Questions about the mpc 5000: shoot

You may or may not be able to answer this question....

Ok. I have a subject that is near and dear to everyone's heart This caused all sorts of headaches in the past. It has to do with memory. The Akai memory for the MPC 2500/1000 initially cost upwards of $150-200. Many users were able to use 144 pin laptop memory in these units with no apparent issues which cost as much as $50. Now this new MPC 5000 appears to use a 128MB memory chip. I haven't located it's price on the market yet. Do you know if this is the same memory chip found in the Alesis Fusion? Do you think it would be possible to use 3rd party memory like the previous MPCs? While I would pay the extra dollars for the Akai Ram, I think many potential buyers would like to know how to cut costs (at least in this forum).

OJ Reem wrote:You may or may not be able to answer this question....

Ok. I have a subject that is near and dear to everyone's heart This caused all sorts of headaches in the past. It has to do with memory. The Akai memory for the MPC 2500/1000 initially cost upwards of $150-200. Many users were able to use 144 pin laptop memory in these units with no apparent issues which cost as much as $50. Now this new MPC 5000 appears to use a 128MB memory chip. I haven't located it's price on the market yet. Do you know if this is the same memory chip found in the Alesis Fusion? Do you think it would be possible to use 3rd party memory like the previous MPCs? While I would pay the extra dollars for the Akai Ram, I think many potential buyers would like to know how to cut costs (at least in this forum).

I have no clue really. The extra RAM in the 5k doesn't look like normal memory sticks I am familiar with.
The 64 Mb RAM that goes with every unit is fixed on the main board.

The extra 128 RAM is a single card with two rows of pins fitting in two slots on the main board:
http://www.synthmusic.info/mp3s/5kram.jpg

Then again, my 5k is not a production version, so who knows what Akai puts in in the end?

Oh wait, I just did a google search and the memorycard indeed does look the same as the fusion ones:
http://www.sinemedia.com/upload/_up_img ... 628211.jpg

But still: no garantuee from me that these are exchangable!

Not suprised at the similarities. When this MPC 5000 was announced, it made me start looking at the Fusion more. The first thing that caught my eyes was the fact that it had identical memory capacity. I started looking for other similarities.

- LCD
- Built in hard drive w/ 8 track hard disk recording
- ADAT lightpipe
- USB 2.0
- Virtual analog synth
- Arp
- Swing settings

I am happy with the MPC 5000 being a nice upgrade to my MPC 2500. But if it actually had the sampler of the Fusion, it may be just enough to win over the forum's die-hard MPC 4000 users (or perhaps not ).

OJ Reem wrote:Not suprised at the similarities. When this MPC 5000 was announced, it made me start looking at the Fusion more. The first thing that caught my eyes was the fact that it had identical memory capacity. I started looking for other similarities.

- LCD
- Built in hard drive w/ 8 track hard disk recording
- ADAT lightpipe
- USB 2.0
- Virtual analog synth
- Arp
- Swing settings

I am happy with the MPC 5000 being a nice upgrade to my MPC 2500. But if it actually had the sampler of the Fusion, it may be just enough to win over the forum's die-hard MPC 4000 users (or perhaps not ).

That is true. I definitely like the Fusions features... 2 Oscillators (so you can have
2 seperate Multi Sample sets), 8 LFO's, 8 Envelopes, 3 Filters

Don't forget the Fusions VA, which is actually quite a nice VA.

Both the Fusions Sampler and VA have a Program Modulation Matrix
Even if it's 32 Slots...

I don't think they will be bringing it over, but if they did , it would be a nice improvement...


Cheers,
Dave

scd wrote:

renegadebliss wrote:Hey Boele,
Can you tell me how the MPC 5000 changes FX, Mixer Parameters, and Q Link settings between sequences?

Cheers,
Dave

Good question. Want to know myself too. I will set up a few sequences with extreme settings/changes in FX types/parameters, Mixer settings and recorded Q link controls, to see (and hear) how the transition from one to the other sequence sounds. Little patience please... first some coffee...
Again, if that is what you meant to ask?

Hi Boele,
Yep, that's what I meant. No hurry, I just wanted to get an idea how/if the 5000 implements it...

So if FX 1 is set to Delay for Sequence 1 and then Sequence 2 needs FX1 to be Reverb.
How does it switch the FX themselves, and how does the swtich sound?



Thanks,
Dave

Scd, you demo sounds nice. Do you have anything that uses the onboard synth? I'm kind of curious to hear that sounds. The YouTube videos soud a bit muffled.

Avene wrote:Scd, you demo sounds nice. Do you have anything that uses the onboard synth? I'm kind of curious to hear that sounds. The YouTube videos soud a bit muffled.

No the synth is not in it. I am planning on doing some synth stuff soon (I was waiting for a certain bugfix, which happened now). That synth can sound wicked, believe me

renegadebliss wrote:So if FX 1 is set to Delay for Sequence 1 and then Sequence 2 needs FX1 to be Reverb.
How does it switch the FX themselves, and how does the swtich sound?

Thanks,
Dave

I will do an extra test of switching FX settings *within* a sequence (you can insert those in step edit mode. Really cool. That is, if the transition from one to the other sounds good. Which I will test ).

The test above only switches from one FX set to another, without changing the effects in that set.

scd wrote:That synth can sound wicked, believe me

Yeah I wasn't initially expecting much, but upon reading the manual... On paper it looks monstrous!. I owned an Alesis ION for a while, and the 5000 synth architecture seems almost exactly like the Fusion VA (and not too far from the ION), so if Akai borrowed Alesis technology I wouldn't complain one bit!!! And I guess there's no need to reinvent the wheel when you have one of the best VA engines in house...

and let's hope those are alesis filter algorithms in the sampler section too.

scd, I'd be very interested in some samples of synth sounds, as well as some filtered samples with the new filter algorithms. Especially kick drums.

Also quantize strength and window were two of my favorite features from the ASR-X sequencer, and they really really expand on what the MPC can do. When you get a chance, some examples of playing around with the new quantize parameters would be great!

Thanks in advance!

scd wrote:
I have no clue really. The extra RAM in the 5k doesn't look like normal memory sticks I am familiar with.
The 64 Mb RAM that goes with every unit is fixed on the main board.

The extra 128 RAM is a single card with two rows of pins fitting in two slots on the main board:
http://www.synthmusic.info/mp3s/5kram.jpg

Then again, my 5k is not a production version, so who knows what Akai puts in in the end?

Oh wait, I just did a google search and the memorycard indeed does look the same as the fusion ones:
http://www.sinemedia.com/upload/_up_img ... 628211.jpg

But still: no garantuee from me that these are exchangable!

Proprietary RAM... That's super wack. They took it back 15 years with that one lol.

mp3 wrote:Proprietary RAM... That's super wack. They took it back 15 years with that one lol.

Could you please keep at least THIS post free of anti-Akai thoughts and ask questions or post something constructive? That's what this thread is meant for. There are enough threads within the 5k forum index (the rest of them?) where you can spit out your negativity. Thank you.

This is the weirdest forum I have ever seen...

Hello again Boele, I've got another question...

Can you assign some (or all) of the Swing function parameters to the q-link controllers and alter the Swing in realtime during playback? If not, can you put it forward for one of the software revisions because it's a brilliant performance aid. I keep an old Yamaha RS7000 in my set-up for this function alone.

Thanks again for all your help. This is the best thread on the forum.

mp3: I'll create a synth recording soon with examples of various sounds.

cheetabone: I'll look into that. Sounds like a nice feature indeed! Will let you know.

scd dawg, do you get to throw samples into the VA synth? What I'm trynna ask is, do you get to apply synth parameters to samples?

yo, since you are a beta tester, how come they didn't include the Z-sampling engine?

LvngDead wrote:scd dawg, do you get to throw samples into the VA synth? What I'm trynna ask is, do you get to apply synth parameters to samples?

yo, since you are a beta tester, how come they didn't include the Z-sampling engine?

Nope, unfortunately not. That's something I would like to see to. Then again. The filters are available for the samples, plus lfo modulation of some stuff.