Today I uploaded the K2000 version of the Program Farm that comes with the K2500, to both Compuserv and AOL. I'm sure members of the list with Compuserv or AOL accounts will make them available for ftp at bach.nevada.edu. I uploaded both .zip and .sea versions for PC and Mac users. I also uploaded a file of the preset effects from the K2500.
Since there has been mention lately on the list of the disks available from Sweetwater which allow the K2000 to emulate the K2500, I thought I would explain the difference between his disks and the file I have uploaded. (Chuck Surack may correct me if I get any details about his disk incorrect.) because we are giving away our files for free, whereas Sweetwater is charging for their disk, I felt it important to distinguish between the two.
The K2500 Program Farm is a set of files which come with the K2500, featuring almost 1000 programs, organized by type. We have taken those programs and ported them to the K2000, with a few differences. Since the K2000 and K2500 have different drum samples, we have left out any programs which use drum keymaps (though some tuned percussion, such as Marimba, has been included).
The other main difference involves the effects. None of the files in the farm contain more than 100 programs, so a file can be loaded to a single bank. But with the exception of the 0s bank, you are limited to 10 effects programs per bank. Since we did not want any objects to overflow into another bank, we are therefore limited to a maximum of 10 effects per file. Since the farm was originally created for the K2500, the programs referenced the 2500's preset effects or other RAM effects. Therefore, in the K2000 version of the farm, some of the programs call up the K2000s preset effects, especially if an effect in the K2000 was very similar to a K2500 effect.
Finally, there are one or two parameters in the K2500 that are either not in the K2000, or have different possible values. These params have been set to work correctly in a K2000.
The K2000 Farm also contains two additional files - ROMPIXA and ROMPIXB - which have the preset programs from the K2500, minus any programs which called up drum samples.
In essence, what are providing, for free, is a bunch of great sounding programs.
Sweetwater has gone an extra step to create an emulation file (which is the reason they charge for the file). In addition to porting over the ROM preset programs, as we have done, they have tackled the issue of the drum samples. From what I understand, they have two versions. One version uses no RAM samples, and instead uses various VAST programming tricks to attempt to make the K2000 drums sound similar to the K2500 drums. The other version requires sample RAM and loads up new drum samples. From what I understand, these are not the drum samples from the K2500. Instead they are samples from other sources, which were deemed to be similar sounding to the K2500 drums, and then tweaked using VAST, to mimic them as closely as possible. The file also contains all the K2500 preset effects, QA banks, Setups, etc.
If you load this file into the 0s and 100s bank, covering the K2000 ROM objects, then the K2000 will emulate a K2500 (except of course for the fact that you will still only have 24 voices, and none of the options unique to the 2500 such as the 4 meg stereo piano ROM block wil be available). If someone has created a file of programs, setups, etc. on their 2500, you would be able to load that file into your K2000 and have it work correctly, referencing all the correct dependent objects, such as keymaps, effects, etc.
Because of the large number of objects loaded in, PRAM is required to use this file, as far as I am aware. I am also under the impression that the K2500 Farm programs are also included on the disk.