Alesis QS7.1, QS8.1 manual Card Storage Ramifications

Part 9: Extras

CARD STORAGE RAMIFICATIONS

It's not uncommon for someone to keep ROM cards in both slots A and B, create their own Mixes which access Programs from both cards, and use a RAM card in Slot A to occasionally to back up their User bank. In this case, there are a few considerations:

Whenever you transfer an internal Bank to a RAM card, the result is that all Mixes in the transferred Bank are changed so that they now access the Programs on the card bank to which the User bank was saved (since they reside there, now), instead of the Programs from the original internal Bank. And, when a Card Bank is transferred to an internal Bank location, the opposite happens – all Programs within a Mix which had previously accessed card bank 1 (for example) now point to the User bank.

However, a problem can arise when you have one or more Mixes in the Bank you are transferring which use Programs from a ROM card in slot A. Example: Let's say Mix 00 in the User Bank is made entirely of Programs that are located on Card A Bank 1 (the ROM card). If the ROM card is taken out of slot A, a RAM card is inserted, and the User Bank is transferred to the RAM card's Bank 1, the result will be that Mix 00 in Card Bank 1 now uses only Programs from Card Bank 1. If later you transfer the entire Bank back into the QS, you will find that Mix 00 no longer uses Programs from the Card as it was originally programmed to do.

Here are a few ways to avoid this problem. First, always transfer to a Card Bank that does not include any Programs used by the Mixes in the User Bank. If in the previous example we had transferred the Bank into Card Bank 2, we would not have had a problem, since the Mix would still be using the Programs in Card Bank 1.

Another way to avoid this problem is to transfer the User Bank to a Card Bank, and then immediately store the individual Mix to that same bank on the Card by itself. When a Mix is stored individually to a Card in slot A, it is not modified in any way ; i.e. if it used Programs in the internal Banks, it will still use them even though the Mix and its Programs are in two different locations (the Mix is on the Card but the Programs it uses are stored in the internal Banks).

Finally, you could avoid this situation by always making sure your User Mixes use only Programs located in the User Bank (or that your Card Mixes use only Programs located in that same Card Bank). This could mean individually storing some Programs to or from a Card. Although this is very limiting, it makes things much simpler in the long run.

QS7.1/QS8.1 Reference Manual 163