Trying to decide if the Live is right for me

Whaddup dudes! I've been through every MPC besides the 4000 and my favorite and most workflow friendly to me has been my 2500. It's so simple to use and the sound it gives drums adds a little knock to them which is exactly what a boom bap producer such as myself loves. My question is, does the Live still have the same FEEL as a 2500 would (I.e swing and punchiness)? I really love how it looks and the workflow seems super nice. Also as a side note, how's the vintage presets for these soundin? Pretty close to the 3k and 60? Lemme know what you guys think! Much love

The Live is not the 2500. You can swing and and punch. Navigation and flow is different. You really need to put your hands on the Live. Not just a day. Go to a dealer and spend two months on it. We can't come near the personal experience you should have yourself.

Vintage mode l keep mines on the 3000.

Here's a vid l did doing boom bap. I loved it and lm loving these updates. Live does all what l need.

TheOddfather wrote:Whaddup dudes! I've been through every MPC besides the 4000 and my favorite and most workflow friendly to me has been my 2500. It's so simple to use and the sound it gives drums adds a little knock to them which is exactly what a boom bap producer such as myself loves. My question is, does the Live still have the same FEEL as a 2500 would (I.e swing and punchiness)? I really love how it looks and the workflow seems super nice. Also as a side note, how's the vintage presets for these soundin? Pretty close to the 3k and 60? Lemme know what you guys think! Much love

As far as the sequencer goes, it feels the same to me. Having used a number of the older machines I definitively say I feel no difference at all.... if anything its tighter. Also... the pads are fantastic.

The sound to my ears is "cleaner" and more present than the 1k and 2500 and I mean that in a good way. I never cared for the overall sound coming out of either the 1k or 2500... always seemed a little harsh. The 4000 / 2000XL sounded much "rounder" and more "full" to me than the 2500. I haven't used those old machines in a while so I can't compare to the Live.

The biggest difference is the lack of front panel buttons on Live which I feel detracts from what is otherwise an amazing device. The workflow is more or less the same, but there are so many more ways to use the machine and so in turn, more possiblities. I'll only sell the Live if they develop a standalone MPC studio / Live hybrid. You would just have adjust to using the touch screen, and build up you memory.

You can find lots of helpful tutorials on youtube to get you jump started but you will probably be able to get urself up to speed quickly coming from the legacy machines and just putting the time in.

Which goes back to what l said the Live ain't like the 2500 lol

JeriKo Jackson wrote:As far as the sequencer goes, it feels the same to me. Having used a number of the older machines I definitively say I feel no difference at all.... if anything its tighter. Also... the pads are fantastic.

The sound to my ears is "cleaner" and more present than the 1k and 2500 and I mean that in a good way. I never cared for the overall sound coming out of either the 1k or 2500... always seemed a little harsh. The 4000 / 2000XL sounded much "rounder" and more "full" to me than the 2500. I haven't used those old machines in a while so I can't compare to the Live.

The biggest difference is the lack of front panel buttons on Live which I feel detracts from what is otherwise an amazing device. The workflow is more or less the same, but there are so many more ways to use the machine and so in turn, more possiblities. I'll only sell the Live if they develop a standalone MPC studio / Live hybrid. You would just have adjust to using the touch screen, and build up you memory.

You can find lots of helpful tutorials on youtube to get you jump started but you will probably be able to get urself up to speed quickly coming from the legacy machines and just putting the time in.

Just be prepared for menu diving for simple functions. That’s a big hurdle for previous mpc users when using the LIVE. Even though you can double tap a few buttons as a shortcut it’s still not enough.

I wish the Live and X had global midi learn like that software does.

There are way too many of the same threads like this.

I took the plunge a week ago and went to the live from 2500, can load all your old projects, a few annoyances but overall improvments out weigh any negatives, heres what i think

Layout - the live has a retarded layout, totally backwards, screen should be on the left aswell as qlinks and pads on right.
Pads - pads are big upgrade from 2500 even with finely tuned fat pads the live wins by far...but a step backwards is you cannot set sensitivity per pad like you could on the 2500 but you can choose the colour :/ werird priorities, i would like this option back from the 2500
Buttons and tact - feel like they are a lot squishier but should last longer, all seem work 1st press.
Loading - projects load 100x faster than the 2500
Menus - there are alot more menus and not as quick to navigate but you can ad external midi control to get around it quicker and access more things at once
Sequencer - upgraded from 96 to 960, major upgrade and much finer detail in perfomance of beats can be recorded, i dont use quantize or swing so havent compared
Sound - so far pretty happy with sound, pretty clean and neutral, metering is wonderful, slighthly less punch than 2500 with same program and gain staging ( 2500 has more noticable attack to my ears) output fx on the live should be able to get it pretty much the same.
Vintage mode - pretty much a load of balls. ive been putting on outputs an sp-303, tascam m216 (crusty mixer) and into vintech 473 preamps on the output of it and sounding dope.
FX and filters dont seem to be much of an upgrdae from 2500 all work fine but not real pretty but you can have alot more of them.
Still learning this new box but pretty happy with it, i will be keeping my 2500 as they work nicely together and can transfer projects quickly either way

Caustic Yoda wrote:I took the plunge a week ago and went to the live from 2500, can load all your old projects, a few annoyances but overall improvments out weigh any negatives, heres what i think

Layout - the live has a retarded layout, totally backwards, screen should be on the left aswell as qlinks and pads on right.
Pads - pads are big upgrade from 2500 even with finely tuned fat pads the live wins by far...but a step backwards is you cannot set sensitivity per pad like you could on the 2500 but you can choose the colour :/ werird priorities, i would like this option back from the 2500
Buttons and tact - feel like they are a lot squishier but should last longer, all seem work 1st press.
Loading - projects load 100x faster than the 2500
Menus - there are alot more menus and not as quick to navigate but you can ad external midi control to get around it quicker and access more things at once
Sequencer - upgraded from 96 to 960, major upgrade and much finer detail in perfomance of beats can be recorded, i dont use quantize or swing so havent compared
Sound - so far pretty happy with sound, pretty clean and neutral, metering is wonderful, slighthly less punch than 2500 with same program and gain staging ( 2500 has more noticable attack to my ears) output fx on the live should be able to get it pretty much the same.
Vintage mode - pretty much a load of balls. ive been putting on outputs an sp-303, tascam m216 (crusty mixer) and into vintech 473 preamps on the output of it and sounding dope.
FX and filters dont seem to be much of an upgrdae from 2500 all work fine but not real pretty but you can have alot more of them.
Still learning this new box but pretty happy with it, i will be keeping my 2500 as they work nicely together and can transfer projects quickly either way

Thanks for the reply homie! Thank you everyone for the replies. I'm thinking of taking the plunge and getting rid of my 60 MKI for it. I really love the sound of the 60 but she needs some work as far as the Vimana upgrade and new backlight and I would rather not send it in for the upgrades. I'm just hoping the Live doesn't sound TOO clean like the Maschine I owned before did. Just didn't have a realistic sound to me!

I like to think im fussy on the sound and i think the live will do nicely, will try it in a live context in 2 weeks and see how it goes under pressure. i think with each new mpc the sound has lost the old vibe but trade off for modern technology updates end up out weighing the old eventuallyapart from studio setting and best kept at home and looked after rather than gigged with. all the tools are there to make it sound dope it. will do a little comparison test against my 2500 with same program sometime when i got a minute