Problem with samples triggering in sequence...

Ok, bought my MPC500 about 6 months ago, love it to bits, but theres one thing thats pissing me off;

When I'm making a beat with drums, bassline and a few other samples, some of the samples randomly will not trigger when playing back the sequence. I say randomly - occaisionally it plays fine, so as far as I know it's nothing that I've **** up on (and yeah before you all open the gates - I have read the manual! 1st thing I did!). But more often than not a hat might drop out, or a snare might not trigger.

As you can probably imagine, it's **** annoying.

Initially I thought it was because I didn't have the Ram upgrade, so I bought that, which gave me more sample time, etc, but I've still got the same problem.

Has anyone had/heard of this problem before? Do you think it is a dodgy Ram upgrade?

Just wanted to check with you guys before buying another upgrade, in case it's something else.

Any feedback appreciated.

Much Love

sos , sos , where is ill green too complicated answer for a frozzy like me

What OS is it running on? I recommend 1.31, thats the last update (Akai are stupid bastards like that). Get it at www.akaipro.com/mpc500 .

If you have it already, then check how each sample is played and setted in Program. If all your samples are in Stereo then you reached the limit of 16 polyphony. To get the full 32 poly, they all need to be in Mono. Also turn the Time Correct off when making sequences. In OTHER mode, try the different sequence settings when you record. One of them allows the samples at the last bar to transition over to the first bar instead of getting cut-off.

Safe for the advise - I've redone the update, and tried the other things you mentioned, still the same problem.

I was initially sampling all my drum sounds from vinyl and recording in stereo, but I've now tried it in mono and it seems to work a bit better but I still get sounds cutting out. Sometimes the sample will trigger but it will only play on one channel on my headphones, then go back to normal. I know it's not set to pan left or right because sometimes the same sounds will play normally.

I've also tried just using some wav drum samples from a cd to see if anythings different there, but it's still the same sh*t.

Not sure what else to try. Any more ideas?

Do ya think it may be a problem with the mpc itself?

I believe the MPC 500 has 16 voices or something or the other. If you have effects such as the global mastering effects (COMP and EQ) + other effects, surely samples will drop out. The only way to avoid this is to sample in Mono, and try not to have too many voices going on at the same time.