Yamaha PSS series keyboards.

[Signal:Noise]

Which model numbers are best to bend or are they all essentially the same?

[andy_wheels]

i've got a pss-6. it bends! 

the weirdest bend i found on it was a short which is connected to a light dependant resistor. when there's enough light it kicks off playing a sequence of fast and randomly timed/pitched notes with whatever voice is playing at that time. sounds amazing with some of the patches. looking at it now i reckon a toggle switch might have been a better choice. hmmm. ......getting twitchy with my screwdriver again...

also found a great buzzing distortion and equipped the case with body contact which adds a lowend honk.

i'll try and get round to opening the keyboard up again later and describe some more details of the bends. i've been meaning to give the little pss another tweakage for a while now.

[andy_wheels]

hadn't quite woken up when i wrote the last reply...

so, here's some more pss info. these are all bendable:

pss-6 -- oddball wavetable synth. good sound quality, weird bends.

pss-80 -- it's a digital squarewave keyboard. love the 'c64' type sound.
pss-100 -- similar type of synth to the pss-80.

pss-140 -- fm synth. great bends by adding 8 toggle switches to cut the datastream between the cpu and fm chip. let the tuned drones begin!
pss-270 -- it's the same synth as the 140 with a chorus effect built in and stereo speakers. it's a nice chorus though. 

140/270 fm mod : http://circuit-bent.net/pss-270-tutorial.html

there must be lots more!

[iqoruvuc]

Hi - I have the PSS-12 which I think is the stereo version of the PSS-6.  Good sound quality but I didn't find many exciting bends, just a few bends that alter some of the voices.

I have a pss-480 and 580 which seem almost identicle bar a slightly different case.  Both have fm editing capabilities, and a seperate PCM rhythm chip that can really easily be bent to make a variety of noisey distorted/flanging drums.  Both have midi too.  If you can get one cheap they are easy to bend and they even have an audio out too so you don't even have to bother installing a line out!

Most of the higher number pss are fm, but a couple such as pss-790 are 'awm' synthesis and I hear they are quite fun to bend too.  There are definately loads of pss's out there.

I think there a pss-570 which is one up from the pss-470 which i wouldn't mind getting my hands on.  I saw one around christmas time but I didn't have the money or space to accomidate any more of what my girlfriend calls 'clutter'

[Signal:Noise]

The pss-140 sounds interesting.

Time to get on teh hunt on ebay.

[Signal:Noise]

Taken it apart today and found loads of bends, and that's not including the data stream thing.

[sn7ke]

Wich Yamaha do you have? Im also planning to buy one, tough i prefer the VSS series or the Casio SK series

Im bidding on  a Casio SK-10 wich seems to be the least of all the sampling keyboards.

Do you guys have any idea where to get the VSS or SK series cheaply? (in Europe!)
Most of the Ebay sellers who has one only sells in the VS.. -_-!

[Signal:Noise]

Got a Pss 140 dude, I'd recomend it, not fitted the mods yet but there's plenty there to do.

[Signal:Noise]

Has anyone else done the data stream mods on teh pss-140? Is the keybaord meant to stop working properly?

[andy_wheels]

the data stream mod, when in place works like this....

the 8 toggle switches you've put in which connect the data streams, when all of them are on, do nothing. the keyboard should be the same as normal...

now, when you turn one or a few (i wouldn't do all of them at once) of the switches to the off position and then change patch, press a key or two and then turn them all on again. you should hear a patch which has parts of the former selected sound in it. chances are it will be a bit more random than you expect. eg, you can't think, hmmm, i'll mix a piano patch with a string patch. well, you can, but the bends don't seem to be the same every time.

it's also worth noting that whilst any of the data streams are off, the keyboard can exhibit 'crash' type tendencies where the keyboard won't track pitch or make a sound at all, sounds will only play when three or four keys are pressed etc. the drums get a bit, er, funky too.

so, if you've wired up the switches, turned them all on and having issues.... then i'd suggest you've done something a bit odd. maybe soldered something wrong or not made a complete circuit on one of the data streams. my pss-270 didn't work correctly when i first wired it up but gentle tugging on the soldered points soon exposed a dodgy connection. it's all a bit fiddly...

[Signal:Noise]

I thought that might be the case, I'll take the back off again tonight. Though even in it's current form it's a complete beast.

[Signal:Noise]

Much resoldering later and it works

Mwaaa haaa haaa haa.

[andy_wheels]

nice one!

hope you're enjoying the wonders of the fm madness!

has it performed it's drone trick yet? after a few bending patch changes my pss-270 can lose control of it's envelopes and start making wonderful deep tuned drones where the polyphony of the keyboard produces a chordal effect as you press more keys and then the last note is replaced with the newest once you hit the 8-10 voice limit. lovely!!

drums go way wonky too. not had much joy out of them though... bit too wrong to be used in a musical context.

[james.athesberg]

i wanted to do this to my pss 280 but the cpu pins are so close together i dont think i have the soldering abilities to do it properly

[Signal:Noise]

Yeah, it's done the tuned drone trick, it's brilliant, I've also goy complete glitched out madness from it.