How many units sold..?

psr wrote:

Dan L wrote:^ Sloth LOL
I'm gonna sample sloth on my perfectly working 5000 I think the whole bug thing is new user buying a piece of gear and wondering why it's not set up like FL studio.

Dan L .... indeed bro. say it again.

I think people should at least go to a music store and try one out before they talk about it. There are so many negative comments floating around about every MPC... Hell every piece of gear!!! People hated the 4000 when it came out. I remember when the 2000xl came out. A guy at guitar center told me people where complaning about it and I should buy an older model. Look how many people swear by their 2000's now.
It all comes down to what YOU WANT to use and what WORKS best for you! Your not going to make a good beat with gear you don't want to work on.

There not stocked as a regular item anymore except maybe mom/pop shops. SA and GC took all but the 1000 off of the shelves a while back .

The problem is the shear number of complaints from actual buyers that doomed the unit. Akai has been re-selling returned 5000 almost since it's launch. 2.0 helped but many still find it problematic. So the problem was never selling the 5000 , but keeping from being walked / shipped back to the seller after.

Akai doesn't acknowledge the 5000's ( or any MPC's) existence in public anymore so another update probably isn't coming. The best thing that could happen is that Akai officially drops the 5000, opening the door for a programmer like jj or some type of open source project. If they do that the 5000 will become more sought after than some other classic models.

moyphee wrote:The best thing that could happen is that Akai officially drops the 5000, opening the door for a programmer like jj or some type of open source project. If they do that the 5000 will become more sought after than some other classic models.

Sadly, I think I'd agree with that...

-- peer

Dropping the 5000 (and let's face it the entire MPC line) makes commercial sense. Whether or not a hardware sampler/sequencer is successful or even just plain brilliant isn't important - there's a million young dudes with laptops and warez software, they are never going to invest in hardware to find out what it is good for and they fuel the market for software and controllers. No manufacturer can tell its board they are going to make a hardware box when much larger sales numbers will buy controllers attached to computers.

But opening up the MPC5000 for open source development can't happen. There will be proprietary work in it which would be considered a competitive advantage to keep secret. The MPC probably now contains code inherited from Alesis for example, its not up to Akai to give that away. The hardware determines how the code operates, and some of those techniques may even be licensed to a third party. I for one would be right in there reading the source code and fixing some quirks just like I did when DOS was one of a number of home grown projects to get a micro computer working. But I don't see it is possible, sadly. JJOS is not as good as it could be because it is not open to everyone to inspect and comment. It is not open source and I wish people would not lump JJOS and open source together as similar alternatives to Akai - they are in reality complete opposites.

LivePsy wrote:But opening up the MPC5000 for open source development can't happen. There will be proprietary work in it which would be considered a competitive advantage to keep secret. The MPC probably now contains code inherited from Alesis for example, its not up to Akai to give that away.

They could do it with no problem. Numark purchased both Alesis and Akai when they were on their deathbeds. They bought Akai from Grande Holding when the 1000 was set to be the last MPC.

I wonder what Akai's est value is right now? It would be great if it could be bought by a group that want to save the hardware/sampler market If every hip hop producer went in on it they could make whatever they want......I ( like everyone else on here ) am waiting to see what happens with the Linn Drum 2. I'll buy one if it ever comes out.

moyphee wrote:

LivePsy wrote:But opening up the MPC5000 for open source development can't happen. There will be proprietary work in it which would be considered a competitive advantage to keep secret. The MPC probably now contains code inherited from Alesis for example, its not up to Akai to give that away.

They could do it with no problem. Numark purchased both Alesis and Akai when they were on their deathbeds. They bought Akai from Grande Holding when the 1000 was set to be the last MPC.

Yes, Numark could do it. But they need to see dollar signs and benefits to make it worthwhile. There's expenses in publishing the hardware, boot firmware and whatever parts of the OS they wanted to release. There's what, 3 CPU's on there now?

Secondly, I can't see any manufacturer making a box open (even without its OS) and having their brand trashed because of badly behaved or bricking amateur OS code. Half the MPC5000's around here melt down because "open source" is also "no responsibility", and the Akai name looks bad.

Best possible outcome might be a ToneCore development kit arrangement, I wish it would happen but it is extremely unlikely.

LivePsy wrote:Dropping the 5000 (and let's face it the entire MPC line) makes commercial sense. Whether or not a hardware sampler/sequencer is successful or even just plain brilliant isn't important - there's a million young dudes with laptops and warez software, they are never going to invest in hardware to find out what it is good for and they fuel the market for software and controllers. No manufacturer can tell its board they are going to make a hardware box when much larger sales numbers will buy controller

I'll bet Dave Smith would dissagree.

Akai could have it both ways btw.
Have you seen there latest line off effect plugins? All analog. A niche market? Dropping the MPC line is a bit assumptious. What they need to do is to be more open to it's costumers.
Example; I have a firewire interface from TCelectronics. I and a few others had issues with the firewire not connecting to the pc. They worked hard to solve the problem, we've been kept updated via their own forum with a product specialist as moderator.

My interface was about to be discontineud and they promised support untill not needed.

Now that's what I call aftersales support.

I'm not suggesting building anything new just going into the code after it's been dropped.