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Korg DSS-1 Factory Library for Gotek Flash Floppy & HxC owners

Posted by :Don Solaris On : October 29, 2023
6

Category: resources and tips

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dss1

 

Assuming you bought a Gotek Flash Floppy (eBay et al.) and decided to upgrade your Korg DSS-1 there are probably a lot of questions bothering you. To save you time this page is here to provide all the basic steps to get your system up and running. This setup could theoretically work on HxC, but you will have to ask / search on their forum about the configuration file. I spoke with the author of HxC he is a great guy and always willing to help so don’t worry you’re safe. The images from this library are in .hfe file format and will work on HxC, while for the setup you will probably have to look on torlus.com forums. If your Gotek is a Flash Floppy type then ignore previous three sentience’s and continue reading on!

Hardware setup
If you installed a Gotek drive (ideally the one with the OLED display), buy a USB stick as small as possible. Format it as FAT32, or if working on a Mac on OSX this is known as MS-DOS style partition. Inspect the Gotek drive and make sure it has a jumper on S0 pins and make sure other pins do not have any jumpers. If you want sound (of virtual floppy clicking) you might want to buy one of those tiny PC speakers and install it into a Gotek by connecting it onto pins marked as JB.

Software setup
There’s nothing really to set up. Simply extract the .7z archive onto USB stick and you can use it immediately. Flash Floppy configuration file (FF.CFG) is already in the archive. If you want you can edit it for your own fine tuned setup, it’s just a standard text file with each line described what it is and what it does. If you decided to upgrade or downgrade your Gotek with and need a good reference on how to setup the configuration file for your own suits, or just feel like a nerd and what to know what each flag does, please follow this link. To remind you, the one which is included in this archive is working just fine.

DSS-1 Library
This the reason you came here, right. But please read this first. While there are various web sources online that provide DSS-1 Library, unfortunately many of them are incomplete / contain corrupt data or contain duplicates and duplicates of duplicates, or are in a format that does not work with Flash Floppy and HxC. This one is different. I’ve decided to start from zero and slowly build or better to say precompile a “new” library that contains all of the DSS-1 images from online, converted into .hfe format, all of the duplicates removed, and corrupted disks replaced with valid ones. There are a total of 144 disks. They are all in .hfe format ready to be used in Flash Floppy and HxC Gotek drives. The library can be downloaded from here:

Korg DSS1 144_disk_Library (64MB) Kindly: do not ask me to add any commercial disks in this library I do NOT support piracy!

What’s inside?
What’s the use of such a huge library without anyone knowing what’s inside. Well we can certainly change that. I took some time and built this large table that covers all 144 Floppy Disks. The table is located here: One huge table

I have a Gotek but don’t have Flash Floppy or HxC what to do?
Fair enough! I assume there are some folks who bought a native “raw” Gotek drive or have one lying around unused or just want to save a buck or two. Don’t worry we got some good news for you. If you know your work with a screwdriver, a paper clip and have USB-A to USB-A cable, you can easily upgrade your Gotek to Flash Floppy for literally free of charge. The instructions are super simple and available here: Gotek FlashFloppy EZ Installer

Discuss!
Below there is a comment section. If you think there is something that can be improved or just wanted to say thanks, you’re welcome. Now go play that DSS-1! Those of us who are lucky owners know how good it sounds and leaving one gathering dust is a sin. 🙂

And so I joined the Korg DSS-1 club!

Posted by :Don Solaris On : October 4, 2023
4

Category: talk

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What a beast! I don’t care for playing acoustic samples at this stage just using it a synth itself is enough power. I kid you not, this thing sounds as good and powerful as a Prophet 5. Still can’t believe its sound. The low end is insane. Osc sync is killer. You can change the bit depth of the samples in real time from 12 bit down to 8 bit and even 6 bit. Also the two delay lines can pull up some incredible flangers. Took me two years to find a mint unit. But it was worth it. I have another unit which I got few yrs ago but it has one dead delay unit and some problems, but when ever I would play it I was always blown away by its sound. Patiently waited to find one in good condition to ensure long life. So here it is. If you can find one locally, give it a try. Press the Synthesize function, use a standard Saw wave (it will auto generate one for each octave) and try it as a synth and tell me it doesn’t sound good! There is also additive engine inside which can generate all kinds of weird sounds like formants, bells etc.

As of the upgrades, for those interested…


We upgraded the PSU with the new caps


Installed a LED based display.


Goodbye to that old “80 calculator” display. Hello LED.


Then we had new tact switches installed, so that when you press the switch it actually works.


Old floppy was removed replaced with Gotek Flash Floppy currently running some 140 floppies on the USB. Floppy images are available here.


Sharp eyed ones probably noticed something unusual about the first image. It’s because this unit has a Evil_Dragon_sayz_the_DSS’_too_big_letz_fix_dat mod. Took a while to build these sides as the slope has that unusual “stair” not easy to do on regular carpenter desk, but a friend Chris is good in his business and built a pair over the drawings I’ve provided. Also this mod is not easy plug and play type of thing. Some things need to be cut inside the unit. Don’t do it unless you know your shi1t.


This is the design I went with. Probably can be made better, I’m not a gear designer. So take it with a grain of salt.