SP-303 “err”

[kb303]

Hello sp-forums!
Just got my 303 in and excited to join y’all, but the “err” message that it shipped with has proven harder to get rid of than I thought. So far I have tried-
- resetting the internal memory- doesn’t respond to that, can’t get it to the “init” screen
- reflashing the OS via smartmedia- since the 303 has never worked for me I don’t have a card that has been formatted by a 303, nowhere I can go with that at the moment
- reflashing the OS via SMF/midi- this might be the most telling- I got it to receive the midi messages from the first midi file, but once it reaches the “1F” portion it begins flashing “err” and then “10” alternately.
-lastly, I opened it up to see if there was any glaring damage, but there was none that I could find

Is this thing completely bricked or is there hope? Maybe someone with the service manual might have some insight into the “err”/“10” message? If anyone can provide me with any information I would be eternally grateful!

[Crane]

Err 10 is a self test error for "Card not protected". It is trying to find the silver dot on the smart media card.

Did you buy this on ebay?

[kb303]

Yes I did buy it from eBay fairly recently
So I guess I have to find an SM write protect sticker and keep the smartmedia card in the 303 even if I’m loading the os via midi?

[Crane]

No. No need to buy a card.
Guessing you bought it from Dalyn S.? That guy just sells fucked up shit. It's a brick. Good luck.

[kb303]

Yeah, that’s who it was, dang. Do you think reflashing it with a 303-formatted SM card would work? Or do you think the motherboard is fried? I know it’s probably hard to tell at this point, but the board looks really clean. Any other diagnostics I can do?

[baddays79]

I'm having the exact same issue - Anyone out there have a fix? I did get a slightly different result using Roland's own UpdSMF program vs SysEx Librarian.

UpdSMF: _00001.mid transfers, then the number 567 is displayed for about 10 seconds, then display flashes ERR 12
SysEx Librarian: _00001.mid transfers then display immediately flashes ERR 10

Also from what I can tell in the Service Manual, ERR 10 only means Card Not Protected Error when you're in self-test mode (from the manual: In usual function, when problems occur is the test mode function, the following letters appear.) So in this case I assume it means something else?