Can the MPC1000 do these things?

Hi there,

I'm really close to buying the MPC1000 for my live setup, but I need to know some stuff before I feel confident in my decision:

1:
Can I press play, let the sequencer loop for a while, press the rec button and record some, then stop recording again without stopping playback? Switch to another "instrument/channel" and record there too? Without stopping playback?
The reason why I ask this is that I will perform/record one track one at a time during concerts without anything being recorded from home, so I need to be able to finish a whole pattern or song without stopping playback.

2: It it possible to turn off quantization for recordings?
And turn it on again if I want to?
Can I turn off quantization for individual tracks, so that some tracks are quantized and some are not?

3: I want to use it for keyboard sounds as well, playing it with my midi keyboard to the midi-in port, how does that work? Fine? I know that it will never be as good for this purpose as a real rack sampler, but does it work ok?

Hope these are not annoying questions....

Thanks in advance,

Pixel

the answers to your questions are yes,yes and yes........for the selection of midi channels all you do is select which one you wanna use and its done.......this machine will do all that you have asked and a whole lot more.......also this unit will give a rack sampler a run for some money too man.......dont sleep on the 1k.....it may be small but it is powerful

I'd say yes yes no.

You need to make a program of just each note you want to play on the keyboard. Rack samplers from the 80's kill the 1000 ability to be played melodically from keys. But it is possible.

Hi there,

Thanx for the quick reply!

Sounds great!

Regarding question no. 2:
How do I turn off quantization for one sound and on for another?
For example, I have a pattern with a SD and a BD and a HH.
The SD and the BD should be quantized and the HH should not be. How do I turn it off for just the HH? And can I choose between on or off without stopping playback?

Regarding question no. 3:
I realize just like I said that a rack sampler will be better, but I don't need so many fancy filters or the like. But can I choose two samples, for example on sinus note at C4 and a BD sound and make them play at the same time? And lay them out on the pads so that I can hit any note on my midi keyboard and it will transpose the sounds? And can I choose to disable tuning on the BD?

Re #2: You can set "Time Correct" (T.C. = Quantization) to operate during recording or on tracks, but it's a destructive operation. Except for the Undo feature, you can't just turn it off with existing tracks or pads, it modifies the actual note timing in the tracks when you use it. You need to verify the right setting when recording, or else it will quantize everything as you record it.

I recommend getting the PDF manual for details on the way it works: http://www.akaipro.co.jp/jp/datalib/dow ... 000_E3.zip

#3: Absolutely, I have some string and other melodic sounds that I play from an external keyboard, polyphonically (10-finger chords). 1 Pad = 1 MIDI note, so you need to program each note, you can't assign a sample to a range automatically. There's no automatuc retuning, you decide what you need and do it.
Example: you have a A3 sample, so you assign it to each key/pad with a different tuning:
G3 -2.00
G#3 -1.00
A3 0.00
Bb3 +1.00
B3 +2.00
and so on. Hit the MIDI key to select the pad, don't worry about which Pad it actually is. You need to use "Note On" mode for each pad so that the sound stops when you lift the key.

In one program, if you want, you can do that for the e.g. top 3 octaves, then use the low octave for drums, and assign those samples to pads as normal. Nothing gets retuned unless you do it yourself, so no worries on that score.

Personally, I would not mix these two methods in one Program. I use the whole 5-octave range for my sounds, so there's no room left for drums in that Program.

Hi again :-)

Thanx once again for the quick reply :-)

After reading your replys, I went to the shop and bought the MPC1000 :-) It feels great, I love that it can record with velocity unlike the electribe SX that I bought last month..

Regarding #2:
I tried using the Time Correct feature, but I had a little problem using the feature in playback mode. It sounds like nothing is happening when I use the limited playback version of the time correct feature.
Is it possible to time correct AFTER I record something? Or do I have to decide if my own time feel will be sufficient before I record?

Regarding #3:
I think Stereoroid's explanation will help me finding out how to do it much faster, thanx! Looking forward to understand how I use the "note on" feature.

There u go dawg peep the manual!

~http://www.akaipro.co.jp/jp/datalib/download/documents/manuals/apro/mpc/MPC1000_E3.zip

pixel wrote:Hi again :-)
I tried using the Time Correct feature, but I had a little problem using the feature in playback mode. It sounds like nothing is happening when I use the limited playback version of the time correct feature.
Is it possible to time correct AFTER I record something? Or do I have to decide if my own time feel will be sufficient before I record?

In play mode, Time Correct is referred to as Quantize. In that mode, it only affects newly-recorded notes, notes you record while the sequence is playing. Hold down TC and roll the wheel to select higher or lower quantize settings before recording new notes. In order to correct after recording, you need to stop the sequence, hit TC and choose the range of bars you want to quantize, then hit Do It.

pixel wrote:Regarding #3:
I think Stereoroid's explanation will help me finding out how to do it much faster, thanx! Looking forward to understand how I use the "note on" feature.

pixel wrote:Regarding #3:
I think Stereoroid's explanation will help me finding out how to do it much faster, thanx! Looking forward to understand how I use the "note on" feature.

Thanks - glad to help!

If anyone's interested, I've put a couple of melodic programs on my site: http://stereoroid.com/sounds/mpc1000 . These are based on samples I got from other sites, which I've linked to - so you download and unzip them, add the PGM file, and xfer to the MPC. The "Pine Piano" sounds pretty good over 5 octaves for such small samples, but you will hear the limitations in the looped section...

There's also the "Blank Melodic" program which has 61 notes set to "Note On" which makes assembling a melodic Program a bit quicker. The default is "One Shot", where every sample plays all the way through without stopping when you release the pad or key. That's it, really.

Hi again :-)

For thynctank:
It's a pity that the MPC can't quantize AFTER the recording has taken place (in playback mode I mean). Well I'll se if I can live with that, I guess I have to ;-) Can any of the larger models do that?

For stereoid:
Thanx for the link, I'll dl then PRG files and check them out!

ok the 1000 is capable of playing the melody thing u asked but u have to create multisample programs..mpc tutor has a tutorial on mulity sampling and also sell some . so remember u can not just load a sound and it will be spread across your keys theres things u have to do first.. the 4k and the 2kxl are the only models that do this 4 u so check this site home page in tutorials for multisampling

pixel wrote:Hi again :-)

For thynctank:
It's a pity that the MPC can't quantize AFTER the recording has taken place (in playback mode I mean). Well I'll se if I can live with that, I guess I have to ;-) Can any of the larger models do that?

Nope, unless the 4k has features I'm not aware of.

-tank.

Sure you can quantize after recording... In step Edit goto the timing correct window, select 1/32, 1/16, etc.. and press do it.

bboy wrote:Sure you can quantize after recording... In step Edit goto the timing correct window, select 1/32, 1/16, etc.. and press do it.

Yeah but not during playback and that's what I need.

I'll check out the MPC tutor/multisample thing.
I can't get the samples looping when I hold my finger on the pads even though I chose "note on". I guess it's really easy but I still haven't found out how....

did you turn looping ON under the trim mode screen?