Is the 500 good for Holidays?

I'm potentially looking at getting an MPC500 to take with me when I go on holiday in Scotland for a week this september (My musical partner in crime and myself are hoping that a change of scenery will inspire us and I'm looking for something to write down any ideas we have).

In my home setup I use a 2000xl so beside the lack of waveform editing and fewer pads I don't think I'll miss out on much, and I'm assuming anything I write on it can be transfered back to the 2000xl when I get back?

My other idea was a small digital recorder, one of the new 4 track jobs from Tascam maybe, with a travel guitar.

The last idea was a little Netbook running a small daw, like Energy XT - I have a license for this software already so it would just be a case of buying a netbook.

Can the 500 record a sample whilst the sequence plays back? Not too worried about hearing the mic input through the outs, just to be able to hear the sequence to keep the sample in time? Looked around and I'm guessing its not possible.

So out of these ideas which sounds the best for fleshing out ideas, I play guitar as well as the MPC and my friend sings so may want to record some vocal ideas at some point. I like the idea of the 500, but maybe if its not able to record whilst playing back it could be a deal breaker..

The MPC500 can record a sample while playing a sequence, and monitoring the input. But it isn't fluid like using a multitrack recorder. After you've recorded your sample, you will need to trim it. To do that you have to stop the sequence, go into trim mode, and turn the wheel to adjust the start point. Then you have to overdub a pad triggering the sample, and maybe adjust the trim again to get it to sync.

It's too much work for fast fluid fun. To let the ideas roll, get a multitrack recorder. The Zoom H4n is small, has built-in microphones, and a 4-track multitrack mode. The Zoom R16 is more like the size of a laptop, but much more comfortable to control. It can record 8 channels at once, has built-in stereo condensers, and stuff like send FX.

For ideas, since you guys can do vocals and guitar already, I'd consider just using voice and whatever is around you to make sounds, forgetting about any hands-on composition. Save that stuff for the final. For vacation, you want the least bit of work getting in your way, to feel loose, and ready to flow. Bang some pots and pans, beatbox, sing, hum, make sound FX, etc.

By using some FX you could even make that sound good without having to use a sampler. But you could get a battery-powered sampler too if you want, or synth. Then between the acoustic instruments, battery-powered multitrack, and sampler/synth you can do complete productions. It just depends what you're hoping to accomplish, and how much fun you want to have doing it.

You can listen to the playback of a sequence during record mode but the 500 won't let you record the incoming signal and the sequence at the same time. But the machine is beastin' though.

For a handheld multitracker, I'll recommend the Boss Micro BR. Its has tons of effects for mics and guitars and you can record in wav. or mp3.
You can even slow down songs to practice riffs without changing pitch.
The new Tascam doesn't even have eq, but its great for the basics, like punching, bouncing and laying down tracks.

I love portable machines myself. I've got a mini-studio of the 500, the micro BR and a cd walkman in my bedroom just for cracking ideas.

Thanks for the hints and tips, thats great news that the 500 can record audio whilst sequences playback. I had a 2500 a while back so had a little experience with direct record and I understand that was more automated than just recording audio and playing back the sequence but I hadnt realised that the 500 even had this basic functionality - so thanks for that info, but yeah a little portable recorder might be a better option, but the 500 does look like a great little portable beat making machine.

Will check out the Boss and Zoom gear you both mentioned, reading tech specs for the zoom and it sounds really useful.

I'm really looking forward to this trip, we're out in the wilds on the Isle of Skye - never been and I'm really hoping to be inspired, we're about half way through an albums' worth of songs and I've hit writers block/indecision on where to go next.

Hoping a change of space, change of gear, a little more of a restrictive environment even will help. Back to basics and all that.

A few things I'll add....

You can sort of do multi-track recording with the MPC 500, but as has been noted the workflow is a bit off. It does require work/patience to record your sample/phrase, then assign it to a program, then trigger the sample on a track, then go back to trim mode and tweak until it lines up properly.

There are several decent multi-track recorders... make sure you get the features you want for inputs/number of tracks. The pocket ones are nice, but with that you might be able to get by just as well with the MPC 500 and a mic or two.

An iPhone/iPod touch have quite a few different interesting synths, plus you can carry a decent selection of music on it as well. Might be a good way to get some sounds to sample on the recorder/mpc.

On the Nintendo DS, the Korg MS-20 synth is great, electroplankton is fun and the guitar app is quite fun (forget the name off the top of my head). Then you've also got nanoloop which is a quite powerful and can make some interesting sounds for the gba. I'd also suggest checking out nitro tracker if you're more into tracking.

I'm not as aware of apps on the psp, but there does seem to be several music apps over there that could be put to good use to sample off of onto the MPC.

I've tried netbooks a bit myself. Although you can run Ableton Live/Reason it qualifies as barely. With Reason you can squeeze a bit more out of it than Live, but things are pretty tight. I just tried to run Record on my netbook and it barfed hard... don't even bother. Beyond that though, if you're just looking for a sound source for synths and don't want to sequence on a netbook there are plenty of older synths out that there might fit the bill. Just remember, most netbooks don't have the best battery life and unless you've got a usb audio card or expresscard port on the netbook you've only got mic in.

Personally I'd consider the Multitrack recorder or the MPC along with a DS/iPod Touch... or possibly a synth like the microkorg. The netbook will probably cause you as many headaches as it *might* solve. Having done some of these trips before I'd shy away from needing a mountain of batteries/chargers and a rats nest of cables. Plus it is easy to be more creative if you limit yourself, sometimes harshly. Keep it simple and you'll really learn the gear and have fun. If you make it too complicated to setup/breakdown you'll quickly get tired of it and not get done what you want.

I'll end with... the bose portable speaker/ipod docking station is pretty good, and might be great to just chill especially if you get an ipod/touch or whatever. Perhaps a bit too bass heavy... but can be managed with most system eq's. The unit charges quite quickly and lasts for a decent amount of time. At least don't forget a decent speaker unless you're planning on using headphones and a splitter... which might be a good idea as well anyways, but again... more stuff to hump around.

Thanks for all the help and advice. I really appreciate it, I went with the 500 in the end, just cos I liked the idea of being able to do a bit of mid sequencing while I'm away. I plan on filling a compact flash with a bunch of drums and guitar/piano chord samples and roughing out some sequences. Might do a few multisamples too, kinda like the 12 pad layout, pad for every note in an octave. Got the ram expansion too so should have plenty to do in Scotland, will just need to send my singer off to see the sights whilst I write the songs! lol