Korg

” Korg Poly 61 Refurbished and with a New Solid Oak Chassis, New Main PCB, Excellent Sound. Condition is “Seller refurbished”.

This is a special fully refurbished P-61 with some great improvements, in top condition, and it sounds and looks fabulous. As you know, the P-61 is a great-sounding analog synth, with a real analog audio signal path, but with the advantage of digitally controlled tuning. As a result, this synth has that great classic sound, and the tuning is very stable. This particular synth has been refurbished with these features of note:

– The main CPU board (KLM 509A) has been replaced with a brand new replica from Andrej Shenshyn of synthronics.de in Germany. (That cost me over $300 US – see the photo).
– I refurbished the keyboard, cleaning all the keys and contacts, and solving the issue of faulty contacts by putting conductive carbon discs on all the contacts, per the solution by Sounddoctorin.com (a great solution to faulty key contacts – look it up). I added the extra effort to glue thin plastic pieces to each of the keys’ hammer stem, to make the contacts activate even better. Now it plays with a nice light touch, with no dead keys.
– I removed all the tactile programing switches, and replaced them from a large pool of 68 used switches that I had, testing very carefully and selecting the best-working 17 switches to use. Now the program selection buttons work perfectly. Gone is the frustrating issue of hitting the buttons a bunch of times to finally select the program you want.
– I cleaned all the pots and switches with a spray lubricant, so they are all working fine with no scratching noise or jumping values.
– The KLM 508 voice board has been fully calibrated, and it is in good shape. I replaced one interconnect that was faulty, so now it is fine.
– I built a new solid oak chassis for this synth, because as you probably know, the original was made of cheap particle board that was one of the main complaints of the P-61. This is a beautiful replacement, built very solid and the panel and other parts fit perfectly, giving this synth a better-than-new look, and it will be way more durable than the original. I gave it an ebony stain, to go well with the gray panel, with a satin polyurethane finish for a classy soft look. ” Click here to visit listing on eBay

“Works perfectly and sounds great
The number keys that are used to select the patch numbers can be a bit sensitive.
Sometimes you’ll press a key and it registers as two presses if you don’t take your finger off in time.
Maybe the keypad needs a clean. It hasn’t bothered me at all.
This is the version with the inverted keys.
No modifications, you still need the D type batteries to run the patch memory.

Cool synth, I just don’t use it very much.” Click here to visit listing on eBay

“Synth powers on and does produce sound. However, the sounds seem to be random and erratic, and no longer correspond with the programs on a consistent basis. Also, it appears some of the keys may be sticking – not physically, but certain presets will produce sound even when no key is being pressed.

Synth was in perfect working order until I recently moved across the country and plugged it back in. My guess is that something internally must have knocked loose during transport. I did briefly open the panel just to see if there were any obvious issues such as an unsoldered wire, but nothing stuck out to me. Cosmetically, the synth looks great, with only some light chipping in the paint on one of the side panels (see photo). All buttons, keys and joystick work.

This would make for a great project synth for anyone interested in tinkering around with it.

I’m selling this synth “as is”. I described the problems as accurately as I could, so please make sure you’ve read my description fully so that you know exactly what you’re getting before purchasing it.”
Click here to visit listing on eBay

“Up for sale is this fantastically cool Korg Poly-61M which I purchased new an eon ago in the 80’s! It is now looking for a new home. There is the usual wear on the ends. All keys function properly, volume and other knobs work fine. I’ve used this keyboard infrequently over the years and so the key action is close to new. Rheostats toggles and switches work fine. Button pads 1-8 also work fine but sometimes one will double tap instead of single tap. This is likely oxidation on the contacts due to infrequent use of the instrument, it “should” correct itself with increased use or cleaning. This is a bulky (but not heavy) item, pickup only. Fantastic vintage synth sound and feel can be YOURS!!” Click here to visit listing on eBay