If you need to read correctly programs (with samples) designed for the AKAI S Series you can get very cheap an AKAI S3000XL; I got mine 3 years ago for 250 EUR with 32 Mb maximum ram, the multiple outs and S/PDIF are standard like the SCSI port.
Today you can find one for 200 EUR I think. But you don't get effects, unless you find one with the Effect board option (AKAI EB-16) which today can be more expensive than the sampler itself!
You have to get used with AKAIs, my first sampler was a Roland so I never found myself very close to its approach, though these days I have too little time to spend on it, so I admit I use it as a Sample Player only: for that, it does its job very well. I tried some soft sampler which can read AKAI CDs, I have to say that the programs never played the same, I mean the programs with envelopes, filters, velocity, etc.
Than, if you want to start from raw samples to develop synthetic sounds you will know
I am gonna name one of the Kurzweil K series with 32 or 64 Mb of RAM.
A K2000R can go for 300 EUR without the Sampling Option and the ROM Expansions.
With the OS 3.87 it reads over SCSI nearly everything formatted on a PC (ok, not the NTFS, but...) you just need the 30 pin RAM for samples -no need for the sampling option- and the K2000 becomes a very powerful sample playback machine with full editing options over the samples.
I never had troubles with floppies luckily, I always used branded Floppies (Sony-TDK-Maxell). The only Kurzweil floppy that became partially unreadable was the Kurzweil Factory Disk ..... (!!!) But they have all their factory sounds on their website, so nothing went lost
I purchased for my K2000 two JAZ drives with 2 New JAZ disks from the US for just $ 15...
The kurzweils can read WAV and AIFF with loop points, AKAI, EMU, Roland CDs... Do I need to say anything else...?
P.
