gowansy wrote:thanks once again mate. this seems to be a pain for such a simple task. is there any way you can change the length of a midi note in the MPC in edit mode of some kind? say i have a 1 bar sequence and have one midi note from one of the pads 1 bar long?
Yes , go into step edit and change the last field of the line ( D: )
The value for a full bar is 384.
gowansy wrote:i really cant wait to get the time to have a proper mess about, but im at work. its disappointing to think that when a synth is hooked up to the mpc it cant record a simple task of holding a lengthened note in midi, without having some silly thing to do. my setup is just a mixing desk, mpc 60, s950 and mbase11, im gonna be adding a synth soon, i dont work ITB but it looks like i may have to incorporate that into my setup as the MPC 60 is starting to disappoint on bread and butter functions and i may have to start phasing it out but i just love the sound and drum sequencing too much 
The 60 has no problem holding long notes and a note can be any size up to the length of your sequence.
The only problem is if the synth your sequencing miss- uses the MIDI spec and uses cc64 for something other than the sustain pedal. (which is a different thing from the sustain section of your synths envelopes)
For example , the Moog Voyager uses cc64 to control release of the amp envelope.
This means when I hit stop on the MPC release gets set to 0.
I can get around the problem by inserting cc64 with the appropriate value at the start of a sequence but I tend to just sequence it from someting else.
This wprk around would also sort out the problem if your ever sequencing your mates synth again.
What was the synth you were having trouble with ?
I've used my MPC60 with various synths (and an S950) and the Voyager is the only one I've found so far that has a problem.
Something else to check if your on OS 3.1 is - in step edit options there is a field to change weather recorded notes will be the length of a step or as recorded.
Maybe you had it set to length of a step when working with your mates synth.