questions about Pads & Memory

Just got my first MPC(500) a couple weeks ago and i got a few questions i couldn't find answers to in the manual.

First: Is a pad ugrade available/recommended for the 500? (i understand they're virtually a requirement on the 1000.) These pads aren't too bad, but i've seen better on other machines.

Also, are the pads supposed to be zone/aftertouch-sensitive? They're not on other drum machines i've owned (BOSS and ZOOM models), but i can understand why some MPC users would want this feature. I however don't need it and was wondering if there is a way to disable it. I want the same sound w/ the same duration to come from the pad each time i hit it.
The manual's chapter on pads is very brief and doesn't touch on any of this.

One last question: If the 500 doesn't cover me for memory and/or amplitude, can i bulk info dump my samples, sequences, programs, songs, etc into a 1000?
All feedback appreciated.

First, MPC pads work as YOU want them to work. You may assign 1 sample only, no problem with that. As far as I know, there is no aftertouch functionality in MPC 500 that affects the pad performance, except the Note Repeat function. Only velocity and gate data is transmitted when you strike a pad. However, there is a possibility of layering 4 samples assigned to 1 pad and if you assign the same velocity range for all samples, then they will play all at once when you hit the pad. If you only need 1 sample to play, just assign 1 sample only to a pad. Select a "One Shot" for play mode (p.74 of the manual) to have the sample played for a fixed length once you hit the pad (note that the length may not be the original length but the one you may specify in the sample envelope screen - see p.75-76 of the manual).

As for the second question, you can save your MPC500's Entire Memory as a Project file (this saves all samples, sequences, programs that you may use) to the memory card and then reload this project into MPC 1000, coz both machines are totally compatible when it comes to data exchange (see p.95 of the manual for details).