Oberheim OB-8 "Memory Liberator" battery eliminator RAM upgrade

The vintage Oberheim OB-8 normally uses three RAM chips to hold program memory, all of which are out of production and increasingly difficult to find, and require a lithium backup battery. Typical F-RAM / Flash RAM upgrades require three modules to replace the RAM in the OB-8 while only using a fraction of the capacity of each. Our Memory Liberator battery eliminator module includes the necessary logic to replace ALL THREE of the original RAMs with the single modern ferroelectric RAM chip housed on our board and eliminates the need for a battery.

Important, OB-8-specific note: This Memory Liberator installation is very easy and requires no soldering or desoldering at all! However, OB-8s with the later hardware/firmware versions have saved envelope calibration settings that will be lost whenever the battery dies, is replaced or removed, or the RAM is replaced as it will be when doing this upgrade.

If your have a Version A OB-8 or its battery was already dead (your patch memory wasn't working) the envelopes will be no worse after installing the Memory Liberator, but if your battery was still good, and it was still holding its calibration settings, you may notice weird envelope behaviors (in our experience, most often this appears as envelopes’ release ending abruptly rather than tapering off). It is not difficult to correct these by following the calibration procedure in the OB-8 Service Manual if you have a digital multimeter, but if you aren’t equipped to do this, you should probably get professional help with this installation.

You can find the installation instructions here: Oberheim OB-8 Memory Liberator Instructions