Boss SP-303 (Dr. Sample) stuck on "Err" Screen

[vandal]

Hey guys, good to see an actual forum for sp-concerns around.

I have a kind of urgent problem as I need my sampler tomorrow night, maybe you can help.

I just unboxed my Boss SP-303 aka. Dr. Sample in my new flat and it seems to have taken some damage in the move. It only displays the error message "Err" with no way to clear it. The manual suggest an internal memory error but even in that case I should be able to clear the screen to delete all stored samples.

Does anyone have encountered a similar problem and knows a workaround?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

v

[vandal]

Oh well, I just dropped (out of frustration) it and it works again. Someone here wrote that I could have as well blown some weed smoke into it.

I'll try that next time.

[vandal]

Aaaaand it's stuck on "Err" again.

Any help?

[fauna]

sorry dude, no idea. i gotta say dropping it to fix it may not be a good way forward!

if you have the manual, there may be a way to sort of re-set it on start up. so like holding a button as you click it on, so it refreshes the firmware.

but i don't know enough about the 303 to tell you. did you scan the manual / support pages for this?

good luck mans.

[drewzle]

maybe try to reload the latest OS onto it?

hope it works out man

*fingers crossed*

[Euclid Ov Oåklånd]

If there is a hardware reset like fauna is guessing then I'd try that first, but most likely you'll have to try re-installing the OS. The machine isn't dead if it powers up and displays a message so there might be some hope, I know Jim Y knows the most about the internals of theses boxes around here so you might try and send him a private message. If worse comes to worse, just send it to Roland for the final word on what can be done.

[iG9]

I say try blessing it with ganja smoke. If it works, great, if not at least you'll be high.

[s0le]

[quote="iG9"]I say try blessing it with ganja smoke. If it works, great, if not at least you'll be high.[/quote]

err high and no sampler sucks if your into that stuff....

[iG9]

Huh? All things being equal, it's better to be high than not. Like the good book says, the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations. Or, in the words of the immortal Nate Dog, "hey hey hey hey, smoke weed every day."

[mostblunted]

ever tried to initialize the internal memory?

hold 'del+cancel+remain' and then turn the machine on.
That always helped me.

[vandal]

Thanks a lot for the replies guys.

And yeah, I already tried to re-initialize the internal memory, and all the other resetting keycombos, but no luck. I can't even clear the error screen at all.

I opened it up and checked for loose conections, as the dropping temporarly fixed it, but didn't find any. It worked again for a second but after i put it back together the screen displayed "8." with no way to clear it. really strange.

How would i re-install the OS?

[Euclid Ov Oåklånd]

Get it from the roland site then load it on your mem. card and put it in the machine to load it. There might be a button combo to load it when the card is in the 303 but it'll say in the manual.

[theemikeb]

I've got the same issue with one of my 303s. Years ago I fell asleep on it (face first haha) when i woke up it said err. Never worked again. I always wondered if I drooled in my sleep or if maybe it over heated or something.

anyway the 2nd one I got is just beat to death now. I found the older one plugged it in and it displays 8. and wont do anything else. I feel like maybe there's still hope for it though. I tried re installing the os. It won't allow me to as it's unresponsive when turning the unit on while holding filter pitch and delay. It just sits there with the 8. on the screen

Is there any new info on this issue? anyone had any luck at all?

[magicsean]

When the screen displays "Err" it is stating there is a problem (0-14) which in case you had error "8". Here's what I've found:

(Solder and pattern defection around the DSP IC and EFFECT RAM IC. Solder and pattern defection between the DSPIC and CPU IC. Device defection of DSP IC or EFFECT RAM IC.)

Worst case scenario an actual component is bad, but from what it sounds like after you dropped it and it worked (momentarily) you probably somehow wedged a broken connection back together. It could be that some soldered component is not stuck on the board anymore after prolonged use and needs to be resoldered or there is a broken trace between two points. I would immediately open it up and check thoroughly looking for anything that looks loose or tarnished. Put up some pictures of the board too so it would help us help you further. Hope you find something! Good luck