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ArtInvent · 9th February 2010

Well, I've had an MR-1000 for about a week now. I realized when I bought it that hard drives make some noise (had an old HDD multitracker years ago) but the unit clicks during recording (not playback for some reason) and it's just too loud. Now, this is probably not a big problem to most people as if you get the unit back about 5 feet and behind the mics, you can't hear it. But for me it is a problem. I'm recording my own classical guitar music (about the softest instrument there is) and I like having the unit right in front of my face - I even made a little rack for it so it sits right below the mics about 18". The clicking is quite audible. I can move it back to a table behind the mic stand, where I can still just reach the controls, which is better, but I can still hear the darn clicking a bit. I can cover the thing with a thick blanket, which is what I'm doing now - but then I can't see the display. Not exactly an ideal situation.

Reformatted the drive - still makes the clicking. It sounds like k-dk k-dk k-dk (pause) k-dk k-dk k-dk (etc). Faint, but audible. This is on highest DSD format setting. Lesser data streams, maybe it's less/not noticeable. Don't care, I'm only interested in the highest setting.

So question #1 - anyone else notice HDD clicking during rec? Is this noise common to all these units?

I had a Zoom H4 that used solid state SD cards, which I must say makes a whole lot more sense than an HDD. Now, in all other respects the Korg sounds like a revelation compared to that thing, but at least the Zoom was dead silent. If the Korg just recorded to SD cards I would be set.

I would definitely be interested in replacing the hard drive with a solid state drive. I don't even need that much capacity. Looks like you can buy a 30 or 40GB SSD for maybe $130 these days. Or a 32GB CF card for much less. I've googled and searched these forums, found some folks wondering about such a swap to get better battery life (no one with my exact problem) but it looks like a number of people have swapped out the MR-1 HDD for a CF card with a ZIF adapter and possibly also a different ribbon cable. Apparently it initializes the drive fine and installs the nec. system files automatically if the drive/card is formatted to FAT32.

The thread is at head-fi.org titled "MR-1: Can this be used as a portable player." So it's possible on the MR-1 so:

Question # 2 - I thought I'd ask here if anyone has tried such a drive swap with an MR-1000 or had any thoughts or suggestions. I'm assuming it's a 1.8" drive like the MR-1 but not even sure about that. I would even be interested in doing the Busman mods at the same time, would be nice if they offered an SSD or CF conversion as well.

9th February 2010	#636
ArtInvent Gear interested Joined: Feb 2010 Posts: 3	Replacing the HDD with an SSD on the Korg MR-1000 Well, I've had an MR-1000 for about a week now. I realized when I bought it that hard drives make some noise (had an old HDD multitracker years ago) but the unit clicks during recording (not playback for some reason) and it's just too loud. Now, this is probably not a big problem to most people as if you get the unit back about 5 feet and behind the mics, you can't hear it. But for me it is a problem. I'm recording my own classical guitar music (about the softest instrument there is) and I like having the unit right in front of my face - I even made a little rack for it so it sits right below the mics about 18". The clicking is quite audible. I can move it back to a table behind the mic stand, where I can still just reach the controls, which is better, but I can still hear the darn clicking a bit. I can cover the thing with a thick blanket, which is what I'm doing now - but then I can't see the display. Not exactly an ideal situation. Reformatted the drive - still makes the clicking. It sounds like k-dk k-dk k-dk (pause) k-dk k-dk k-dk (etc). Faint, but audible. This is on highest DSD format setting. Lesser data streams, maybe it's less/not noticeable. Don't care, I'm only interested in the highest setting. So question #1 - anyone else notice HDD clicking during rec? Is this noise common to all these units? I had a Zoom H4 that used solid state SD cards, which I must say makes a whole lot more sense than an HDD. Now, in all other respects the Korg sounds like a revelation compared to that thing, but at least the Zoom was dead silent. If the Korg just recorded to SD cards I would be set. I would definitely be interested in replacing the hard drive with a solid state drive. I don't even need that much capacity. Looks like you can buy a 30 or 40GB SSD for maybe $130 these days. Or a 32GB CF card for much less. I've googled and searched these forums, found some folks wondering about such a swap to get better battery life (no one with my exact problem) but it looks like a number of people have swapped out the MR-1 HDD for a CF card with a ZIF adapter and possibly also a different ribbon cable. Apparently it initializes the drive fine and installs the nec. system files automatically if the drive/card is formatted to FAT32. The thread is at head-fi.org titled "MR-1: Can this be used as a portable player." So it's possible on the MR-1 so: Question # 2 - I thought I'd ask here if anyone has tried such a drive swap with an MR-1000 or had any thoughts or suggestions. I'm assuming it's a 1.8" drive like the MR-1 but not even sure about that. I would even be interested in doing the Busman mods at the same time, would be nice if they offered an SSD or CF conversion as well.