha SY77 in excellent condition. It had a hard shell case and inserted into the card slot was an MCD64 64K Memory Card. The pice tag was $100 bucks. I took it down from the shelf and quickly decided to give it a whirl to see how nice it sounded. As expected, it sounded great.

Just one day before I had found a fantastic Yamaha V50. One of the things I wanted was a memory card for it, so I got onto Ebay and checked around. As exepcted I found a couple of MCD64 memory cards, but they were at least $75 plus an extra $35 or so for shipping to Japan. You can imagine what I was thinking when I saw the MCD64 memory card sticking out of the Yamaha SY77. In my mind, I basically bought the memory card and got a Yamaha SY77 synthesizer for free…laugh. Seriously, that’s what I thought.

When I got home with the Yamaha SY77 I noticed that it was extremely heavy. This thing is built like a tank and it weighs like one as well. Throw a hard shell case in with it and you have some major ball busting to carry this around. I don’t know if I’ll be lugging it on the stage, but I can certainly say it will fit nicely in the home studio. It’s a big synth, but the keys feel great and really solid just like the Yamaha DX7.

A couple of notable problem areas on these Yamaha SY77 synthesizers are (a) the LCD fading out and (b) the floppy disk drive failing due to broken drive belts. In my case, the LCD was just fine. However, my floppy drive was indeed not working. I opened up the synth and took a look inside. As expected ( and hoping ), the floppy drive had a broken belt. The rubber stuff was luckily easy to clean off in my case and quickly I scrounged up a rubber band to replace the floppy drive belt temporarily. I needed to check and see if the floppy drive was operational or whether there was an additional problem.

I put the Yamaha SY77 back together with the floppy drive fixed using a rubber band. I started it up and decided to format a new floppy disk. Awesome! The floppy drive worked like a charm. Now I can just order a new floppy belt off of Ebay and know that will fix it for quite a while. I don’t know if just using the rubber band will be stable enough long term. I was happy that I didn’t have to pay $85 from Floppy Drive Solutions for a new floppy drive, although I may do that in the future if I use the drive a lot. Right now, transferring voice banks from the computer via midi is the way to go. I can also use the MCD64 Memory Card for adding extra banks to the SY77.

All in all it was a great day and a nice surprise to come home with a really nice Yamaha SY77 to go along with the Yamaha V50 from yesterday. After playing both synths, I must say that the sequencer, drum machine, and raw edgy synth sound of the Yamaha V50 is pretty cool and unique. However, the incredible power of the Yamaha SY77 Synthesizer is simply awesome. I haven’t tried the sequencer yet, but it looks great and of course it’s a Yamaha. They have probably the best sequencers. What I like the best about both synths are the keys themselves. They are so nice to play and are very sturdy.

If anyone has any questions about the Yamaha SY77 or Yamaha V50, please feel free to comment or send me an email anytime. Thanks and enjoy!