Some questions about reducing loading times.

I`m still considering buying the Akai key 61 for live use. I`m aware of the potential loading time problem with more complex layered sample patches. I have a few questions I was hoping to get answered.

1) Normally a “sample purge” feature means that samples do not get deleted from the system. Though in the manual they are talking about deleting samples. I was hoping if I set a small range to a multi sampled instrument and purge it, the samples that I don’t use will be off-loaded from that patch. This way the loading times would be reduced and you keep the unused samples for use in another project. Is this the case?

2) If I have midi files with classic keyboard Rhythm drum patterns (intro/verse1/fills etc), can I trigger them with the pads and be played by a sampled drumkit at the same time? Or do I must use audio loops to do this? This also would lower ram usage/loading time. Can you trigger one shot drum samples with a midi file?

3) I read that an external SSD can only go as fast as usb3 speeds. Is that true? Does SSD speed matter much in loading speed?

4) You have any other suggestion lowering loading speeds?

Thanks in advance! Tim

disk speed is almost irrelevant when dealing with sample-heavy kits and instruments, as the bottleneck is the MPC browser itself, it is very sluggish. The main solution to speedy loading is to reduce the number of samples in a program. A 100MB instrument made from 100 samples will take 10+ times longer to load than a 100MB instrument made from a single sample.

Sample chains are the way forward, I use them in many of my commercial multisampled libraries. https://www.mpc-samples.com/article/sam ... -explained

[quote="MPC-Tutor"]disk speed is almost irrelevant when dealing with sample-heavy kits and instruments, as the bottleneck is the MPC browser itself, it is very sluggish. The main solution to speedy loading is to reduce the number of samples in a program. A 100MB instrument made from 100 samples will take 10+ times longer to load than a 100MB instrument made from a single sample.

If I convert SFZ multisample files into Akai keygroup files, the Akai will probably see it as all separate samples right? i normally use Samplerobot to make multisamples, because it's just the best and fastest way. It cannot handle this chain method you referring too.

Sample robot will use lots of individual samples, as per the original SFZ, so it may be fast at creating MPC keygroups, but it's not the best in terms of loading performance.

MPC-Tutor wrote:Sample robot will use lots of individual samples, as per the original SFZ, so it may be fast at creating MPC keygroups, but it's not the best in terms of loading performance.

Thank you for the replies!

MPC-Tutor wrote:Sample chains are the way forward, I use them in many of my commercial multisampled libraries

I wish the onboard multisampler did that ! Would there be a technical reason it doesn't - or has Akai just not bothered yet ?

I suppose you have tooling to convert from individual samples to sample chains - but I suppose those are among the trade secrets that give you competitive advantage...

This leaves the question about the "purge" feature. This could potentially cut loading times in half.. The manual does not make it clear for me and i don't have the key61 here to check it.

Yeah Akai could have destroyed the mid tier synth workstation competition. Unfortunately it's downside is to big to ignore.

Yes purging will remove any unassigned samples from your active project (I. e from the current contents of ram), so your project will load faster and use less memory. If those samples were saved in the project previously then they will remain within the project folder on your disk, they just will no longer get loaded into memory when you load the project

MPC-Tutor wrote:Yes purging will remove any unassigned samples from your active project (I. e from the current contents of ram), so your project will load faster and use less memory. If those samples were saved in the project previously then they will remain within the project folder on your disk, they just will no longer get loaded into memory when you load the project

Perfect, just what i wanted to know! Thanks

Ow, and this question:

2) If I have midi files with classic keyboard Rhythm drum patterns (intro/verse1/fills etc), can I trigger them with the pads and be played by a sampled drumkit at the same time? Or do I must use audio loops to do this? This also would lower ram usage/loading time. Can you trigger one shot drum samples with a midi file and use pads to switch midi events?

Oggfish wrote:
2) If I have midi files with classic keyboard Rhythm drum patterns (intro/verse1/fills etc), can I trigger them with the pads and be played by a sampled drumkit at the same time? Or do I must use audio loops to do this? This also would lower ram usage/loading time. Can you trigger one shot drum samples with a midi file?

MPC cannot trigger MIDI sequences from pads. You need to sample the phrases.

The force can trigger MIDI clips, mpc cannot