Audition samples

Im seriously looking at buying MPC 4000,
Can anyone tell me if you can audition samples direct from disk before loading them to memory?
I couldnt seem to find this function whilst playing at the shop.................


Please ignore this post, I just read previous posts and found what i needed, cheers

Its not implemented yet even though it was an advertised feature when the mpc4000 was announced almost 2 years ago. We're waiting for OS 1.50 to drop this December (was supposed to drop last 1 year ago!!!), and the audition from hd feature is announced to be in OS update 1.51.

So, if you want that feature you will have to wait for 2 OS updates. Which means, by AKAI's OS update rate, should be out in late 2004, early 2005.

Sorry about the bad news, but thats the way it went down so far.

Kalei

To be fair to Akai, they had some problems with their American distributor going out of bussiness without warning them. They were caught with their pants down which lead to a lot of delays and such with R&D...I'm sure they will get on the ball with the updates now for us 4000 owners. Not to mention, with the MV-8000 in their faces they will probably have some more motivation to speed up those updates.

well... theyve done the same to the s5000/s6000 users, and even to some of the earlier models. The z4/z8 owners are also FAR from satisfied from what I understand. And distribution issues in the usa should hardly have anything with os development to do, since its been developed on Japan. I would still have my respect for them as a company if they atleast made an OFFICIAL statement on OS development; how can a OS update be a year late?

I do hope you're right about the mv8000 making the nervous cause maybe something actually happens now. Unless they simply ditch the 4k and release something else instead. Wouldnt be the first time they did that.

Kalei

As far as the history behind the akai products... have they have finished all of the OS updates for the other machines like thee 3000. 2000xl, 2000...ext????????

I mean this is bullshiiitt !! I don't think we will ever get any good updates to the OS !!!

yeah I wouldn't be surprised if we saw a 4000xl at the winter or summer 04namm.

Kalei wrote: And distribution issues in the usa should hardly have anything with os development to do, since its been developed on Japan.

Kalei

Kalei, not that I'm completely in defense of their non-release of updates for items that were in the initial press release for the 4000, but the USA distributor going out of bussiness would most certainly disrupt the Japan parent company. Firstly, it is America where the most centralized sales of Akaipro products are sold, not to mention, Akai Japan had to figure out how to set up their own new distribution in the US. Believe me, this haulted them.

They were also, unbeknownst to us at that time, right in the middle of R&D for their new 1000 line that was soon to be released. Now I know in our minds, they should service R&D for their existing products rather than continue with one that is about to be released but from a marketing standppoint, there is no question that with the negative cash flow they had from the downfall of APIC, they had limited revenue to throw into R&D and scheduled those revenues into the 1000 instead of the 4000 (they needed the money). Things are getting back to normal though, I think.

Well thats fine and all, I dont agree with most of what you are sayin, simply from just experience: The same thing happened with the s5000/s6000. It was advertised with features it didnt have and the OS updates werent coming very fast, it annoyed alot of users. And then all of a sudden they dropped the z4/z8 from nowhere upsetting the s5000/s6000 owners even more, just like they did with the mpc1000, making most mpc4000 users really annoyed.

Even if all you are saying is the truth, it never excuses the way they treated their customers -> NOT 1 OFFICIAL STATEMENT!!! Its hard to comprehend but this is the way theyve done business for many years.

Kalei

True, but it's like the wife that keeps going back to the husband who's beating her because she needs his good stuff. Anyway, I agree, Akai is traditionally bad about these kind of things but it's not a surprise. I do not think that the 1000 relase is correlatable to the Z4/Z8 being released to replace the S series stuff...Reason being the 1000 is not tackling the same market as the 4000. I would imagine that within the next year or more, a replacement for the 2000xl will show up and by then the 4000 should be up to spec just in time for a new 4000 type in a few years. The 1000 created a new market, not replaced one.

Very true about the mpc1000. However, what irritates mpc4000 users is that it seems they spent all the money/time on the mpc1000 when the 4k was hurting badly from bugs and missing features.

This is where the official statement would mean all the difference; if they atleast had been honest and said something in the line of "We have to do this or else we're not gonna be able to survive or even yet, update the 4000" (IF this is the case) that would have made me and others ALOT more understanding.

Kalei

JusDaFied, I feel your comments. But Kalei has a point too, an official statement would've eased the pain.

On the S5000/S6000 thing, I disagree. I got a S6k and I don't remember it missing advertised features, but V1.0 had lots of problems, yeah, that's for sure. That's when owners were upset. It took a while, and then Akai released V2.0 that fixed everything and added extra features like the USB card and AKSYS. From then on, it's been rock solid with all the advertised features and more. S5k/S6k owners were not upset when the Z4/Z8 dropped, 'cause the S5/6k were great samplers by then (128voices, 16outputs, big display, virtual samples/playsheets, USB, etc).

I still use the mpc 2000, but was considering a 4000... I feel for you people though, how are they not going to release an OS upgrade in a timely manner to people who forked over 2300-3000 for a new buggy machine? That's ludicris, man!

The problem is that these updates were suppost to be in the 4000 right out the box. THAT IS FAULS ADVERTISING !!

you mean to tell me that they didn't figure this out in the beging when testing and creation was going on for the 4000.... give me a break. Now all of a sudden they want to start testing Shhhiiittttttt. The sade part is we have to here all this bullllshiitttt second hand from David ( no disrespect ) because akai doesn't have the sack to make us awere on there web site.

Lie, after Lie, after lie...... I wish we could have a 20/20 show on this beyotch !!

TREV wrote:As far as the history behind the akai products... have they have finished all of the OS updates for the other machines like thee 3000. 2000xl, 2000...ext????????

I mean this is bullshiiitt !! I don't think we will ever get any good updates to the OS !!!

The 3000 series were probably the last rock solid samplers that Akai had. I still miss my Akai s3000xl because it just worked.

I had a s6000 and akai never implemented the UNDO function which, again, was advertised in their brochures. After 3 years of waiting for OS release after OS release, I sold it. I vowed never to buy another akai product.

I went virtual, but now I"m getting tired of software. So, I thought, maybe akai has their act together -- maybe the mpc4000 is tight now that it's been out for 2 years. and i come to this board, and it's the same treatment from akai again. they still haven't changed.

now i'm seriously eyeing the roland mv8000. which is funny because for the most part i think roland is really uninspired. but i'm looking for a solid, modern hardware sequencing sampler and it looks like roland might be the ticket.