Alesis PCMCIA
The Alesis PCMCIA standard was used across the Alesis Quadrasynth series as a way to expand the number of editable on-board presets and mixes, or as a way to include new waveforms to be used with the QS composite synthesis engine. It supported up to 8 MB of any mixture of aforementioned extra content.
Unlike other contemporaries, such as the Roland SR-JV80 series, users were free and encouraged to create their own cards with their own samples, and additionally had support for SampleCell formatted files. A compact disc containing the necessary software for both Windows-based systems and Apple Macintosh computers was frequently included with most Alesis Quadrasynth purchases.
Official cards
Alesis also provided a number of official card expansions, albeit their rarity makes any information very hard to come by in terms of exact preset/mix counts and waveform additions. (to do: make a table for this i think it'd be great but also add tables for "generic" cards to detail how many patches/mixes these could *store*)
Alesis QCards
| Model | Photo | Patches | Sounds | Notes & Links | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Patches | Mixes | ||||
| Stereo Grand Piano Plus |
? | ? | Features the same piano from the Alesis QS8.[1] | ||
| EuroDance | 128 | 100 | 283 |
||
| Vintage Synthesizers and Classic Beatboxes |
128 | 100 | ? | ||
| Classical Instruments Plus | 128 | 100 | 89 | ||
| Hip Hop Grooves and Instruments |
128 | 100 | ? | ||
| Vintage Keyboards | 128 | 100 | ? | ||
| Sanctuary | 128 | 100 | 68 | ||
| Rap Techno Dance | 100 | 128 | ? | ||
| Latin | 128 | 100 | 500 | ||
| Stereo Jazz Piano |
128 | 0 | ? | ||
| Stereo Classical Piano |
128 | 0 | ? | ||
Everything here is sourced/referenced from the external links in the Notes & Links, including owner's manuals and official preset lists from Alesis.
Oddities
Despite the standard being comparatively more permissive, in today's world it is very difficult to find compatible PCMCIA flash cards - it requires a specific type of Linear Flash cards, which were only produced by AMD and Intel. It was noted in a Sound on Sound article how difficult this was by the time the QSx.2 upgrades arrived on the market as early as 2003.[2]
References
- ↑ "This QCard provides the same great acoustic pianos as you'll find in our acclaimed QS8 synthesizer." - Official Alesis Page
- ↑ Alesis QS6.2 & QS8.2, Sound on Sound, June 2003, section "Back To The Time Machine...".