Orla Grande Theatre Organ

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Orla Grande Theatre Organ

Postby Peter S » 11 Oct 2017 08:02

Lovely warm sounds in a powerful great looking organ. Sounds different to my other gear, and I love the simplistic layout for ease of play. Super Sax, and solo voices.
Keep the music playing!
Organs: Roland AT800; Technics GA3; Technics U60; Yamaha EL90. Keyboards: Korg Pa4X; Technics KN1600.
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Re: Orla Grande Theatre Organ

Postby ken horton » 26 Oct 2017 20:04

Hi Peter, I think we have exchanged mesaages in the AR Group and you gave me some assistance when trying to post in Sound Cloud, it's some time ago now, but I see you have an Orla and wondered if you knew of anybody who deals in spares as I think I need a new floppy disk drive for my GT9000 and I can't find a firm handling these. I joined this group back in 2013 but have been inactive for some time and recently started to post a few tunes again but found my floppy system did not seem to want to work every time which make setting up longer and I have tried new disks so I guess the drive is faulty. Regards Ken
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Re: Orla Grande Theatre Organ

Postby Peter S » 27 Oct 2017 15:04

Hi Ken

I'm afraid I don't know of any parts suppliers for Orla, other than the main dealers or Paul Carmen.

If it was mine I would remove the floppy disk drive, note the serial no, and try to obtain a replacement through eBay, or maybe PC world. I have fitted one on an AR and it is fairly straightforward, unscrews and clip on the connectors.

Alternatively, you could consider this an opportunity to fit an USB drive, which would mean no more floppies everywhere!
There are comprehensive notes on fitting one of these on the AR site to an AR, but not sure about how what's involved on the Orla. However, the 'Grande Theatre Jubilee' - which looks identical to my 'Grande Theatre' and your GT9000 has one fitted, so I'm sure it can be done easy enough.

Good luck

Peter s
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Organs: Roland AT800; Technics GA3; Technics U60; Yamaha EL90. Keyboards: Korg Pa4X; Technics KN1600.
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Re: Orla Grande Theatre Organ

Postby ken horton » 27 Oct 2017 18:12

Thanks Peter it's as I guessed not much information is about even finding what model fits is a problem, I did investigate the posibility of fitting an emulator, but Paul Carmen had some points about those which made me think twice and I let it go. But recently I have 'come back' to music a little and found it would help if I could use the floppy drive. After emailing you I suddenly had a thought, bought from Whitley Bay before Edna died so I got onto Jamie Halliday one of Edna's sons, he is still involved as his name appears on the news letter from One Man Band of Banbury where the name carries on.

I do not know what he does other than I think it's freelance repairs, but he calmly announced that he had a drive and when he was in the area would come and fit it,
it is more involved than the AR ( I changed one of those ) but on this the lower manual has to be completely removed and some other parts as well, he offered to talk me through the operation, but I decided not to chance it. I don't expect this will happen until he has other reasons for venturing south but I will let you know what happens... regards Ken
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Re: Orla Grande Theatre Organ

Postby Peter S » 27 Oct 2017 18:41

Ok Ken - sounds like you know what your doing!

Keep us posted.

Kind regards

Peter s
Keep the music playing!
Organs: Roland AT800; Technics GA3; Technics U60; Yamaha EL90. Keyboards: Korg Pa4X; Technics KN1600.
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Re: Orla Grande Theatre Organ

Postby ken horton » 28 Oct 2017 15:51

Hallo Peter It sounded like a bad floppy drive fault but the answer was quite simple,
My drive did throw me because on occasions when loading it would ask me if I wanted to format the registration disk ( which is all I use the floppies for ), then it somehow jumped a track when saving so the master disk had 1 to 6 and the working disk had 1 to 5 and 7 which did not make sense and of course when you click on yes and the scroll to which track you wanted to load they are never in sequential order and you may have to use both scroll buttons to get to the track you want and finding a gap was puzling.

So when mine started hiccupping, grunting and stopping when copying a disk after a very short time I got the wrong idea.

It will only copy one track at a time not the whole disk content, so if you have 20 tracks on there you will be putting the source and target disks in and out 20 times, ubnfortunately while all this is going on unless you keep a count you have no clue as to what has been loaded until the machine stops asking you for another disk and it does not always seem to load them in sequence although they do end up correct when finished!

The answer came from David Gunn at the Orla's agent at Music Traders, I had explaned the symptoms and he said that from my description he did not think I had a faulty drive, it is lack of memory available because so much on the GT9000 and Grand Theatre models take much more for other purposes.

I had tried his suggestion to copy using the computer but my separate USB floppy drive would not copy the original disk, but I could at each stage put the target disk into it and see what had been copired on each bite, and that's how I found out but until you know you always fear the worst . I always have a working disk and save to the master when finished, I can't recall ever having a problem like this before but it looks like saving each track is going to be one at the time in future Regards Ken
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Re: Orla Grande Theatre Organ

Postby Peter S » 29 Oct 2017 09:51

Hi Ken

Very pleased that you have resolved this. It's amazing really that despite all the clunkin n clicking, and other noises these older MDR make that they seem so reliable...maybe I shouldn't have said that!

Why not post a recording on here to celebrate, there are not many recordings of this fine organ on the tinternet, I for one would definately like to hear more Orla.

VBW

Peter s
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Organs: Roland AT800; Technics GA3; Technics U60; Yamaha EL90. Keyboards: Korg Pa4X; Technics KN1600.
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Re: Orla Grande Theatre Organ

Postby ken horton » 11 Jun 2021 19:05

Hi Peter, some water has passed under the bridge since we last exchanged notes......Since then I have had a string of organs, some for a matter of only weeks, but I finished up with a Roland AT900C last year. What an organ but so technical. But in January this year my wife and I caught Covid, unfortunately she did not survive and I just managed somehow but the long covid as it is called is the aftermath that leaves side effects, not always the same for everyone, I have dizziness and memory loss, so much so that I could not manage the Roland anymore when I tried I could not remember some of the simplest things without getting out the manual !
So I went in for something less technical, I was talked out of a Technics G A 3 as being too old ( no spares available ) and settled for an Orla Grand Theatre, do you still have yours?
I read your remarks, yes it makes some lovely noises. I would like to exchange notes on this at some time in the future, as I do have a question on floppy disks but do not have a clue on who to ask except you !
Hope you are keeping well and safe regards Ken
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Re: Orla Grande Theatre Organ

Postby Peter S » 11 Jun 2021 19:58

Hi Ken

Very sad for you loss, COVID has ruined far too many lives.

I still have my Orla Grande Theatre, GA3, AR100, U60, PA4X keyboard, KN1600 keyboard, and most recently a lovely little Yamaha EL90 .. I really do need help, but I just can’t resist them most of the time. Trouble is they are all organs I drooled over years ago, but couldn’t afford, and they're now so cheap (EL90 was actually free).

A few years ago I bought a large shed to ease my overloaded garage storage, but within no time I ended up with two organs in there, the U60 and EL90.

I have always liked the Roland organs, and until a couple of years ago I owned an AT80Sl. I kind of regret selling that one now. Very nearly bought an AT800 this year on EBay, but someone pipped me to it at the last moment. I’ll keep looking.

I hope your enjoyment of the Orla helps with your long COVID issues.

VBW

Peter s
Keep the music playing!
Organs: Roland AT800; Technics GA3; Technics U60; Yamaha EL90. Keyboards: Korg Pa4X; Technics KN1600.
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