your favorite sounding 12 bit sampler

whats your favorite sounding 12 bit sampler, or top 2, and why? what do you like it best on? is there one you prefer for drums and one you prefer for melodic stuff?

Emu Emax. Like whatever kinda sound get sent through it.

kneebone77 wrote:Emu Emax. Like whatever kinda sound get sent through it.

+1. Best sounding sampler IMO.

S950 and SP1200.

I prefer the S950 over the MPC60 because you can overdrive the input and get awesome sounding results. Other than that... they sound pretty much the same.

Too bad the individual outs are busted on mine... gotta fix that as soon as possible!

Emu Sp series all the way, love all those **** artifacts. It's like the high frequency sounds are being decayed by acid through the a/d.

But I know your not gonna buy an entire sp1200 to color the sound so I'll cast another vote for an akai rack sampler. They seem to be the most stable and easily upgraded/fixed for the most part aside from the coveted sound.

If you decide to go outside akai be careful, it seems that most 12bit rack samplers from that era had the voices directly routed to the outputs which can lead to a lot of distortion and volume issues. Specifically Roland, Yamaha. Could be just a loose or dirty connection or could be more difficult. But I'm sure there loads of people out there without problems..

Someone has/had an s900 on here for sale that had the option to work in 16bit or 12bit (select on startup i beleive). this to me would be dope because you get the best of everything IMHO. You could crunch your drums in 12bit and then chop your melodies in 16bit but still using the fantastic s900 a/d converters.

Hyped to see what you eventually pick out

m56p87 wrote:Emu Sp series all the way, love all those **** artifacts. It's like the high frequency sounds are being decayed by acid through the a/d.

Interesting description
To answers the ops question.. All of them are my favs
Last one I'd sell is the sp12, then the emax... but that's also related to the fact they're rarer and harder to buy up again..

And yea the emax is just amazing for the magic it can give you... I've sampled analog synths into the emax and arrived at sounds that where better/more interesting than what went in..
Emax is a synth fiend sampler... using it just for breaks is real shame.. I know in hiphop it's not used for much more in many cases... fine the quality it gives any sample is pretty interesting, I can see how tempting it is to just use it as a general sample magic-ifier.. without digging into everything thing else it is great for.

950 is a serious drum sampler.. with a totally different sound to the 12bit emus.. Not as boomy as the sp12 in the low end, but when you pitch kicks down... wow

@szr:

I'm curious to what is your experience with the SP12 and sampling drums? I've had some good and some bad results with the SP1200 so far... any tips to get the best results? Gain levels, pitching, left/right channel seperate or combined from the turntable? etc...

Some of the drums i sample knock hard after sampling, some sound weak... ok, maybe some of the drums i sampled were just weak to begin with..

@jibber I did virtual sample cd release where I programmed analog synth drums and stuck them though my sp12....
Honestly the drum sounds where not usable to begin with.... But f*ck me did the sp transform them.

... So anyway I tried alot of different settings... my findings..

Use output 1/2 ! (Tom outs) .. for kicks

If the kick is already deep enough (808) it might sound better through output 3/4

I've never liked kicks though the other outputs..

I also usually try sampling the kicks after pitching them up about +7 semitones.
Then pitch down in the sp.... honestly, only about 20% or less of the time is the kick good like this...
I find you loose to much bass.... So usually use the kicks that where not pitched up first.
It's always worth testing both though.. cos the sp is full of surprises.

For snares about 60% of the time I pitch them up first.. and it sounds better than sampling them at std. pitch.
I usually always use output 5

Hats... same as above... always use output 7/8

All of the sounds I sample a little bit hot... but also play around with sampling with really hot levels... sometimes interesting... but usually not.

Anyway the best advise is to get some 808 kicks snares and hats... sample them at different levels... pitched up/not pitched ... try the different outputs... see what you like best.

Ideally your kicks will end up so monstrous that you need to reach for eq to tame them... that's how it should be

If you want to post an audio clip of you sp, feel free. it's possible that it needs recapping to be performing at 100%
Mine was fully recapped by the prev.. owner... he said it was less noisy afterwards... also you can loose bass when caps dry out.. they act as high pass filters then...

szr wrote:If you want to post an audio clip of you sp, feel free. it's possible that it needs recapping to be performing at 100%
Mine was fully recapped by the prev.. owner... he said it was less noisy afterwards... also you can loose bass when caps dry out.. they act as high pass filters then...

You mean a 2.5s sample (recorded from all the outputs) of any record, a drumloop, full orchestra... can you elaborate on this a little? I'd be really interested in your opinion. I like how the machine sounds, but who knows if that's how it's supposed to sound when all is well... i kinda liked the sound of my tape machine as well before i had it serviced..

Thanks for your very informative post by the way...

I've read the SP1200 FAQ over at their forum and somehow got the impression that it's better to use output 3 and 4 for kicks, so i simply started off this way... i routed played some samples through output 1 and 2, not drums however... i thought they sounded kinda interesting in a good way... i'll go and try some kicks...

I know how you feel on the tape machine front...
I had alot wow and flutter at the end of my tapes cos of the tape guide not running smoothly anymore ... and loved it ... I put new parts in and now it's fixed .... but I'll probably figure out another way to f*ck it up so I get my wow and flutter back

Thing about recapping is, the sp will stop working at some stage down the line if you don't do it... probably the psu will fail first... might be 5yrs or longer though.

Best thing is if you sample this loop http://soundcloud.com/sampler-shootout/odb-original
Click download to get the wav.... put it though output 8 ..

You can then compare it to mine here:
http://soundcloud.com/sampler-shootout/odb-e-mu-sp12

or one from livigsounds's sp12 here:

http://soundcloud.com/sampler-shootout/ ... hed-hotter

... He sampled that one hotter than mine..

It seems to be ok...



Recorded pretty hot into the sp (no sample overload... "sample is good"... love it! ), then recorded not so hot into logic... turn it up to the same level and it sounds almost the same as the one from livingsounds. I think it's fine.

If you turn it up a lot you can hear some static noise or something in mine...? Maybe not 100% ok..

Edit: I think some of my cables suck... here's another recording with a good one (recorded a little more hot into logic this time)...

Theres alot more static in your one, also the bass isnt as deep from what I can tell... just not as full sounding across the board.
Might be how you recorded it... did you put it through a mixer... cos for mine I recorded it from the sp direct into my audio interface.
Did you set the sp to max gain mode.. and maybe record it too quietly.. I set my sp to the lowest gain setting

Same here, directly into the interface (apogee duet), then i grabbed the wav file from the logic project folder. The more i listen the more i agree...

The cable made a huge difference however, at least i learned that some of my cables are bad (got some of them used)...

If you listen to the beat i did (in the "your music" section under "First beat using the SP1200", i think it's noticeable too... this was tracked with the bad cables btw... the beat sounds like there's a lot of static noise going on...

I might have to look into it in the future... for now i'll make some "dirty" beats...

Thanks very much szr, i was thinking about this the whole day and you kinda saved the day...

And sorry for hijacking the thread.

Nice track.
... But if cables make a big difference .... then your sp should sound fuller... cos my cables are the s*it cheapest I could find
... I mean it's possible... but I'd personally contact armen and ask for cash to bring the sp up to 100% spec... considering what he charges..that gear should have been recapped if it needed it... which I'm pretty sure is the case here... judging by how you say it's been recorded... and that you said youself that it isn't as fat sounding as you expected.
Glad to help by the way, nice to see ppl like yourself making great use of classic gear.. I wanted an sp for a very long time myself.. Got mine last yr.

What i meant with the cables is...

If i just plugged the cable from output 8 into my interface and turned up the gain, you could hear static noise very well with the first cable (old used neutrik cable). When i switched cables to a newer one (klotz cable), the static noise was almost gone (very big difference). It's of course still not optimal and as it should be, but there was a noticeable difference between the two cables.

I will contact armens and ask him about a refund. Judging by the things people say about him, i don't have high hopes however...

I will also have to look for a place here in switzerland who could do the servicing of the SP... i'm hesitant to give it to somebody unless i know for sure they know exactly what they are doing...
EDIT: Found a shop in zurich that does repairs for old samplers and drum machines since a few years. Just talked to the owner on the phone and the guy seems to know his stuff very well (he has an SP-12 himself and recapped a few SP1200s already). He said it would be anywhere between 200-500 swiss francs to get it up to 100% working order again... guess i'll ask armens to compensate for that, wish me luck...

PS: Yeah, i really get a lot of satisfaction using old gear. I love it all so much... old hardware, vinyl, tape, the limitations... it's just so nostalgic, so much fun and hands-on...