Assuming you bought a Gotek Flash Floppy (eBay et al.) and decided to upgrade your Korg DSS-1 there are probably a lot of questions bothering you. To save you time this page is here to provide all the basic steps to get your system up and running. This setup could theoretically work on HxC, but you will have to ask / search on their forum about the configuration file. I spoke with the author of HxC he is a great guy and always willing to help so don’t worry you’re safe. The images from this library are in .hfe file format and will work on HxC, while for the setup you will probably have to look on torlus.com forums. If your Gotek is a Flash Floppy type then ignore previous three sentience’s and continue reading on!
Hardware setup
If you installed a Gotek drive (ideally the one with the OLED display), buy a USB stick as small as possible. Format it as FAT32, or if working on a Mac on OSX this is known as MS-DOS style partition. Inspect the Gotek drive and make sure it has a jumper on S0 pins and make sure other pins do not have any jumpers. If you want sound (of virtual floppy clicking) you might want to buy one of those tiny PC speakers and install it into a Gotek by connecting it onto pins marked as JB.
Software setup
There’s nothing really to set up. Simply extract the .7z archive onto USB stick and you can use it immediately. Flash Floppy configuration file (FF.CFG) is already in the archive. If you want you can edit it for your own fine tuned setup, it’s just a standard text file with each line described what it is and what it does. If you decided to upgrade or downgrade your Gotek with and need a good reference on how to setup the configuration file for your own suits, or just feel like a nerd and what to know what each flag does, please follow this link. To remind you, the one which is included in this archive is working just fine.
DSS-1 Library
This the reason you came here, right. But please read this first. While there are various web sources online that provide DSS-1 Library, unfortunately many of them are incomplete / contain corrupt data or contain duplicates and duplicates of duplicates, or are in a format that does not work with Flash Floppy and HxC. This one is different. I’ve decided to start from zero and slowly build or better to say precompile a “new” library that contains all of the DSS-1 images from online, converted into .hfe format, all of the duplicates removed, and corrupted disks replaced with valid ones. There are a total of 144 disks. They are all in .hfe format ready to be used in Flash Floppy and HxC Gotek drives. The library can be downloaded from here:
Korg DSS1 144_disk_Library (64MB) Kindly: do not ask me to add any commercial disks in this library I do NOT support piracy!
What’s inside?
What’s the use of such a huge library without anyone knowing what’s inside. Well we can certainly change that. I took some time and built this large table that covers all 144 Floppy Disks. The table is located here: One huge table
I have a Gotek but don’t have Flash Floppy or HxC what to do?
Fair enough! I assume there are some folks who bought a native “raw” Gotek drive or have one lying around unused or just want to save a buck or two. Don’t worry we got some good news for you. If you know your work with a screwdriver, a paper clip and have USB-A to USB-A cable, you can easily upgrade your Gotek to Flash Floppy for literally free of charge. The instructions are super simple and available here: Gotek FlashFloppy EZ Installer
Discuss!
Below there is a comment section. If you think there is something that can be improved or just wanted to say thanks, you’re welcome. Now go play that DSS-1! Those of us who are lucky owners know how good it sounds and leaving one gathering dust is a sin. 🙂
Thank you so much for this, Don. It worked flawlessly (once I had worked out how to unzip the file on my mac), and has returned the instrument to my studio. I really appreciate the effort you have gone to, and the fact that you have shared it.
A couple of quick questions, if I may: 1. is it possible to write new systems (for example using multisounds that you create yourself) to the flash drive, or does one need to have “empty” .hfe files to write into? 2. What is the best way to read old dss-1 discs (that i created back in the day) and convert them into .hfe files that can be stored on the flash floppy? I dont currently have any systems that can read my old discs.
Hello, unfortunately I do not know answers to these questions. I would highly suggest checking with the distributors of the conversion software. I provided the link at the beginning of this article. Kind Regards!
Hey Jeremy, has your problem been solved yet? I just bought a DSS-1, put a Gotek in it and am now busy filling it with data from older floppies. If you want I can help you with your 2 questions. Greetings, Luc (Belgium)
Salut Luc! je une question si tu peux me répondre je vient d’acquérir un Korg DSS-1 je achetée le émulation LOTHAREK HXC Floppy avec carte SD, comment faire pour sauvegarder plusieurs sons (.hfe) avec le programme, ( HxCFloppyEmulator_soft) j’arrive à copier sur ma carte SD une bibliothèque (.hfe) mais de que je remet une deuxième en renomment exemple: sons Piano.hfe en suite une fois insérée la carte sur le lecteur ceux ce que je renommée le lecteur ne reconnait pas.
Comment faire, car cet fatigant de juste copier une bibliothèque dans la carte en suite si je besoin de charger d’autres sons je dois effacer celle d’avant et remettre la nouvelle! ma carte SD à 32GB j’aimerai copier tout mes sons dedans et pouvoir charger les sons quand j’aurait besoin.
Comment fait tu pour copier tout tes sons dedans et avoir accès facilement pour les charger dans la mémoire de ton DSS-1?
Je te remercie d’avance si tu peux m’aider 😊
Thank you for your comment! Kind Regards!
Muchas gracias, muy agradecido por tan gran aporte.
Por cierto, yo probé con una microsd en adaptador a usb y me daba error, supongo que memorias de más de 2gb no funcionan al igual que temas de adaptadores a sd, microsd…
Un saludo
Hello!
I have installed the library and put it on a thumb drive, then into Gotek drive that has been installed into the DSS-1. I keep trying to load the disks from the thumb drive and the DSS-1 will not find any of the sounds. The Gotek drive is using Flash Floppy 3.42. Please help!
Works perfectly in here. The article literally follows step by step of me operating the actual Korg DSS-1 with a Flashfloppy. Cheers!
I hit system, then 9, then hit enter and it says F9 drive not ready set disk or cancel. On my Gotek I see all the disk names from the library,and can scroll through them. Do I have to do anything further on the Gotek before I attempt to load it on the DSS-1? I am very new to this.
I got it now, thank you for your awesome library and guide!! Rock on!
Gotek flashed and built in. Diskettes unzipped on USB-STICK.
Emulator shows F-F for flash floppy,ok. When I plug in the stick, the emulator shows E43 error. What could be the problem?
Works perfectly in here. The article literally follows step by step of me operating the actual Korg DSS-1 with a Flashfloppy. Cheers!
It was a problem of unpacking your data to my USB-STICK. It created a folder. I saw it and copied the hfe and cfe files in the main directory. Now it works!!! Thanks a lot, you make me happy!!!