jesus christ, these pads are hard

just got my 1k, and i didn't know you had to hit the pads so hard to even get a sound out, even with the sensitivity all the way up, is there anything i can do, modification of the pads-wise, to make them more sensitive? i wish i could just tap them with a finger. on another note, would formatting my cf card be a good way to erase all the stock sounds/sequences?

pydromaniac wrote:just got my 1k, and i didn't know you had to hit the pads so hard to even get a sound out, even with the sensitivity all the way up, is there anything i can do, modification of the pads-wise, to make them more sensitive? i wish i could just tap them with a finger. on another note, would formatting my cf card be a good way to erase all the stock sounds/sequences?

Congrats on your new bit of kit. Well, you don't say where you got it from i.e. eBay, brand new etc...The reason I say this is that older mpc 1000's were notorious for having bad pads. By 'bad' I mean that the softer feel (which was so popular on the 2000 machines) totally went.
Its not the end of the world if you have one of these mpc's - but you will need a pad upgrade ( $ 180) - check out mpcstuff.com

Bear in mind that the pads simply might need breaking in. Best thing to do is do some searches on these forums - there is a lot of information. But to summarise - if you have old style pads (which were known for being hard) then you'll need a pad upgrade.

The upgrade isn't too difficult to do - no soldering or anything like that.

In response to your other question - yes - formatting the CF card would get rid of those sounds. I'm assuming that there isn't already a hard drive in the unit and the sounds are being loaded from there.

Good luck - and be sure to check out the JJOS (JJ Operating System) if you can.

Mark,

No i would not kill that cf card

the Stock sounds are loaded from the flash memory. You can get rid of them by an option...

Loki wrote:No i would not kill that cf card

the Stock sounds are loaded from the flash memory. You can get rid of them by an option...

fair enough - hell, kill that cf card anyway

you just gotta get used to them i pretty much leave my full level button on except when doing hi hats.

but once u get used to them ull be good the "breaking in" shit is bull shit just get used to pounding the drums and ull get accustomed.

the pad upgrade is inconclusive some say they make the world of difference some say they dont do shit.

ps. u coulda waited two months and got a beat thang u woulda had softer pads and chromatic layout.

I had the same problem with my 1k, pads felt hard as hell, used to leave full level on all the time. Someone on another thread suggested to turn my pad on level to 1 which worked like a charm with the sensitivity turned up to 25. btw i have jj os 4.99 not sure if that option is in the akai os, but to check hit mode - pad 10 (other) and go to the pad tab and there should be some options to adjust sensitivity and such. hopefully that might help a little

jpeg wrote:ps. u coulda waited two months and got a beat thang u woulda had softer pads and chromatic layout.

How do you know it will have softer pads?

From what I could gather in regards to MPC pad comparison, the MPC1000 has hard 3/4 pads like the MPC500.

Supposedly the 2500, although maybe not as soft as legacy models, is not as hard. But I've only tried the 500, which was way too unresponsive for my taste.

My fix was to remove the pads. But with JJ OS you might be able to tweak the input sensitivity enough so you don't have to.

does anyone know if the pad replacements from MPCStuff are any softer? Or require less 'break-in' time?

fawn wrote:does anyone know if the pad replacements from MPCStuff are any softer? Or require less 'break-in' time?

There's plenty of posts that state the new pads are the ish. Just get them, you won't be disappointed.

thing is i have the newer pads, when i wiggle one pad the surrounding ones do also. i have the newest (free) jj os and the sensitivity is all the way one 25, i guess i just gotta break em in. so how exactly should i go about deleting the stock sounds? i have "all_seqs&songs.all" in the flash card, doesn't sound like i should delete that

on the screen where you adjust the sensitivity, make sure on the right that the value for "pad level on" is set to one, my pads were unresponsive too with the sens at 25 until i changed this setting as well, made a huge difference for me

markmorgan10 wrote:Bear in mind that the pads simply might need breaking in.

i have a mpc500, when i got it i had to hit the pads really hard, but now that ive used it a lot they are a lot easier and more responsive. they most likely just need to be broken in