so... i have read the manual and have had no luck backing up my cf cards to my computer using a cf card reader. can anyone give me some step by step instructions on how to do this?

Just copy that ROLAND folder.

i tried that, but when i tried to put those saved samples onto a new card nothing showed up when i put it in my 404.

Did you format the new card with the 404 first? Just format it and copy the ROLAND to it.. should work, or then there might be something wrong with the card.

you also have to import the sounds to the 404 once they are on the card, you do that by holding cancel and and hitting resamples, then both rec and resample will start flashing, you hit record for import and it imports files onto the card pads in alphabetical order i believe, maybe you already were doing that, but i saw no mention of it so i figured i would throw it out there

Think Import is only for new sounds. A&B banks must have been backed up onto the original CF and restored off the new CF to get those back. If you don't do that, you've lost A&B.

All other banks should have their samples and patterns just where they were on the original CF and nothing more need be done.

What I do is copy all of the CF into it's own new folder. Then for a new CF formatted on the 404 I copy everything in that folder onto this CF, allowing it to replace all existing files. It should be a perfect copy.

Jim

ok. thanks.
but what was this about banks a and b? if i import the new sounds from the card will they overwrite A and B? i am using the old 404 (maybe that makes a difference) where A and B are internal memory. does the SX back up A and B to the card? i need to make sure i am not going to lose my samples on A and B before i try this.

If it's an SX it's an SD rather than CF card and all the banks live on the card - there is no internal bank memory so backup/restore via the card isn't needed. But yes, the original CF equipped 404 has internal memory for banks A & B so restoring them from the CF card will overwrite - but you can back them up to a card before doing that or move to the card banks using the Pad Exchange function.

Obviously, you don't ever have to touch banks A & B if you keep only your go-to beat samples there, there's plenty of room in the card banks to have the song/gig specific samples and patterns. Personally, I don't use A & B except for messing around. Serious stuff goes in the card banks so I don't have to bother with the backup/restore thing with the original 404.

Jim