Korg Midi Synchronizer - KMS 30

 This is a useful and pretty rare piece of kit from the 1980s.

Made in Japan, its great for clocking old gear .. esp Roland 808s, 909s, 303s etc

It enables sync between vintage Korg and Roland units. Not just MIDI sync but also DIN sync.

The KMS30 converts Midi clock to 24/48 PPQ  

Old Roland gear uses 24 PPQ

Korg gear uses 48 PPQ.

 

 

So this box is useful if you want to sync a Roland TB 303 with a Korg KPR-77 drum.

 

There are actually 3 time formats - Tape, Midi, and Din Sync.

 

Tape sync is now pretty obsolete, but it may come in handy if you have an old tape multi track deck 

You would need to record a TAPE CLOCK click track on one track of the tape. Then for your overdubs, as you play back the tape, you would connect the click track to the RCA tape in jack of the KMS30

 

 The KMS-30 can also be used to record a click track onto tape.

The DDM-110 is an old Korg Drum machine. 

  + DDM-110 (Digital Drum Machine)

There are plenty of old drums that will do this job, but it's a good example as it has

 a TAPE OUT jack & DIN sync jack

 

You sync it to the KMS30 via DIN and record it's audio (from the tape out) onto tape to make the click track.

 

Power supply is a 9V external PSU polarity (negative tip) .

Thanks to Ed of Elk Elktroniks for repairing it for me.

 

 

In the case of Roland DIN Sync, the standard is 24PPQN.

Lots of old Roland Synths such as the TB303 & TR606, 808, 909 use this standard.
Most DAWs will also use  a 24 PPQN signal