Ensoniq to Mac translation?

[unitard]

Hi all,

I have three Ensoniq formatted SCSI hard drives. One each for my EPS-M, EPS-16+, and ASR-10 that I'd like to translate to Halion format. So I purchased Translator Halion Edition. I'm using a Mac G4 (OS 10.5.8) with an Adaptec SCSI card. When I launch Translator, the drives don't show up under "Proprietary SCSI" as expected. Should this configuration work? It seems too good to be true that a Macintosh computer could recognize an Ensoniq formatted drive from 10+ years ago. But I thought this is part of Translator capabilities.

Any advice or tips would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

[garth]

The internal ways that a Mac reads/sees SCSI-specific information are a little confusing (that's our part). Generally Translator should show SCSI Devices within Proprietary Drives on the left, just like anything else.

If it doesn't, we aren't losing any sleep over it - SCSI is dead and USB lives on. The workaround - which is a great idea anyway - is for you to make images of the drives using OSX's Disk Utility. Then, put them into the /Library/Application Support/Chicken Systems/Translator/Images folder (or alias them to it). Translator will then see them under Virtual Drives and you can convert them easily.

This is a good idea because you have a backup of your drives (which you want), and conversions go a lot faster because reading off an image is faster then reading off a foreign-formatted device.

[unitard]

Thanks for the prompt reply and the tip about making disk images. I was successful in making disk images of my 3 Ensoniq formatted SCSI drives. I placed the .dmg files in the /Library/Application Support/Chicken Systems/Translator/Images folder but unfortunately they don't show up as "Virtual Drives" in the pane. I also tried placing them in User/Library/Application Support/Chicken Systems/Translator/Images but that doesn't work either. Any suggestions on how to get these disk images to show up in Translator?

[garth]

When you made the images, did you select in the program "compressed" or "encrypted"? They won't work then. Make the images without those things (OSX is rather bad with the defaults) and they should work. The folder is /Library/Application Support/Chicken Systems/Translator/Images

If you feel you didn't, zip up on of the images and post it to me. use Bug Reports www.chickensys.com/translator/bugreports or YouSendIt www.yousendit.com

[unitard]

I submitted a bug report and uploaded a disk image. A big thanks to Chicken Systems support for confirming that my disk image is working fine and reminding me to "check my work."

After reinstalling Translator Halion Edition on my main computer I am now able to view the Virtual Drives. The folder structure naming is slightly different for Translator Halion Edition:
/Library/Application Support/Chicken Systems/Translator Halion Edition/Images

I'm getting mixed results converting my Ensoniq instruments. Most of the time the samples are there but the loop lengths have been shortened so each sample is silent. In which case if I manually change every sample's loop length to full then the samples can be heard. Kind of a pain. But at least I have my samples in Halion. Sometimes I can see that the sample is there and the loop length is set but I still can hear nothing. Go figure.

I'm also having an issue with some instrument's samples not importing at all. I just see an empty sample location named "default". I've adjusted the format prefs too. Sometimes the ASR setting works better on an EPS translation. Sometimes vice versa.

Another issue I'm having is being able to navigate deeper in each of the Virtual Drives file structure. I can only see the files and folders at the root level. So I have to translate an entire directory of instruments which sometimes causes Translator to crash. Is there a way to navigate deeper? When I double click a folder it brings up the translate dialog as opposed to opening the folder. And when I twirl down a Virtual Disk in the Container Pane I expect it to show the file structure but it does nothing.

In general I'm thankful for Translator and I'm happy to get these sounds off the old drives and into my current system. It seems to me like there are still a number of little file format issues to work around. Hopefully with some more time spent using Translator I'll come up with a good workflow. Any tips on resolving the above issues would be appreciated.

[garth]

Yes, we "meant" that "Translator" also meant something a little different for special editions.

Perhaps your disk is slightly messed up. Does the drive that you took the Virtual Drive from show the sub-directories on the Ensoniq?

You can post the Virtual Drive to Bug Reports www.chickensys.com/translator/bugreports and we are happy to look at it for you.

As for Ensoniq instrument that don't convert the way you want them to, you can take the .efe file and send it to Bug Reports too, www.chickensys.com/translator/bugreports

[unitard]

Perhaps your disk is slightly messed up. Does the drive that you took the Virtual Drive from show the sub-directories on the Ensoniq?

This issue was resolved after installing the build 95 update. Thanks.