Korg M3: Changing program bank references in a combi
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Note: this article also applies to the Korg M50.

Scenario

You've moved an entire bank of programs from one bank to a different bank, and now some combis won't work correctly because they think the programs are still in the old bank.

Note: This how-to will work only if you've moved an entire bank of programs, such as saving bank U-A to media and the loading that saved PCG file back to bank U-E.

Warning: There is one important pitfall to be aware of, due to a mild oversight in Korg's design of this functionality. The pitfall is described after the procedure.

Related information: Korg M3: Basic data management techniques

Procedure

  1. Press the GLOBAL button.
  2. From the page menu, select Change all bank references.
    1. Select the Combination checkbox and make sure the Song checkbox is cleared.
    2. Find the original bank that you moved the programs from on the left side of all those > icons and touch the corresponding button.
    3. From the pop-up window that appears, select the bank that you moved the programs to.
  3. Touch OK. All combinations that previously referenced program numbers from the original from bank now reference the same program numbers, but in the new to bank.

For example, if you moved program bank U-A into program bank U-E, you would touch the > icon just to the right of U-A, and select U-E from the pop-up window. A combi that previously pointed to program U-A087 would now point to program U-E087.

One pitfall to be aware of

This feature of the M3 only changes the program bank assignments made in all combis (and/or all songs if you choose the other available Song checkbox in step 2.1 of the procedure.

What this feature does not do, unfortunately, is to change the program bank assignments made in the Drum Track section of every program. This isn't an issue if the programs that you've moved from one bank to another all use Drum Track Program assignments that point to the internal program banks where all the default system programs are located, because those never change (or shouldn't, in normal environments).

But it's a huge issue if the programs that you've moved to another bank use Drum Track Program assignments that point to another user program bank that you might have moved. For example, some professional sound sets might use some programs in a bank to house their programs for use in the Drum Tracks of other programs in the same bank. If you then move all those programs to a different bank, there is no automated way to change those Program Assignments in the Drum Track sections of the programs in that bank. And you're stuck with manually changing all of those Drum Track Program assignments manually.

Hopefully Korg will update this feature of the M3 to include the ability to change program bank assignments in the Drum Track section in a future update.

How to tell when this problem has occurred

When the M3 cannot find the program originally specified in the Drum Track, it replaces the Drum Track with a pointer to I-A004 Studio Standard Kit. So if you suddenly notice a lot of your program's Drum Tracks are pointing to that program, this is a good indicator that the original program assignment for the Drum Track was lost.

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