Artis 7 troubles: anyone experience this? Pls help!

[Michelle ggurl]

Hi everyone, long time no post! Sorry I've been a bit of a ghost around here for ... well, a long time. Certain demanding family issues mean I have very, very little time for even music at the moment (but I am still gigging, etc).

 

Anyway, hoping someone here can help. I am at my wit's end.

 

A couple years ago I bought a Kurzweil Artis 7. Thing is, I bought it used. From Guitar Center. Things were going great, until about a year into ownership, it started intermittently making this horrible digital-distortion noise, which would just come on suddenly and LOUD. The first time it happened, I was setting up my rig to play a coffee house/restaurant that has a nice listening clientele. We were using the house PA. I had set everything up, then suddenly, KSSHSHHHSHSHHSHSHSH!! Hugely loud static noise deafens everyone in the joint. We quickly start turning things down, realizing it's coming from my keyboard, but we don't know if it's the board itself or somwhere else in the signal chain. I turned off the keyboard (among other pieces of gear), and the noise did not return. The next time it happened some months later and after several uses in between, I was setting up for a gig in a LIBRARY. KSSHSHHHSHSHHSHSHSH!! Fortunately we were in a dedicated performance room, but it kinda shook me and made me wary of whether it would do it again during performance. This is when I realized, this was an intermittent problem and definitely was the Artis, not the PA since this PA was mine, completely different from the PA used at the venue we'd played at the first time the noise happened.

 

Months went by. At this point the keyboard is sitting in my closet till I have time to take it up to one of two authorized repair places in my area, and I'm back to using my very old Kurzweil PC2, "the purple dinosaur". [Those of you familiar with me understand that I have a neurovascular condition that makes any digital weighted keybed hurt my arm ... dunno why, but only acoustic pianos and semi-weighted keys will do, and as a jazz piano player, the best I've found is the Fatar TP-8. Both PC2 and Artis have the TP8, totally the reason I bought it ... plus I like Kurzweil products in general.] I finally take it up to one place. They have it for 3 weeks, couldn't replicate the problem. There's a diagnostic fee down the drain. Months pass. I have time to take it to a second place, and the guy who runs it is in country (he leaves a lot). He has it for 3 weeks and gets the sound to happen. Problem is, he doesn't know if it's the motherboard, some other power circuitry, or one other thing he mentioned to me. It could be a bad solder. But without a $700 motherboard lying around, he can't just swap it out to "see".

 

Ugh! What do I do?? This keyboard is a doorstop now ... unless someone knows about this problem and a solution for it. My PC2 is battle-scarred and has been a reliable tank. Really disappointed in this Artis, never expected a Kurzweil keyboard to do this. But I guess I took my chances buying it used, even if from GC (I think it was refurbed but for some reason, can't find this ONE receipt, out of all the receipts I have). I don't need a dummy controller, I have other boards that function standalone I can use for that. Can I sell it with the caveat that it makes this noise? Or do I have some kind of recourse I'm not aware of? You folks are the most knowledgeable group I know when it comes to gear, I figure if anyone has ideas on what to do next, it's you.

 

Whew, that was longer than I anticipated! If you read this far, thanks for doing so.

 

 

[ChrisDespo]

Having almost exact same issue with my Forte still under warranty ... sent it in to American Music and Sound (Jam Industries) and Forte has been non functional since February and still trying to get it resolved ... first time I took it out to gig loud static from every output, including headphones and Aux A and Aux B ... swapped cables (TRS) with ones working with other Kurzweil with same issues... power supplied was conditioned with Furman and I also tested using a 1500kva UPS with line conditioning just to make sure power was not issue (my other Kurzweil PC361 worked perfectly fine) ... even with nothing plugged into the Forte but headphones the noise was extremely loud and was unusable so I ended up getting thru gig with PC361 luckily ... the regular sound tech at the venue said he could also hear radio broadcasts coming thru my Forte when he was running the mains with his headphones on as well as them loud crackling static ...

I made an appointment to take it to local Kurzweil repair facility and the tech ran it for several days (had it for a week) and said he could find nothing wrong with it ... I explained it was also an intermittent issue thus making it difficult to troubleshoot but that the issue needs to be repaired ... they wouldn"t do anything else so I picked it up last week and contacted AMS/Jam Industries to get this resolved since it is not reliable for gigging at all ...

 

... I"m waiting to hear back from AMS (Jam Industries I think now?) to see what they want me to do at this point ... weird thing is it was working fine (no noise) in my home studio but first gig I took it out to it failed and was useless .... very frustrating to say the least ... feel free to PM me if you want ... (might be helpful to others to have it here rather than PM?)

/end rant

[mate stubb]

Welcome back Michelle!

 

That's a tough situation. Mike Martin might still know someone at Kurzweil who could pull some strings to at least get it looked at by someone competent.

[Tom Williams]

Welcome back Michelle!

 

That's a tough situation. Mike Martin might still know someone at Kurzweil who could pull some strings to at least get it looked at by someone competent.

Mike's with Casio. Maybe you meant Dave Weiser?

[zxcvbnm098]

I would call/email Kurzweil support:

 

Phone: (310) 355-8052

Email: support@kurzweil.com

[MoodyBluesKeys]

One reason that I still use my PC2 (and 2X) as well as the various PC3 models. Made before the "no lead solder" era, when solder connections were generally reliable. Having said that, two thoughts: first, also post on the Mastering VAST forum which is Kurzweil specific. Someone else there may have better thoughts than my self, I don't own an Artis or Forte for that matter.

 

Second, either yourself or someone reliable disassemble the case enough to reach every single plug in connector on the keyboard, carefully detach, spray a bit of good contact cleaner such as DeoxIT or CRC 5103 on contacts, and carefully re-attach the connector. This won't fix any bad solder joints that are actually on internal components of the various boards, but will clear up a surprisingly large percentage of problems; and it doesn't cost that much to do.

 

Tracking down sub-miniature component lead solder problems is quite difficult, and fixing them also requires expensive soldering equipment and near-totally-perfect eyesight combined with high magnification. This sort of thing is common with all electronics produced today except military, aircraft, and medical which are still allowed to use the old lead based solder.

 

I have made my livelihood the past 60 years from servicing various types of electronic gear. My PC3 suffered a problem several years ago where all analog output ceased, I tracked it to possibly two different boards, way too expensive to replace. Connected the SPDIF digital audio to a small Digital to Analog converter, and still using it at church, since it doesn't have to be moved much there. Going to have to open up the PC3X soon, since it sometimes doesn't finish boot (the little audio relay doesn't click except by turning off and back on)

[mojkarma]

I owned the Artis some three years ago and experienced the same. But in my case, the static noise appeared only when I connected something to the Audio-in connector. The Artis has a bug in the parameter range for sending msb/lsb/pc data which is a combined number in Kurzweil keyboards calculated with a formula. The Artis has a max. number of 128 on that parameter and that means one is unable to send bank change data to connected keyboards and expanders. On top of that, the mac version of the editing software (soundtower) was horrible, I could barely program one single multi with it and on one occasion it destroyed my preprogrammed patches. I sent the keyboard back to my kurzweil seller.

[TomKittel]

 

....it started intermittently making this horrible digital-distortion noise, which would just come on suddenly and LOUD. The first time it happened, I was setting up my rig to play a coffee house/restaurant that has a nice listening clientele. We were using the house PA. I had set everything up, then suddenly, KSSHSHHHSHSHHSHSHSH!! Hugely loud static noise deafens everyone in the joint.

 

 

This is a common and a well known problem of the Artis 7 series. I experienced the very same thing with my first Artis 7. I returned it and got another one which didn't show this weird behavior. It has something to do with a faulty grounding of the audio input. It's a pain to see a couple of years later that Kurzweil still doesn't seem to have fixed this.... they don't seem to care much for Artis/ Artis7 owners. There were also a couple of OS flaws in the Artis series which could have been easily fixed with an update. But nothing ever happened.

 

[allan_evett]

Great to see you back here, Michelle! Very sorry to read of the Artis 7 trouble though. Intermittent gear problems are the worst. Had a similar situation with a Roland FP-8 piano: it would generate a full-velocity low key every couple of weeks, usually on a gig. Techs couldn't resolve it, and I chose to sell it cheap with a caveat. Hopefully your situation doesn't end that way.

 

Dave Weiser is a resident guru on all things Kurzweil. perhaps he can jump into this conversation. Hippogrito, here on the forum, would also be a resource - especially regarding possible updates from Kurzweil that might resolve the issue.

[AnotherScott]

This is a common and a well known problem of the Artis 7 series. I experienced the very same thing with my first Artis 7. I returned it and got another one which didn't show this weird behavior.

Interesting. I had intermittent static noises on my first Artis7, "luckily" it happened from the start so I was able to return it for a replacement, which has had no issues.

 

they don't seem to care much for Artis/ Artis7 owners. There were also a couple of OS flaws in the Artis series which could have been easily fixed with an update. But nothing ever happened.

It is disappointing that there have been no updates. I do not presume to know how easy any flaw could be fixed, but there are some software enhancements I would have liked to have seen. I understand that it may not be financially sound to update an older model, but I've wondered whether a kickstarter kind of thing would make sense. Like there would be a list of potential enhancements, and if they could get enough owners to commit to maybe $50-$100, they would do the update with the assurance that their costs would be covered.

 

[Michelle ggurl]

Thanks so much, everyone, for your replies. I did contact someone from Kurzweil initially, as the rep who answered my ticket was the one who gave me the places to take it to. So disheartening to know this is a Artis 7-wide problem. Actually, a Kurzweil-wide problem (Chris, Moj, Tom, you know my pain ...and Allan, with the Roland). I think I will not be replacing with another Kurz for a while.

 

The rep closed out my ticket even though I responded it was still happening, so I think I will open another ticket and point him to this thread so he/she can see what a travesty this is.

 

I will be trying the Casio PX-5 I have again ... I have been doing some treatments that are giving me better tolerance for other keybeds, and I do like that keyboard aside from the pain (what a weird sentence, lol), so I will have to see. Ugh.

 

Thanks also, MoodyBlues Keys for the insight on lead solder vs. newer solder. I don't think I have the confidence, patience, or time to tackle a job like that myself, but the latter guy I took it to said he did get in there and check everything and clean it up ... but as you say, it's probably something you can see.

 

*sigh* OK. Well, if Dave Weiser has any input, or if I get success in talking to a Kurz rep, I will let you know. It's not right so many of us seem to have had this issue.

[TomKittel]

Here is a PM which hipogrito sent me back in the day

[TomKittel]

The rep closed out my ticket even though I responded it was still happening, so I think I will open another ticket and point him to this thread so he/she can see what a travesty this is.

 

Here is an email Jean of Kurzweil support sent me back then. Perhaps this helps you to keep the ticket open this time. The Kurzweil guys really should be AWARE of the Artis 7 loud hiss problem ("loud hiss" might not be the right word for it, it's more like a loud explosion!) and they should be able to offer you proper support and solution. In my case the communication was a mess. It went on and on between Kurzweil support, Kurzweil headquarter, the distributor in Europe and the service technician...

 

Good luck!

Thomas

[AnotherScott]

FWIW, it sounds like my issue was different. The sound was not explosive. And it was mostly (or entirely?) in just one channel, And I could make it happen more by playing harder.

[mojkarma]

In my case it was an explosion. A loud hiss sound like white noise at max volume. Fortunately, it only appeared at my home. I am gigging professionally and that loud hiss would be disastrous on the concerts I play.

[TomKittel]

In my case it was an explosion. A loud hiss sound like white noise at max volume. Fortunately, it only appeared at my home. I am gigging professionally and that loud hiss would be disastrous on the concerts I play.

 

In the automotive industry a serious problem like this would cause a recall of the affected products...

[rockinroller]

Sorry to hear about your Artis 7 issue. I bought my first one in 2015 and loved it so much I bought a backup two years ago. I do a lot of gigging in a trio in which I play keys and LH bass, so I wanted to make sure I was covered in the event of an issue--of which I have had NONE. I have migrated most of my coveted programs and setups from previous PC3 ownership into my Artis'es and absolutely love the smaller form factor and weight advantages the 7 has over the PC3. I've been able to further delve into the programming of the Kurz through the free Sound Editor software interface with my PC. Honestly, every time I research something newer and purportedly more powerful, I come back to my 7's. I think most people rip on Kurzweils because their out-of-the-box sounds haven't kept up with the various advances exhibited by other manufacturers. What is overlooked however is the POTENTIAL of Kurzweil boards--using the access into its multitude of parameter and nuance adjustments, either directly on the hardware itself on their more expensive models, or like on the Artis 7's, by using the external Sound Editor. IMO you can literally create any sound or program you have in mind with a Kurzweil--not so with many of the "newer" hardware that so many consumers think is better.

[Michelle ggurl]

Hi Guys, thanks for the additional info. Yes, I would classify mine as an "explosion." It happened two times while setting up for a gig, and once while at home. It definitely is a full-volume shriek of a hiss, and, yeah, terrifying through a gig setup.

 

Rockinroller, I remember you raving about the Artis! After PMing with you I realized this might be what I need, and indeed, I was so happy once I dug into it and started playing out with it. It really seemed to fit the bill perfectly.

 

 

Tom, thank you for showing me the emails convsersations you had. I did not get that far when attempting to get help through Kurzweil. Very frustrating, but now that I know this is an issue that THEY know about, I'm going to press again.

[Jill]

Michelle, were you ever able to get the problem fixed? The Artis 7 I purchased in 2016 developed this problem recently. Kurzweil rep said to take it to a repair shop (standard non-answer). I bought it through Sweetwater so I may ask them to look into the issue as well.

[Jill]

Want to follow up with what I found out about my Artis 7 malfunction. I did contact Sweetwater and they had not heard of the malfunction and were not willing to contact Kurzweil on my behalf. So I posted in a Facebook Kurzweil group and got a response that it sounded like a power issue, that these synthesizers need clean power. And Tom said above that the problem is faulty grounding of the audio input. I realized the outlet I was using in the garage (for covid-safe practice) also had a small refrigerator plugged in, and that the compressor kicking on likely was the culprit. I unplugged the refrigerator during practice and have not had the issue since. It also occurred to me that I've had a problem with sounds going dead or switching during gigs and that Michelle only experienced an issue while playing gigs.

 

I'm going to buy a Powervar power conditioner to use at gigs. For those of you who use power conditioners, I'd appreciate hearing your opinion on whether it will take care of my problem and which model I should buy.

[Delaware Dave]

I have used a Tripplite LC1200 for over 20 years. Keeps the voltage at or near 117 volts. Whether it matters whether you use one or not is another story. Since I've used mine for so long it is now difficult to tell whether or not using one makes a difference. I' ve had a PC3 for 10 years, no issues ever encountered. Is it because of the Tripplite? Dont know...... My guess is that anytime you can keep the voltage steady and 117V it can't be bad.....

[mojkarma]

So I posted in a Facebook Kurzweil group and got a response that it sounded like a power issue, that these synthesizers need clean power. And Tom said above that the problem is faulty grounding of the audio input. I realized the outlet I was using in the garage (for covid-safe practice) also had a small refrigerator plugged in, and that the compressor kicking on likely was the culprit. I unplugged the refrigerator during practice and have not had the issue since. It also occurred to me that I've had a problem with sounds going dead or switching during gigs and that Michelle only experienced an issue while playing gigs.

 

While the solution works for you, it is basically a cheap excuse for a cheap design. Because, while I'm on stage, I can hardly control the power conditions there and where I can (safely) plug in my keyboard.

[re Pete]

I know some people blame design with these issues and debatable. But since using a UPS with boards I've had no more issues so far.

I remember one gig before using UPS, the stage was behind the bar and every time the bar tender opened the cash register it sounded thru my amp with noise.

[Delaware Dave]

Back in the day we had a gig next to a radio station. When I was using my Motion Sound it would pick up the radio station; it got rather annoying....

[drawback]

Back in the day we had a gig next to a radio station. When I was using my Motion Sound it would pick up the radio station; it got rather annoying....

Back in the 70s we had a gig on a radar base where there was a sweeping buzz running through all our amp & PA gear every couple of minutes. No one in the crowd even noticed it!

[Mighty Motif Max]

My church used to somehow pick up a football game from a radio station two hours away at times. Always interesting sound effects during worship lol.

[zxcvbnm098]

Reviving this thread as my Artis 7 had the shriek happen. Wow..... it's f*****g loud.

 

I actually had a really good experience with Kurzweil support, as I mentioned this issue and referenced this thread by sending the link to it. I spoke with Logan from American Music & Sound, who was actually based out of Canada at Jam Industries. He contacted the Kurz folks who knew of the issue.

 

They sent very detailed instructions to the service center nearest to me, who very quickly did the repair. It seems it's actually a few things involved; the tech told me he changed out a couple of capacitors, updated the main PCB and rerouted I think an AC cable.

 

I love the Artis 7 as it's perfect for my needs, and since I did the spring swap to lighten the action it's a dream to play. Having spent a bit time working in CE design and manufacturing, I can cut Kurz some slack. I know they're a small company, and I suspect they were mortified when these issues started showing up.

 

If anyone else is having problems connecting with them to get it fixed, feel free to PM me. I can share the contacts and details I went through to get it taken care of....

[Jill]

Power conditioner did not fix the issue. Took the Artis to the repair shop I used in the past for a SP4-7 and gave tech the link to this thread for instructions as issue is not reproducible. Four months later, tech still is waiting for repair instructions from Kurzweil.

[zxcvbnm098]

Jill, I'm at work so don't have the details on this computer, but when I'm home tonight I'll pull up my correspondence with them and get back to you with the details?

[zxcvbnm098]

Check your messages Jill...just sent you details.