The official AKAI S series thread

for programability and sound, the 3000xl/3200 is very good.
apparently, the sound of the s3000/3200 is meant to be superior to the s5000/6000.

for moving files between between your sampler and computer - the 5000/6000 comes with usb, right? the s300xl is scci or floppy. it also has digital i/o.
i know nothng about the z8.

have you seen the youtube footage of this guy who has sampled a b3 on an E-MU ESI4000?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkfUgyLt7Jg

jazzroom wrote:....
need to be able to program or load Rhodes patches with multiple velocity switching samples for realistic rhodes sound...
Cannot decide between S5000/6000 or Z8 or even S3000/S3200 ....

witch one is the best allrounder in terms of programability / fx, sound, exchange with Mac/PC files ?

beach_break wrote:for programability and sound, the 3000xl/3200 is very good.
apparently, the sound of the s3000/3200 is meant to be superior to the s5000/6000.

for moving files between between your sampler and computer - the 5000/6000 comes with usb, right? the s300xl is scci or floppy. it also has digital i/o.
i know nothng about the z8.

have you seen the youtube footage of this guy who has sampled a b3 on an E-MU ESI4000?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zkfUgyLt7Jg

jazzroom wrote:....
need to be able to program or load Rhodes patches with multiple velocity switching samples for realistic rhodes sound...
Cannot decide between S5000/6000 or Z8 or even S3000/S3200 ....

witch one is the best allrounder in terms of programability / fx, sound, exchange with Mac/PC files ?

thanks for your reply, ( nice video BTW - would AKAI sampler able to do the same?)

got a chance to buy a S6000 with USB and ADAT board fitted for 300euros + 4- euro shipping...
looks like a good deal, what do you think?
but i am still undecided where i should get it or keep looking for Z8 ( smaller box + all the Qlink dials.. but don't know about its sound)

For your needs I would personally go with a Z8 or a S6000/5000, the Z8's internal library is quite good..there is even a multi-sampled piano weighing in a 250MB on the hard drive! and can take up to 512mb of ram.

The 3000/3200XL in no way sounds better than a 5000 sorry, even when people say oh yea the 3k is more hip hop I tend to disagree...the S-3000 sounds muffled in comparison to the 5000...the SP-1200 is raw and gritty but don't sound muffled..don't get lo-fi good sound mixed up with ish sound lol
The S-1000 and S1100 sound more like the 5000..i.e. just really nice

Haven't seen the video but Akai's can do 4 way velocity switching, cross fading between key groups and so on.
On the older 3x series though cut that in half if you want to use stereo samples; Basically each keygrop can play 4 samples at one time that can be velocity switched..think of that as your oscillators but as samples for waves, stereo samples you obviously use two OSC's and pan then hard left and right..I can't remember how the 5k treats samples but I think it's more like a MPC-2000XL where a stereo sample is treated as one sound instead of two.

vinyl_junkie_1620 wrote:For your needs I would personally go with a Z8 or a S6000/5000, the Z8's internal library is quite good..there is even a multi-sampled piano weighing in a 250MB on the hard drive! and can take up to 512mb of ram.

The 3000/3200XL in no way sounds better than a 5000 sorry, even when people say oh yea the 3k is more hip hop I tend to disagree...the S-3000 sounds muffled in comparison to the 5000...the SP-1200 is raw and gritty but don't sound muffled..don't get lo-fi good sound mixed up with ish sound lol
The S-1000 and S1100 sound more like the 5000..i.e. just really nice

Z8 is kindah hard to find these days... how is its sound and any other extras versus S5000/6000?
but i just found a S6000+USB for 300eur... thinking of buying it .. but have doubts
as its mega huge in size - scary looking box

Never used a Z8 so can't comment, my friend had one but I never used it. Z4 is pretty much the same thing though..they pop up on ebay here and sell for not a lot as they don't seem to be the "desirable" model that's in fashion now...much like you can pick up a S-5000 for less than a S-3000XL or S-1000!

Sound wise I guess it would be the same/similar to a MPC-4000 as they both use the same sampling engine

vinyl_junkie_1620 wrote:Never used a Z8 so can't comment, my friend had one but I never used it. Z4 is pretty much the same thing though..they pop up on ebay here and sell for not a lot as they don't seem to be the "desirable" model that's in fashion now...much like you can pick up a S-5000 for less than a S-3000XL or S-1000!

Sound wise I guess it would be the same/similar to a MPC-4000 as they both use the same sampling engine

i never used MPC4000 so no idea of its sound ...
but i've got MPC1000 and its sound isnt that good at all
compared to my MPC3000 ...
i hope Z8 doesnt sound like MPC1000 ?

my 5000 finally showed up after 3 day delay! very clean,sounds great,I love the speed of this machine,can't wait to learn and get comfy with it.

jazzroom wrote:

vinyl_junkie_1620 wrote:Never used a Z8 so can't comment, my friend had one but I never used it. Z4 is pretty much the same thing though..they pop up on ebay here and sell for not a lot as they don't seem to be the "desirable" model that's in fashion now...much like you can pick up a S-5000 for less than a S-3000XL or S-1000!

Sound wise I guess it would be the same/similar to a MPC-4000 as they both use the same sampling engine

i never used MPC4000 so no idea of its sound ...
but i've got MPC1000 and its sound isnt that good at all
compared to my MPC3000 ...
i hope Z8 doesnt sound like MPC1000 ?

anyone could comment on S3000/32000 vs S5000/6000 vs Z4/8 sound and workflow ?

z8= best work flow and sound hands down.


I have owned them all

Lord Toranaga wrote:z8= best work flow and sound hands down.


I have owned them all

could u please please be more specific about Z8 sound and workflow versus S5000/6000?

i just got a S5000(USB/128MB/Hard Disk/ No FX card installed) in for a test drive

and love the vibe of it already only the buttons around the screen are bit flimsy and stuck sometimes ( maybe from years of no use?)
the interface is busy and awkward , feels hard to get to the functions u need fast compared to my
MPC3000 or S950 ...... need to rumn more tests though....

so far S5000 sound is great it's even has a resample function that i get the 12 or even 8 bit sound with a variable sampling rate - incredible!

but need to make a purchase decision between S5000 or S6000 or Z8 .....

jazzroom wrote:

Lord Toranaga wrote:z8= best work flow and sound hands down.


I have owned them all

could u please please be more specific about Z8 sound and workflow versus S5000/6000?

i just got a S5000(USB/128MB/Hard Disk/ No FX card installed) in for a test drive

and love the vibe of it already only the buttons around the screen are bit flimsy and stuck sometimes ( maybe from years of no use?)
the interface is busy and awkward , feels hard to get to the functions u need fast compared to my
MPC3000 or S950 ...... need to rumn more tests though....

so far S5000 sound is great it's even has a resample function that i get the 12 or even 8 bit sound with a variable sampling rate - incredible!

but need to make a purchase decision between S5000 or S6000 or Z8 .....

well the s5000/s6000 can take a good chunk of ram... plus the 6000 has that face plate that you can put on your lap for making beats in bed which is slick...

I think maybe you should figure out what you plan on using it for... cause that z8 can take a 512 and I'm guessing it would be king for keyboard type patches especially with that 24bit... you can transfer some kontakt patches onto that SOB if you wanted to which would be very bad ass IMO. plus you got a 3k also? that would be pretty sweet I think.

mr_debauch wrote:

jazzroom wrote:

Lord Toranaga wrote:z8= best work flow and sound hands down.


I have owned them all

could u please please be more specific about Z8 sound and workflow versus S5000/6000?

i just got a S5000(USB/128MB/Hard Disk/ No FX card installed) in for a test drive

and love the vibe of it already only the buttons around the screen are bit flimsy and stuck sometimes ( maybe from years of no use?)
the interface is busy and awkward , feels hard to get to the functions u need fast compared to my
MPC3000 or S950 ...... need to rumn more tests though....

so far S5000 sound is great it's even has a resample function that i get the 12 or even 8 bit sound with a variable sampling rate - incredible!

but need to make a purchase decision between S5000 or S6000 or Z8 .....

well the s5000/s6000 can take a good chunk of ram... plus the 6000 has that face plate that you can put on your lap for making beats in bed which is slick...

I think maybe you should figure out what you plan on using it for... cause that z8 can take a 512 and I'm guessing it would be king for keyboard type patches especially with that 24bit... you can transfer some kontakt patches onto that SOB if you wanted to which would be very bad ass IMO. plus you got a 3k also? that would be pretty sweet I think.

Z8 for sale is tough to find these days, but there are still lots of S5000/6000 floatin' around..
and i am playing with one now ---- just loaded some rhodes, bass, synth , strings AKAI patches into it
--- > sounds great with MPC3000 ,
only notice that with 64 voices max i ran out of voices already on the 4th track..... means i willl need to buy voice expander card makes it max 128 voices ...
and that S5000 , i've been testing, doesn't have EB20 FX board installed - so no FX at all ....


All those options are already in Z8 i guess , but does it resample to 12/8 bits as well as S5000/6000 ,
and is it easier to navigate/operate Z8 menus than on S5000/6000 ---just wondering ?

AKAI S5000 test drive:

Have S5000 for couple of days - testing

just discovered that in the
sample EQ section there is no way of pre listening the EQ-ing
before rendering sample to a new file - so its just aditing by numbers???

So the EQ's edits are actually distructive while logically it should be non-distructive?

is it the same for S3000 series?
that is a limitation .....

has EQ ing, Filtering and FX it improved on Z4/8 ?

I always hated that about AKAI samplers,why they did digital EQ's.I beleive all their rack sampler's are like that.the z series might be different,just google it and find out.