Feels like the MPC's are the Force's underdogs.

How much was an accessory for a legacy MPC ?
FX modules
Extra outputs
More RAM


If you’ve been in this game long enough, you are familiar with brands requiring u to buy BS accessories. AKAI clearly wants us to purchase both of these units. At $2k USD for an MPC & A FORCE, I say thats cheap relative to past “hustles.”

OR
You can just settle with the limitations of 1 of these machines.
I want a FORCE & can afford but I know the MPC is 80% of what I need/want. What I don’t care for is bugs/crashes that AKAI needs to smooth out.

Limitations  creativity

zangetsu01 wrote:

Fess wrote:They compliment each other. The Force is effectively now a multi-track recorder and what better instrument to pair it with than an MPC- especially an X. Possibilities almost become endless as far as sampling and song making go.

That's not the point here.. (No offence) But one machine MPC or Force is capable of doing both.
I've got the Force firmware loaded on my MPC-X and it it runs smooth.

Only problem is that the MPC's don't have all the buttons needed to interact with with the software.
Akai could easily fix this.

But all we actually need is the mixer and the arranger from the Force.

Even tough I've got the money for it I still can't justify buying 2 devices that (with a little bit extra effort from Akai) could do the same thing.

I don't want to see new features in the next update, I just want the MPC's to catch up to the Force:

1) Arranger;
2) Mixer;
3) Disc streaming.

Just let the Force distinguish itself with the clip launching stuff.

Well, I know what you want but Akai doesn't make things just for you- no offense.

Every company wants to sell as many products as possible- Akai is no different.

Putting the strongest features in both devices would be an absolutely stupid business move.

The devices are getting the separation they need to be useful individually or collectively.

It's good business to keep them separate.

Having an X and a Force opens up many more possibilities when making songs- the connectivity options alone are vast when combining the two and the creative possibilities are massive pairing them up.

Expect to see functions on the MPC's next update that won't be on the Force.

Nah.. We shouldn’t settle for this, What happened to all the cats that used to raise noise about these shortcomings? What happened to those MPC wariors that wanted to spend their precious time and creativity coocking up some cool beats instead of looking for alternatives and workarounds??

I know how business works and that’s the main reason (apart from wanting to enjoy my X) I’m making this noise.

Nothing’s gonna change if we just sit back and accept being played into Larry’s game.

We need those guys wearing those three-piece suits at Akai headquarters to skip the caviar for a minute and stop playing games with us and barge into the software develpment room and round those floor managers up to tell those devs to get it done!

You know what, skip that. Where is Larry? Can someone please get Larry the lead software engineer in here?

Rookie intern: Sir, Larry is bussy with his team trying to enhance the Splice experience for the MPC users base.

Akai boss wearing the fanciest three-pieced suit: Go and get Larry and his team now!

5 minutes later: Larry and his team walk into the board room.. Y-Y-Y-Y-Yes, sir you’ve called?

Akai boss wearing the fanciest three-pieced suit slams his hand on the flip board erasing half of the splice roadmap integration plans.

Akai Boss:

Larry, the MPC community have spoken, as a matter of fact they’ve been asking about this stuff for years and they say that they don’t want splice services or ableton link intergraded into their MPC’s, as a matter of fact they want the arranger, they want a modern style mixer, they want disk streaming, they wan’t to be able to rearange the track order because they love to keep things in order Larry.

That means that the piano keygroup track that they came up with today, they want be able to place it next to track 4, that’s the piano keygroup track they layed down last month. They don’t want it at track 24!

Why aren’t you listening to them?? Am I not paying you enough Larry?? And why the h3ll are you guys standing in here smelling like nail polish?? What the h3ll is happening down there Larry??

Listen, Last monday we dropped 3.1.0 for the Force community. All packed up with all kinds of bells, whistles and Mojo. You know Larry, I love checking the boards over at MPC-forums.com from time to time, it’s great website visited by the majority of our MPC users base. (You should check in sometimes Larry for learning purposes). But today Larry, I’ve stumbled across this post of one of our loyal customers named Zangetsu01 saying that: “it feels like the MPC’s are the Force’s little b!tches”

What the fu€#% Larry? I almost chocked while I was reading that sh!t and trying to swallow some European flatt oyster at the dinner table. Are you trying to k!ll our business here?

I mean the automation of the submix and master busses, why the h3ll did you put it in the Force first? Are you trying to piss them off?? Didn’t you know that they’re the ones that asked for it first?

This is 2021, So why is it impossible for them to freeze tracks in controller mode so they can free up some ram and ease the stress on their CPU’s?

When they feel like tweaking the track some more they need to be able to unfreeze those tracks so they can tweak away until they’re satisfied!

Listen team..!! From now on this the new roadmap it’s very simple but still I want you to take notes and make sure to even get it straight even when I call you up in the middle of the night:

1) First we fix those bugs;
2) Than we implement basic functionality like the arranger and the new mixer;
3) And lastly we try to trow in some small fry like splice.

Are you still listening Larry?

Larry: Sir!! Yes Sir..!! Splice..!!

Akai boss: No, Focus Larry..!! Focus..!!

Larry: Sir..!!

Akai boss: Let me continue:

4) Guy’s Top it off with some Mojo and hand it over to the beta testers.

5) After 2 months of beta testing take 3 weeks to a month to fix stuff based on their feedback and show the Beta testers some appreciation by telling them that the bounce to sample feature has been fixed after all these years and finally bounces their samples to 24 bit instead of 16 when needed.

Okay enough of me joking around but these are modern times folks, people don’t want to buy 4 raggend pieces of socks just to make it a pair.

*Btw, Larry is just an fictional character that I came up with. So no Disrespect to anyone with a similar name intended*.

zangetsu01 wrote:

Fess wrote:They compliment each other. The Force is effectively now a multi-track recorder and what better instrument to pair it with than an MPC- especially an X. Possibilities almost become endless as far as sampling and song making go.

That's not the point here.. (No offence) But one machine MPC or Force is capable of doing both.
I've got the Force firmware loaded on my MPC-X and it it runs smooth.

Only problem is that the MPC's don't have all the buttons needed to interact with with the software.
Akai could easily fix this.

But all we actually need is the mixer and the arranger from the Force.

Even tough I've got the money for it I still can't justify buying 2 devices that (with a little bit extra effort from Akai) could do the same thing.

I don't want to see new features in the next update, I just want the MPC's to catch up to the Force:

1) Arranger;
2) Mixer;
3) Disc streaming.

Just let the Force distinguish itself with the clip launching stuff.

Mixer and Disc Streaming are definitely needed in the MPC Firmware. Do you think it would be difficult to implement changing meter or different time signatures on the Force? I wonder because anything out of 4/4 time would probably destroy the clip launching (or at least make it difficult to work with) That's one of the main reasons I think the Force Firmware is different from the MPC and has to be.

zangetsu01 wrote:Nah.. We shouldn’t settle for this, What happened to all the cats that used to raise noise about these shortcomings? What happened to those MPC wariors that wanted to spend their precious time and creativity coocking up some cool beats instead of looking for alternatives and workarounds??

I know how business works and that’s the main reason (apart from wanting to enjoy my X) I’m making this noise.

Nothing’s gonna change if we just sit back and accept being played into Larry’s game.

We need those guys wearing those three-piece suits at Akai headquarters to skip the caviar for a minute and stop playing games with us and barge into the software develpment room and round those floor managers up to tell those devs to get it done!

You know what, skip that. Where is Larry? Can someone please get Larry the lead software engineer in here?

Rookie intern: Sir, Larry is bussy with his team trying to enhance the Splice experience for the MPC users base.

Akai boss wearing the fanciest three-pieced suit: Go and get Larry and his team now!

5 minutes later: Larry and his team walk into the board room.. Y-Y-Y-Y-Yes, sir you’ve called?

Akai boss wearing the fanciest three-pieced suit slams his hand on the flip board erasing half of the splice roadmap integration plans.

Akai Boss:

Larry, the MPC community have spoken, as a matter of fact they’ve been asking about this stuff for years and they say that they don’t want splice services or ableton link intergraded into their MPC’s, as a matter of fact they want the arranger, they want a modern style mixer, they want disk streaming, they wan’t to be able to rearange the track order because they love to keep things in order Larry.

That means that the piano keygroup track that they came up with today, they want be able to place it next to track 4, that’s the piano keygroup track they layed down last month. They don’t want it at track 24!

Why aren’t you listening to them?? Am I not paying you enough Larry?? And why the h3ll are you guys standing in here smelling like nail polish?? What the h3ll is happening down there Larry??

Listen, Last monday we dropped 3.1.0 for the Force community. All packed up with all kinds of bells, whistles and Mojo. You know Larry, I love checking the boards over at MPC-forums.com from time to time, it’s great website visited by the majority of our MPC users base. (You should check in sometimes Larry for learning purposes). But today Larry, I’ve stumbled across this post of one of our loyal customers named Zangetsu01 saying that: “it feels like the MPC’s are the Force’s little b!tches”

What the fu€#% Larry? I almost chocked while I was reading that sh!t and trying to swallow some European flatt oyster at the dinner table. Are you trying to k!ll our business here?

I mean the automation of the submix and master busses, why the h3ll did you put it in the Force first? Are you trying to piss them off?? Didn’t you know that they’re the ones that asked for it first?

This is 2021, So why is it impossible for them to freeze tracks in controller mode so they can free up some ram and ease the stress on their CPU’s?

When they feel like tweaking the track some more they need to be able to unfreeze those tracks so they can tweak away until they’re satisfied!

Listen team..!! From now on this the new roadmap it’s very simple but still I want you to take notes and make sure to even get it straight even when I call you up in the middle of the night:

1) First we fix those bugs;
2) Than we implement basic functionality like the arranger and the new mixer;
3) And lastly we try to trow in some small fry like splice.

Are you still listening Larry?

Larry: Sir!! Yes Sir..!! Splice..!!

Akai boss: No, Focus Larry..!! Focus..!!

Larry: Sir..!!

Akai boss: Let me continue:

4) Guy’s Top it off with some Mojo and hand it over to the beta testers.

5) After 2 months of beta testing take 3 weeks to a month to fix stuff based on their feedback and show the Beta testers some appreciation by telling them that the bounce to sample feature has been fixed after all these years and finally bounces their samples to 24 bit instead of 16 when needed.

Okay enough of me joking around but these are modern times folks, people don’t want to buy 4 raggend pieces of socks just to make it a pair.

*Btw, Larry is just an fictional character that I came up with. So no Disrespect to anyone with a similar name intended*.

Keep dreaming lol. Btw I'm doing fine with my MPC as it is.

64hz wrote:
Keep dreaming lol. Btw I'm doing fine with my MPC as it is.

Than this tread clearly isn’t meant for you, surely you can have your own opinion but you’re wasting your time here.

When I check this tread, this forum, Facebook or YouTube these are the main features people care about nowadays and the list would have been longer if we kept silent for the past years.

I’ll keep dreaming because I’ve got a goal here. When these features finally arrive it won’t be because you helped us getting them.

Cause your MPC is fine the way it is.

What we are doing here is the same thing we did when we helped ‘your’ MPC to get:

1) Side chaining;
2) Copy and paste in the Grid Editor;
3) Automation lanes on the touchscreen;
4) Hype Synth, drum synth and bass synth;
5) More editing capabilities for audio tracks;
6) etc.

But your MPC probably would’ve been just fine without these features..

KaoticShock wrote:

Mixer and Disc Streaming are definitely needed in the MPC Firmware. Do you think it would be difficult to implement changing meter or different time signatures on the Force? I wonder because anything out of 4/4 time would probably destroy the clip launching (or at least make it difficult to work with) That's one of the main reasons I think the Force Firmware is different from the MPC and has to be.

I think they should turn it around and implement these features in the MPC software so it won't cause any problems with the time signatures.

If complaining helps, iguess i should give it a go. Got the live 2 in april this year, was hoping to see an arranger function on this device. in fact I refresh the akai website several times a day.

sure.... I also get by with the live, by writing in loops as manny of you do.
the issue here tho, is that for example a vocal track, does not start at the same time as midi sequenses!
and why bother settle, with some lessthan half decent "workarond", when you can just connect the MPC to your DAW and drag the audiotrack, and arrange your song like any normal human would do.
lack of arranger makes the mpc NOT standalone.

Akai, please start to function properly!!
-Please!
If you give us arranger i will never ever ask for anything ever again!!

Go use a pc then! lol the mpc is very much stand alone, it's like you and many others don't want to put in any work toward making a song.

If you want your favorite daw, go use your favorite daw and just capture the MPC to it if you feel its a better instrument than a work-station. There's nothing wrong with how the mpc works thats why theres been a zillion and a half beats produced with it as the main device.

If you dont like the workflow, its not the mpc that is wrong, its you not wanting to use it in the manner it was designed.

People usually want features they know from other equipment or software. If these complainers wouldn‘t know those, they wouldn‘t miss them.

It‘s okay to ask for features, but complaining will only help you blowing off steam, especially when not sending constructive feedback to Akai themselves but on a third-party-service forum. A vacuum cleaner won‘t do your dishes, and telling your neighbours about it won‘t change a thing.

I myself am sick of it. I can understand all your frustration, but the MPC isn‘t an „eierlegende Wollmichsau“ or jack-of-all-trades.

This is where folks need to learn about the words 'sacrifice' and 'compromise' you should already be familiar with. The MPC is not some grand 6 core Intel or AMD beast inside. Its a **** shite Linux mobile SoC with 2GB of RAM. If you want an all powerful DAW style sequencer go use your damn computer or get a laptop and go use the MPC software. I still dont understand why folks bought a $1200 sequencer/sampler and then spend all their time complaining about it. All that time wasted could be spent actually learning how to use it and putting in some actual work and getting creative to get your shit done, just like every other generation of MPC user before did.

Sorry folks, nobody was tracking vocals on the MPC 60/3000/2000/4000, and you're going to tell me nobody was able to make songs with those or what?

zangetsu01 wrote:

64hz wrote:
Keep dreaming lol. Btw I'm doing fine with my MPC as it is.

Than this tread clearly isn’t meant for you, surely you can have your own opinion but you’re wasting your time here.

When I check this tread, this forum, Facebook or YouTube these are the main features people care about nowadays and the list would have been longer if we kept silent for the past years.

I’ll keep dreaming because I’ve got a goal here. When these features finally arrive it won’t be because you helped us getting them.

Cause your MPC is fine the way it is.

What we are doing here is the same thing we did when we helped ‘your’ MPC to get:

1) Side chaining;
2) Copy and paste in the Grid Editor;
3) Automation lanes on the touchscreen;
4) Hype Synth, drum synth and bass synth;
5) More editing capabilities for audio tracks;
6) etc.

But your MPC probably would’ve been just fine without these features..

Im perfectly fine arranging complete songs with vocals on my MPC as is. It's a lot easier then it used to be where I used to have at least 3 different machines to accomplish the same goal.

The arranger will come, no doubt about it, but I highly doubt a post on MPC forums is gonna make the difference. That's what I mean with keep dreaming. No Inmusic CEO is gonna visit this board for ideas. There all in it to make money and I'm betting the force is making them money for all the differences it has over an MPC.

Than this tread clearly isn’t meant for you, surely you can have your own opinion but you’re wasting your time here.

When I check this tread, this forum, Facebook or YouTube these are the main features people care about nowadays and the list would have been longer if we kept silent for the past years.

I’ll keep dreaming because I’ve got a goal here. When these features finally arrive it won’t be because you helped us getting them.

Cause your MPC is fine the way it is.

What we are doing here is the same thing we did when we helped ‘your’ MPC to get:

1) Side chaining;
2) Copy and paste in the Grid Editor;
3) Automation lanes on the touchscreen;
4) Hype Synth, drum synth and bass synth;
5) More editing capabilities for audio tracks;
6) etc.

But your MPC probably would’ve been just fine without these features..[/quote]

Im perfectly fine arranging complete songs with vocals on my MPC as is. It's a lot easier then it used to be where I used to have at least 3 different machines to accomplish the same goal.

The arranger will come, no doubt about it, but I highly doubt a post on MPC forums is gonna make the difference. That's what I mean with keep dreaming. No Inmusic CEO is gonna visit this board for ideas. There all in it to make money and I'm betting the force is making them money for all the differences it has over an MPC.[/quote]

You are correct that Jack O'Donnell and Andy Mack aren't going to be skimming the forums, but Dan Gill used to be active on gearspace and Nick Trickakis used to give user feedback to Akai about the Force when he worked for them. I understand and agree that our posts might not make a difference, but there's no problem expressing our opinions and discussing improvements.

Also, there are plenty of other music production devices (Roland MC-101, Elektron Analog Rytm and Octatrack, and plenty of other synths) that recive Firmware updates based on user feedback.

I know it's a stretch, but compare the MPC to the Toraiz SP-16. The Toraiz launched earlier, dropped significantly in price, and still doesn't have the user or community support of the New Generation of MPCs. I think that there's nothing wrong with using the MPC in the classic way without needing any features, but there's always room for improvement, and while we don't know if InMusic is paying attention, it never hurts to try. Thanks for the interesting perspectives and discussion!


(Still keeping fingers crossed for All the AIR plugins in Standalone mode)

Ultros wrote:Go use a pc then! lol the mpc is very much stand alone, it's like you and many others don't want to put in any work toward making a song.

If you want your favorite daw, go use your favorite daw and just capture the MPC to it if you feel its a better instrument than a work-station. There's nothing wrong with how the mpc works thats why theres been a zillion and a half beats produced with it as the main device.

If you dont like the workflow, its not the mpc that is wrong, its you not wanting to use it in the manner it was designed.

I already use my daw for arrangin and mastering, but please don't tell me what to do, its rude.

83dude wrote:People usually want features they know from other equipment or software. If these complainers wouldn‘t know those, they wouldn‘t miss them.

It‘s okay to ask for features, but complaining will only help you blowing off steam, especially when not sending constructive feedback to Akai themselves but on a third-party-service forum. A vacuum cleaner won‘t do your dishes, and telling your neighbours about it won‘t change a thing.

I myself am sick of it. I can understand all your frustration, but the MPC isn‘t an „eierlegende Wollmichsau“ or jack-of-all-trades.

if your sick of it? why would you bother to read this tread, and ontop of it comment on the "Complainers" post, i belive you are lying. or atleast seeking confirmation on youre "belifes" in a wierd way. to confirm you existence maybe.

Monotremata wrote:This is where folks need to learn about the words 'sacrifice' and 'compromise' you should already be familiar with. The MPC is not some grand 6 core Intel or AMD beast inside. Its a **** **** Linux mobile SoC with 2GB of RAM. If you want an all powerful DAW style sequencer go use your damn computer or get a laptop and go use the MPC software. I still dont understand why folks bought a $1200 sequencer/sampler and then spend all their time complaining about it. All that time wasted could be spent actually learning how to use it and putting in some actual work and getting creative to get your **** done, just like every other generation of MPC user before did.

Sorry folks, nobody was tracking vocals on the MPC 60/3000/2000/4000, and you're going to tell me nobody was able to make songs with those or what?

the force has the same specs as the mpc, it should be a realistic expectation, i am familliar with these words you are mentioning but i dont get your point.

i dont know what mpc users did on the previous mpcs. so i cannot say what everybody or nobody did on those.

and who is complaining ALL the time? me? the users in this forum? I agree complaining is a waste of time when you dont use the proper platforms. but is it really better to waisting time complaning about the complainers, or complaining about the mpc i general. atleast you wont offend anyone... no wait im wrong
it appears those complaints are offending AF in this tread.

you know what sickens me? people on the internet looking for reasons to be offended,

I only want arranger mode on the mpc live, why is that such a cruel ting to want?
and why do people get offended by this. i suggest that you ignore such comments in the future.
instead of raining on other people's sunshine.

Why is that people think that Akai is not reading this Forum? While 80% of their user base is on this forum.
I've seen it so many times that when Akai or their associates accidentally leak something and it's picked up on this forum it swiftly gets terminated.

Whether it's here, on GS or on FB.

Don't be fooled guys, Akai is on this forum and they are here in numbers. Might even be some of the nay-sayers..!!