Akai Force Forum: Everything relating to the Akai Force, the new 64 pad, clip-based standalone sampler/groovebox from Akai. While not an MPC, it shares many similar software features to the MPC X/MPC Live including the same underlying code-base.
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By EnochLight Sun Apr 11, 2021 7:34 am
Allin wrote:It has only 2GB ram, it should have gotten 4GB ram. I run out of ram all the time which is pretty frustrating.


Would love to see/hear these projects that keep pushing your Force out of all ram. Are you trying to use your Force as an 8-track recorder? Can you share/post a video demonstrating your issues?
By ace_of_dub Tue Apr 20, 2021 2:45 am
Tronlady wrote:What seems to happen is when you utilize the undo feature, the undo's recordings still are stored in RAM until you save/close/reopen the project. I tend to use Undo a bit as its a fantastic feature, but this is what was causing my sessions to max out with less than 20 minutes of audio recorded.

This is brilliant info thanks! This makes me wonder about RETROSPECTIVE RECORD???. Is there any way to turn this off ? Surely this feature is overkill on a device like this with very limited RAM ??


Retrospective record is only for MIDI, not audio, so it shouldn't impact the RAM significantly.
By gab3s Wed Jul 21, 2021 1:41 am
emme ask you someting about the force?
i play DUB and hip hop, so i use 8 stems (already mastered) per song, 1 for drums, 1 for bass, 1 for keys... and i blend the original beat arrangement with moments of looping some section of the song so i can dub it or improvise an instrument or singing on top of it.
In ableton i can load the hole set, wich is 10, 12 songs with 8 channels and 7 to 10 scenes each in one project, and just press page down to change the song. Also the play scene button in ableton can change the BPM of the whole project, so when i page down and start a new song on the set, press the play button on scene 1 of song 2 it will be on the BPM of the song 2.
In FORCE i can perform like that or similar to that? How can we perform a set with different songs and different BPM's on the FORCE?
I don't mind if i have to open a different project for each song because of the RAM, but in a live performance the force can change between these projects fast?
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By EnochLight Thu Jul 22, 2021 6:11 pm
gab3s wrote:In FORCE i can perform like that or similar to that? How can we perform a set with different songs and different BPM's on the FORCE?
I don't mind if i have to open a different project for each song because of the RAM, but in a live performance the force can change between these projects fast?


Currently, you'd have to load it as another Project, because at the moment, the way Force currently handles it's 8 available stereo audio tracks are all buffered into RAM, and you can't load or record an audio take longer than 4 minutes and 59 seconds onto each track. It takes a few seconds to load a new Project, depending on its complexity.

But that's how Force works currently. In the future, this could change. ;) :nod:
By gab3s Thu Jul 22, 2021 7:34 pm
EnochLight wrote:
gab3s wrote:In FORCE i can perform like that or similar to that? How can we perform a set with different songs and different BPM's on the FORCE?
I don't mind if i have to open a different project for each song because of the RAM, but in a live performance the force can change between these projects fast?


Currently, you'd have to load it as another Project, because at the moment, the way Force currently handles it's 8 available stereo audio tracks are all buffered into RAM, and you can't load or record an audio take longer than 4 minutes and 59 seconds onto each track. It takes a few seconds to load a new Project, depending on its complexity.

But that's how Force works currently. In the future, this could change. ;) :nod:



so if i wanna play a beat that's 8min long it won't play??
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By EnochLight Thu Jul 22, 2021 8:39 pm
gab3s wrote:so if i wanna play a beat that's 8min long it won't play??


Currently, each of the 8 audio tracks are capped at 4 minutes and 59 second recordings each, because if you populated all 8 audio tracks with 4 minutes and 59 second recordings (these are upsampled to 32-bit in Force at 44.1 Khz), those would occupy almost 40 minutes of stereo audio in RAM - which is almost 846 MB of the available RAM (which, newsflash - there is *NOT* 2 GB of RAM available as the OS itself occupies some of that).

Akai is trying to maintain a balance so there is enough RAM to run not only 8 stereo audio tracks (buffered into RAM), but also any Keygroups, Drum Programs, and plugins you may be running at the same time, plus allow the ability to sample as long as 20 minutes. All of this occupies RAM, which is why so many wish that disc-streaming was added.

Hopefully this will change in the near future. :nod:
By gab3s Thu Jul 22, 2021 9:24 pm
EnochLight wrote:
gab3s wrote:so if i wanna play a beat that's 8min long it won't play??


Currently, each of the 8 audio tracks are capped at 4 minutes and 59 second recordings each, because if you populated all 8 audio tracks with 4 minutes and 59 second recordings (these are upsampled to 32-bit in Force at 44.1 Khz), those would occupy almost 40 minutes of stereo audio in RAM - which is almost 846 MB of the available RAM (which, newsflash - there is *NOT* 2 GB of RAM available as the OS itself occupies some of that).

Akai is trying to maintain a balance so there is enough RAM to run not only 8 stereo audio tracks (buffered into RAM), but also any Keygroups, Drum Programs, and plugins you may be running at the same time, plus allow the ability to sample as long as 20 minutes. All of this occupies RAM, which is why so many wish that disc-streaming was added.

Hopefully this will change in the near future. :nod:


now i got it
thank you so much!!
i just bought mine today, waiting for it to arrive
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By EnochLight Mon Jul 26, 2021 8:57 pm
gab3s wrote:now i got it
thank you so much!!
i just bought mine today, waiting for it to arrive


Nice, congrats! You made the right choice - Force is incredible!
By prole Fri Aug 06, 2021 1:56 am
Hello All,

I recently purchased a Force after many years of dabbling with DAWs, mostly Ableton, and although I was very much inspired by the logical workflow and access to seemingly unlimited sounds and tools, ultimately was never able to feel comfortable interfacing with a computer. For some reason or another the software was never quite stable or the hardware interface never was as seamless as promised and my interest in making music waned as I spent more time time scouring forums for answers to problems related to the DAW, or computer itself. I realize the Force is another form of the same paradigm of software/hardware integration but I had read encouraging news of its continual development since being released and so I finally took the plunge as I assumed it was mostly a mature standalone product by this point.

I have since discovered this forum and thread specifically bemoaning the paltry audio recording time available and my heart sank upon reading some user’s experience with running out of memory within such a short amount of audio recording time. I have also seen some hints that an impending software update might ameliorate what would seem to be a very severe shortcoming in the design of what seems to be an otherwise very inspiring tool for making music.

Perhaps those who have enough experience could tell me if I made the correct decision in purchasing this machine if I describe how I’d like to use it. Very simply, my intention is to use the 8 audio tracks as I would with Ableton, filling up the available grid with 1-4 bar clips of a repetitive nature so that I might create an arrangement that would be groove-oriented in nature but not static. I would likely want to create as many clips as possible so that I could keep things evolving. My inspiration mostly comes from the Eno/Byrne collaboration of “Remain in Light” and “Bush of Ghosts”. I would then like to augment the arrangement with sampled acoustic instruments that seem to be widely available for MPCs. Am I correct in assuming clips derived from those sampled instruments don’t tax the available recording memory as would recorded audio?

I have yet to break open the manual as it is a few hundred pages long and before I make any further commitment to the Force would like to be confident that I have not set myself up for disappointment in its audio recording capabilities. I also see the manual has been updated with every major software update so I am more or less holding my breath waiting for the next update to allay my fears and dive into the updated manual.

Any advice from experienced users would be very much appreciated, thank you.
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By NearTao Fri Aug 06, 2021 1:50 pm
If you are working in clips/loops, the memory is likely to be more than enough for you. The Force workflow is absolutely geared towards the core Ableton/MPC style of making repetitive content/repeating content out of sparse sample sets. So if you're thinking about arranger view in Ableton... you're rewarded in the Force for making smart use of a loop, changing up automation, switching to a new loop, etc... I would say this is all standard operating behavior.

Where the memory constraints come in, is one, there is a hard limit on the Audio Track... so you can only record up to 4m 59s of continuous audio into an audio track. After that you need to work out ways to trigger another audio track. So for example, if you were recording a vocal track into the Force, you can do it is one long audio track, the Force will let you do this. On the other hand, there's probably a lot of dead air, repeated vocals, etc... that again... the Force will reward you for, as much as possible, turning this into loops or chopping down to take out duplicate information and free up memory.

The second constraint is just how much recorded material the Force can have in memory, if I recall, it's around about 60 minutes of stereo content total. If you're trying to use the Force as an 8 track recorder, well you're going to run out of memory in about 7.5 minutes (but you're hitting the 4m 59s limit first)... but that's not usually the best use of your memory on the Force.

On the Force, if you're working with clips/loops like you would in Ableton, that are 1-4 bars in length, you can literally load 100's of clips, and you can record off tons of 4 bar content on the Force very quickly as well.

So I suspect a lot of the memory concerns/constraints people are hitting are using the Force to do something that it can technically do, but it's not really designed to do (at least at this time). And honestly, not being able to use it as a full multi track recorder is a bummer, and there's certainly suggestion in marketing material that it can operate this way or will be able to operate in this way "in the future".
By prole Fri Aug 06, 2021 2:56 pm
Thank you for that very helpful, and encouraging information. I think I will be able to be productive within those time/memory constraints. I will buy a ream of paper and print out the manual, can’t read text on a computer screen for very long these days…

If there is a supplemental guide along the lines of the MPC bible or particularly well organized online tutors I’d be obliged if anyone has a recommendation.

Thanks for the support!
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By Koekepan Fri Aug 06, 2021 4:24 pm
I would also add that you really save memory when you can do things in MIDI format. For example, if you can have a drumkit that lays down a groove (something that the Force is very good at, by the way) then do it. Basslines, too. Cheap and easy!

If you have an external synth that's part of your rig, such as a KORG Kross, things just get better because you can jam on the KORG's keys, send audio back through the Force as well as using the KORG as a MIDI controller, you can get all the voices of the KORG under the Force's control - things just get way better.

The Force with a MIDI hub and an army of synths behind it is a monster.
By prole Fri Aug 06, 2021 11:30 pm
Thank you for that conservative strategy as well. I am mostly interested in recording my guitar,bass, and various percussion instruments although look forward to recording clips of sampled instruments I envision uploading to a storage device connected to the Force, I assume those will be midi clips… Am about to print out the manual.

Btw, is there a consensus on what would be the preferred storage device to hold samples and to record to? Perhaps USB stick for one and HDD for the other?