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.
By Losangeles Thu Jan 20, 2022 1:49 pm
Hi everyone, I’ve recently become more interested in importing .als files to the Force for performance. I know the recent disk streaming update is meant to help with features such as this by reducing RAM limitations.

My main question surrounds how it’s implemented and how I can make use of it?

I’m interested in loading several Ableton Clips, packs, and grooves in session view slots, also many drum and instrument racks themselves, in turn? grouped in racks (for easy accessibility of a rack “instrument” within another rack, for organization). Would the instruments, key groups, clips, audio samples, audio loops, and such all stream from the disk such that I could load 3-4GB of content within a file and not have to worry about RAM consumption? I would like to load as much content as I can for a given performance so that I can simply load or access it from the hardware and not have to touch the mouse.

Are there any settings I have to manually configure after formatting and attaching a suitable SSD for any settings that may be related to such tasks?

Also, how does Live currently deal with synth instruments such as Operator in Ableton, contained in device racks and Live Clips, when the sets/files containing them are imported to Force?

Thanks!
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By MPC-Tutor Thu Jan 20, 2022 1:58 pm
Any sample that would normally be loaded into ram can be (manually and individually) selected to be streamed (via the 'Project' screen), although I believe only audio tracks can be streamed automatically by default. So it will take some effort to go through any check off each individual sample for streaming (there's no bulk selection option)

However, there will be CPU issues if you stream too many files (which is why Akai make it a PITA to stream many individual samples). For example, streaming samples in a keygroup program would likely begin to cause issues depending on how many samples are being triggered at any given moment. Basically we're not going to be doing away with RAM any time soon.
By Losangeles Thu Jan 20, 2022 4:08 pm
Ok, that helps, thank you! So, basically, if I’ll be dealing with large samples individually, or a large collection of small samples (making it considered “large” altogether), I may have some issues.

I take it Live sets have to be imported as a unit and Force can’t simply load Live clips or racks individually?

I guess I’m not really seeing the usefulness of disk streaming if everything still has to be ported through memory? Can you explain why everyone’s raving about this if you can’t load large files without RAM issues still? Is it just for those who want to steam DJ style sets that are premade as one long audio track, or at I missing something? If I load a 4GB ALS file onto my attached SSD, it won’t “stream” it directly from the disk? That’s hard to believe :shock:
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By MPC-Tutor Thu Jan 20, 2022 4:15 pm
You can stream long audio tracks without ever touching RAM, absolutely, that's really the main use for it. But streaming all the little samples in kits and instruments, while possible, is not going to give you the best performance.

But streaming a bunch of 3 minute WAV files direct from disk is definitely working fine and no RAM ever involved.
By misterflibble Sat Jan 22, 2022 10:01 pm
Losangeles wrote:I guess I’m not really seeing the usefulness of disk streaming if everything still has to be ported through memory?

Depending on how the feature was implemented, the Linux OS that runs the Force may be using something called a page cache that is a RAM layer on top of the file system, which acts as a buffer to give the drives a break when the same thing is being accessed over and over again. So technically even the disk streamed audio may be making its way through RAM from time to time.
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By EnochLight Sun Jan 23, 2022 7:37 am
Losangeles wrote:Ok, that helps, thank you! So, basically, if I’ll be dealing with large samples individually, or a large collection of small samples (making it considered “large” altogether), I may have some issues.

I take it Live sets have to be imported as a unit and Force can’t simply load Live clips or racks individually?

I guess I’m not really seeing the usefulness of disk streaming if everything still has to be ported through memory? Can you explain why everyone’s raving about this if you can’t load large files without RAM issues still? Is it just for those who want to steam DJ style sets that are premade as one long audio track, or at I missing something? If I load a 4GB ALS file onto my attached SSD, it won’t “stream” it directly from the disk? That’s hard to believe :shock:


We're raving about disk-streaming because for the first time, Force no longer is capped at 5 minute audio recordings on the 8 audio tracks. We can now record an unlimited amount of time, making it an extremely powerful 8-track audio recorder, for starters. Second, although it's not recommended to use disk-streaming with Drum Programs or Keygroups for performance reasons (as you can quickly choke your disk bandwidth by repeated triggering too many samples), it does allow for a nice work-around to the 8 stereo audio track cap, as you can also load stems of almost any length into a Drum Program and trigger the stem that way. I've gotten between 16-24 stereo stems triggered at once, all streaming from disk, without any issues.

As for your ALS set, 4-5 GB won't be an issue. I've loaded 8 stereo stems that are 10 GB total without issue (each stem was over 1 and 1/2 hours long).
By voonta Wed May 18, 2022 7:36 pm
EnochLight wrote:We're raving about disk-streaming because for the first time, Force no longer is capped at 5 minute audio recordings on the 8 audio tracks. We can now record an unlimited amount of time, making it an extremely powerful 8-track audio recorder

Hi @EnochLight, Could you describe how to enable disk streaming on recorded audio? I have 7 analog synth tracks sequenced by midi from the force running back in stereo to 7 audio tracks.

When I attempted to record a session today into the arrangement I was limited to about 8 mins before the Force started spluttering because it seemed to be running short on memory. I unfortunately forgot to check the memory usage after recording.

I have set ENABLE DISK STREAMING to ON in Menu > Preferences > AUDIO/EXPORT > DISK STREAMING

I have a lot more questions about recording, perhaps I should start a new thread..
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By EnochLight Sun Dec 11, 2022 3:00 pm
voonta wrote:
EnochLight wrote:We're raving about disk-streaming because for the first time, Force no longer is capped at 5 minute audio recordings on the 8 audio tracks. We can now record an unlimited amount of time, making it an extremely powerful 8-track audio recorder

Hi @EnochLight, Could you describe how to enable disk streaming on recorded audio? I have 7 analog synth tracks sequenced by midi from the force running back in stereo to 7 audio tracks.

When I attempted to record a session today into the arrangement I was limited to about 8 mins before the Force started spluttering because it seemed to be running short on memory. I unfortunately forgot to check the memory usage after recording.

I have set ENABLE DISK STREAMING to ON in Menu > Preferences > AUDIO/EXPORT > DISK STREAMING

I have a lot more questions about recording, perhaps I should start a new thread..


Sorry I missed your post - this forum doesn't notify you when people quote or even reply so it's easy to miss stuff. :WTF: :lol: Were you able to get things sorted? When you start a new Project on Force, disk-streaming is automatically enabled for the 8 audio tracks, so not sure why you are running out of RAM. Were you loading a ton of samples into Drum Programs/Keygroups? :hmmm:
By Expectaz Wed Jan 11, 2023 3:45 pm
It might be a good idea to check where the temporary recordings are stored in preferences. Make sure they're on your SSD. At least not on the internal drive.