ak.sys 2.53

We know that there are problems with getting Aksys to work simply and smoothly(ie just plug in the cable and go) So I have to figure out if it is worth the investment to either make a new program or usb driver that has easy installation and practical usage.
I am sure it is really cheap to create a program that makes simple file transfer. The most basic type of plug in a usb cable and it shows up on the screen and simply allows for file transfer to the interior memory.

The question then becomes...

Does aksys work well enough in apple products and XP(sp2, sp3), Vista, Window 7?
or does the software need an independent update?

Are there any changes that people would want to see in an alternative to Aksys?

I am going to try to meet up with another local AKai 4000 user who I know uses aksys. Once I get a good look at it and see if I can get mine working then I will see whether this is worth undertaking.
Harder things have been accomplished.
cheers,
ian

Ian Canefire wrote:We know that there are problems with getting Aksys to work simply and smoothly(ie just plug in the cable and go) So I have to figure out if it is worth the investment to either make a new program or usb driver that has easy installation and practical usage.
I am sure it is really cheap to create a program that makes simple file transfer. The most basic type of plug in a usb cable and it shows up on the screen and simply allows for file transfer to the interior memory.

The question then becomes...

Does aksys work well enough in apple products and XP(sp2, sp3), Vista, Window 7?
or does the software need an independent update?

Are there any changes that people would want to see in an alternative to Aksys?

I am going to try to meet up with another local AKai 4000 user who I know uses aksys. Once I get a good look at it and see if I can get mine working then I will see whether this is worth undertaking.
Harder things have been accomplished.
cheers,
ian

Well, this is my personal opinion here:

Aksys was buggy as hell on the OSs it was designed for from the get-go. The Metadata issue, nestled folders, sounds with odd filenames, anything would cause that dreaded "USB Error 15". Keep in mind that we are talking about a peice of software that is way over 10 years old.

I would love just a driver update that would allow me to move files to the machine similar to the USB connectivity of maybe the 1000 or 2500, but there are so many other features that Aksys has under the hood that make it phenomenal tool if it was applied correctly.

A low-level driver would be a big help, and shouldn't be TOO expensive but, without a facelift and an increase in reliability the point would be moot.

Hopefully, we would be able to squash bugs and add features. Do you think our cheap Indian programmer would be able to help us with that, maybe a la JJ?

So I just called Akai and spoke to tech support and that guys manager. They were not helpful in any way. I called an Indian outsource contractor and asked him a few questions and they said that they need the programming language, database and a description of the system. If they had a machine then they could start reverse engineering.
So now the trick is to find a way to contact the JJ OS dude or the Vaillixi guy and see if they have the 4000 OS in code form or get in touch with a hacker and have them get it for us. I wouldn't be surprised if this isn't already leaked but only in programmer/hacker circles in the lost regions of a harddrive somewhere.
I am going to send the USB Aksys to the Indian guy and see if he can figure out anything.

Cheers,
Ian

Ian, I may have a peice of some old scrap code that a dev used a few years back, trying to make a Aksys clone. I'm sure the Akai Ak.sys was written in C+ due to it's age. The stuff I have is in Python.

This is where I got it from... http://walco.n--tree.net/downloads/snapshots/

Aksy - Python API for accessing system exclusive and file transfer functionality of
Akai samplers over USB connections.

Copyright (C) 2005-2007 Walco van Loon

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or
(at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful,
but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of
MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the
GNU General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU General Public License
along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software
Foundation, Inc., 59 Temple Place, Suite 330, Boston, MA 02111-1307 USA

This is exciting!

I'm in (but I don't know squat about drivers/code/OS programming). I'm in for buying the new driver or bugfixed Aksys.

Mike...so you know someone that Started something like this? Why did they stop?

I was up until 2 am last night and I could not get Aksys to work. For some reason I can't seem to get the computer to use the usb driver. I tried doind what Lamp said but no yellow exclamation mark comes up in xp sp3. In XP sp2 I get the exclamation on the akai mpc aksys in device manager.
I ended up taking out both my Z4 and MPC 4000 harddiskdrives(HDD) and connecting them to my desktop as slave drives. Then I transferred all of my samples into both units. It was very easy to do. I made a short video. You just have to make sure the drives are already formatted in their respective machines in the case of using a new drive. Then you have to set the jumper to slave on them. They will be set to master in order to work in the Z4 and MPC. Then they will show up as drive Z4 and mpc in your computer. Then take then out put the jumpers back to master on them and put them back in their homes.
I noticed that one of my harddrives is louder when connected to the Z4 and quieter when exposed and connected to the compter. weird...I figure that is a power supply thing.
In any case I am hoping to get to the bottom of getting aksys to at least come up on my computer.

mike thanks for the info if you have a code then send it along i will PM you my email address. I can't get pricing on this until I get more info to the programmer/ coder. I am starting to think that maybe we don't even need an Indian contractor we may be able to find a college student that wants credit , needs a project, and is already an mpc user.
If I find a kid willing I will drop money on this project myself. I can see the value in it. I can also see why Akai would not want this because it would directly compete with the renaissance.
Cheers,
Ian
EDIT EDIT EDIT EDIT

Okay I have been doing research and found this older set of linux programmers that tried to build a better OS conclusion not good...http://web.archiveorange.com/archive/v/ ... WacvCJyMVD

I am still going to ask around about the feasibilit of an aksys alternative.

Took out the HDD and put it in my computer to organize the file structure. Someone else mentioned doing this. I can confirm it works.




cheers,
Ian

Still can't get Aksys to work on my xp. I am going to call geek squad and spend $129 to see if they can figure it out.
cheers,
Ian

Ian Canefire wrote:Still can't get Aksys to work on my xp. I am going to call geek squad and spend $129 to see if they can figure it out.
cheers,
Ian

Don't do this... Geek Squad is TERRIBLE!!!

Ian Canefire wrote:Still can't get Aksys to work on my xp. I am going to call geek squad and spend $129 to see if they can figure it out.
cheers,
Ian

Take a deep breath and start afresh...

Have you got all the files and the correct driver?

Have you sussed out where and how to install the driver?

Do you have the manual?

How are you going about launching the software? Is your MPC on at the time? This seems to make a difference... If I launch the software with the MPC on it struggles to connect.

Don't pay any money out when you can probably crack this in 5 minutes.

lol...okay, okay I hear you guys. I think I have tried every different method. The computer says there was a failure loading the software. I can't seem to find a way to connect to the usb driver or to get it to run. I will be contacting a local akai owner about this issue this evening. I plan on making a video about it too. There needs to be a you tube video about this.
I did find the manual for aksys. However it has not been helpful.
peace
Ian

Just to update this thread. I met up with Dabmeister and he showed me that the driver was not loaded properly. It was a simple fix. My XP laptop did not automatically choose the proper driver. Also the driver was either on my desktop or in my download folder but not in "my documents" . Once put in my documents then I connected everything up the MPC 4000 was recognized by the computer and the driver began to show the symbol where it was locating and sending info between the computer and the mpc.
So everything was good and then when I got home I tried plugging in my Z4...did not work. I thought it would use the same USB driver but it did not. So I grabbed it from the Akai pro site and sure enough it is working also.
So now I can plug my Z4 and the MPC4000 into my computer and see ak.sys showing both HDD.
So now I have been trying to learn ak.sys on the fly and it seems relatively easy to understand. Dabmeister explained to me that many people use software editors to cut up samples faster and then put them in the MPC via Ak.sys. We downloaded a free copy of Audacity. I had been doing all of my sample cutting in the MPC and was not really bothered by the time. However now I see the vast difference.
In conclusion, I love my hardware and I see that using the two together is great. Fingers crossed so far I have not gotten any error messages with Ak.sys. I am grateful that I do not have to open my desktop and connect the HDD in order to arrange files. Ak.sys is gettin a thumbs up so far though, and I still have not tried looking to see about synth editing with it. I have only done the file transfers and I looked at the editor page where it shows the zones and such.



Cheers,
Ian
PS Regarding computers and hardware...that is why I enjoy the roland VS brand of hardware digital mixers...the last set they made the 2480,2400 and 2000 have the ability to connect a screen a mouse and a keyboard to the machines (like the MV8000/8800) it makes everything much easier. As I have stated before the VS units have great midi timing and can link together easily so that you can have more tracks to work with. I plan to make a short youtube vid regarding ak.sys since I do not see any.

Ak.sys video volume is a little low.
I did not see a video so I figured I would make one.
Cheers,
Ian

You were like a kid on Christmas day through most of that!

Cheers for the vid.