What happened to my MPC500?!

Pulled out my 500 after maybe 3 years of it sitting on a shelf and all I can say is, what the hell happened to the pads? Pretty sure when I used it last the pads were 'okay', now with full level off, geez, need a hammer to get anything out of them.

I just put tape under 3 pads to fill the void and that's helped with general responsiveness on those pads no end, so with full level on, all is fine on those pads, but that hasn't fixed the overall sensitivity issue with full level off - no matter what pad sensitivity settings I'm using, I'm basically getting nothing unless I hammer the things to the point where I fear my fingers will bleed.

Seriously, I only bought it to write the beat making on the mpc500 book, since then it's not been used. It's had a few months use, that's it. Everything seems 100% fine when I open her up, no dust, no loose connectors.

Any ideas?

Thats the issue I was getting recently about a few months back. I bought two 500s, one in 2006 and the other in 2009. The 2006 one had good response with the stock pads, kinda stiff but doable. The 2009 one I noticed I needed to add more pressure than the 2006. I bought the MPC Stuff pads and it made Full Level highly sensative that I could fingertap away on drums but on velocity, I still had to jackhammer it. But the pads respond wacky, if I hit pad 1, the sample on pad 3 is played too messing up my sequences that I have to redo them a few times. I think the sensors aged over time and is giving up the ghost slowly. The 2006 has a few dead pads, can't say its from age because rats chewed the pads and pissed on the pcb boards inside but the sensors still look shiny and new. With the 2009 though I lost my patience with it from reinstalling the 1.31OS, to installing the stock pads and I still get issues. The Full Level smooth sensativity is now waning too.

Just downgraded to 1.30, just in case, didn't change anything.

MPC-Tutor wrote:I'm basically getting nothing unless I hammer the things to the point where I fear my fingers will bleed.

Any ideas?

I don't know what Akai was thinking with the MPC pads. Why couldn't they be like the ones in the XR20? There is no way that banging that hard on it can be good for any electronic device, so I don't even play directly on mine anymore (I use a keyboard controller instead). The only times I use the pads now are to save/load and track mute.

RTFM
got no idea , mine bought in 2008 still works fine maybe it doesn't stand the 3 years sitting

this is probably an issue with the software calibration, just like most pad issues.

You sure it's not that you just forgot how tough they were in the first place? I go through periods where I use my 500 for a while and I'm always amazed at how unresponsive they are. Then I get used to it after a few days.

MeSoHordey wrote:You sure it's not that you just forgot how tough they were in the first place? I go through periods where I use my 500 for a while and I'm always amazed at how unresponsive they are. Then I get used to it after a few days.

Rocking the mpc 2500 most of the time, but still use the 1000 with the pad upgrade when I'm outside of the house. When switching to the 1k I always experience the same thing.

Nym wrote:this is probably an issue with the software calibration, just like most pad issues.

Worth to try an upgrade I would say.