Official: Akai Force Topic

Awesome analogy!

CharlesRandolph wrote:

Danoc wrote::worthy:

I don't understand why some don't understand what ram is for. Its not an obsession its necessary like Frisbi said.

A hobbyist and a professional's thought process, workflow, and needs are different. It's like a Race Car Driver who pushes their car to the limit and it needs the automobile to operate at peak performance 99.9% of the time. While a regular driver, will drive their car with bad tires, poor breaks, bad fuel, and have a oil leaks for months.

Sorry bub, lm not trying to be a tactile technical genius BY ALL MEANS WE ARE NOT TALKING ABOUT THE MPC!

We're talking about the Force. For $1,600 and a newer model between the Live/X should have been beefed up on a lil more ram. Period!
4 to 8gb ram at least. Me l like to blow my crap out! Why in the hell would l buy into this new machine with the same ram as the X/Live? This machine should be better and not only that, upgradable and since its not l would never buy into it. As you upgrade the product is suppose to get better!

I dont make money being a tech genius my important role is to be the best musician possible.

machinesworking wrote:Nah, that's BS boasting for no real reason. Some of us bought the MPC Live knowing what the specs were and that it probably couldn't be upgradable.

I will stick with my Live for the purpose of making complex drums and use my computer to actually make music. The MPC Live will never be the center piece IN MY STUDIO! So l don't have a need for time stretch, PDC , this or that.l got all of that already! Only thing would be nice is the Air effects on it. So l don't care about the extra bells and whistles. But others do and they have that right.
But l know with facts mo machine will have everything people want. Some will be content. Some will be extreme with their wants but the fact is they will not get everything. So bottom line is you buy it or not. Im in the won't buy it lane!
Conclusion , The Force is nothing but the MPC hybrid Push machine. When will thete be a point where people stop being extra technical and do actual music!

For the record l didn't spend $1,000 for my brand new live l spent $959 and got the receipt to prove it.

Now to answer your question , 3 words;

BETTER WORK FLOW!

QuickStrike wrote:Somebody please set me straight. tell me why in your best marketing voice I need all this extra junk.

machinesworking wrote:Nah, that's BS boasting for no real reason.

Only an overtly sensitive hobbyist would take, what I typed as boasting. If I was, you would know.

machinesworking wrote:Some of us bought the MPC Live knowing what the specs were and that it probably couldn't be upgradable. Honestly finishing whole songs with just the hardware is a bonus, not my main concern, nothing about it looks like a DJ tool, it looks like a drum machine and sequencer from a 25+ year long line of drum machines and sequencers.

We as the end user, determine where the machine can and will go. I.E. The turntable was never meant, to do what we do with it. Even the way drum machine are made now, is because the end user, made it do things the manufacture did not think of.

machinesworking wrote:Now if it gets disc streaming you'll be able to stream long live sets of stems etc. but it's still essentially a cheap surface touch screen with a dedicated OS and drum controller attached, and the Force looks to be exactly the same.

If you want more tracks use a computer or better yet buy TWO and sync them together. Disk streaming is good, but it also forces the user to have another back up drive.

machinesworking wrote:I'm not at all against getting 8 -16GB of RAM, I just don't get being mad that a glorified stand alone drum machine doesn't have that? Personally I don't throw $1000+ down on anything without reading the specs.

As far as the MPC LIVE/X/FORCE, their board is made to support up to 8GB of RAM.

machinesworking wrote:My main reason for owning the MPC is the drum programming workflow, and with that in mind, it's got enough RAM and CPU. If it ever became my only DAW etc. then I suppose I would want more, but it already is as capable as Ableton of running RAM and CPU on the desktop controller mode with the same power capabilities, ( same amount of instances of U-He Diva can be used in both ), stand alone will never beat the computer.

This sounds like the MPC Live, is your first MPC. (I may be wrong.) If your main goal is drum programming, you could've bought an older MPC.

QuickStrike wrote:Somebody please set me straight. tell me why in your best marketing voice I need all this extra junk.

I've always found that if you have to be set straight, it's not the machine for you. No amount of marketing will work. You would have to test drive the machine, for a couple days and see how it works for you.

No different than a guitarist who dislikes a guitar, because of the way the neck feels. Or because it's 1 pounds too heavy. Also I don't think the Akai Force is a Techno Machine, it's just a machine. It all depends on who uses it, because in the wrong/right hands, It could be a butter knife or Samurai sword.

Dammmm!

The MPC and computer are 2 different products and a PC can be blown out to unmeasured portions where the MPC can't.
You huild these different anf not try to make the MPC be or compete with a PC. You make the mpc however capable of doing things other MPCs couldn't.

The 2 types of producers.
1. One that has the MPC and center core is the computer (that's ME).
2. One that would like to produce in standalone without the computer, then lay tracks in the computer. (Use to be me).
The center of the producers stu.

It is possible to to take say the X and rebuild a new model strictky for stand alone but beef that motha up real good where a priducer could just produce without worries. You wouldn't have to worry about PDC. Put a top of the line motha board in it, optional ram expansion , get with Microsoft and have a intel chip in it, etc, the works. So you don't need it to be equal with a computer but dam near one. Though it sounds nice l wouldn't be interested because l love being ITB but for traveling purposes hell yeah. I could pick that up and a small keyboard and go.

Danoc wrote: You make the mpc,capable of doing things other MPCs couldn't.

I think Akai Pro looked at all the forums and saw people using the 2000XL, 1000, 5000, and 2500. Then thought, 2 GB should be enough, because those guys are using machines with 128 MB of RAM now. Also all the touch and Renaissance user are connected to desktop/laptop already. So they'll just get the LIVE or X and continue to work that way.

Hip Hop Sample base producer on a whole spend less money on gear. Also if you make a machine that can sample, chop, edit, loop, has effect, and sequence. Most, not ALL Hiphop Sample based producers will be happy.

As for the Akai Force, they are researching the EDM scene and seeing what holes can be filled there. Also, I won't lie, but on the whole an EDM producer, spend more money on gear than hip hop producers. Especially in the tabletop and module world.

If the Akai Force had MIDI Polyphonic Expression, Users could use the Equator software created by Roli. The software works with standard MIDI pressurize pads but the power is in MPE.

Link: https://roli.com/products/software/equator-synth

QuickStrike wrote:
Personal attack... That's interesting Lozzieben why would you say that?

No, there was no "Personal attack".

It is a simple matter of fact that none of us "need" equipment that does everything. We may have preferences for certain features, and will buy accordingly.

Specifically on the subject of RAM, the amount of memory available for samples within a project may be really good for traditional MPC drum programs, but for features like audio tracks and clips, less than 1Gb seems to not to be a good match for the firmware's capabilities.

That would be dope. Agree of your previous post.

Yo on the 2000XL max ram was 32mb lol

CharlesRandolph wrote:If the Akai Force had MIDI Polyphonic Expression, Users could use the Equator software created by Roli. The software works with standard MIDI pressurize pads but the power is in MPE.

Link: https://roli.com/products/software/equator-synth

Danoc wrote:That would be dope. Agree of your previous post.

Yo on the 2000XL max ram was 32mb lol

Yes...and that was considered a lot of RAM. Also Keyboards had 8 mb expansion sound cards. With the live/x/force I wonder how much ram is shared just on the graphics.?

Danoc wrote:The MPC and computer are 2 different products and a PC can be blown out to unmeasured portions where the MPC can't.
You huild these different anf not try to make the MPC be or compete with a PC. You make the mpc however capable of doing things other MPCs couldn't.

The 2 types of producers.
1. One that has the MPC and center core is the computer (that's ME).
2. One that would like to produce in standalone without the computer, then lay tracks in the computer. (Use to be me).
The center of the producers stu.

It is possible to to take say the X and rebuild a new model strictky for stand alone but beef that motha up real good where a priducer could just produce without worries. You wouldn't have to worry about PDC. Put a top of the line motha board in it, optional ram expansion , get with Microsoft and have a intel chip in it, etc, the works. So you don't need it to be equal with a computer but dam near one. Though it sounds nice l wouldn't be interested because l love being ITB but for traveling purposes hell yeah. I could pick that up and a small keyboard and go.

Hey man your name on reverse is Conad

LOL

Frisbi wrote:
Hey man your name on reverse is Conad

CharlesRandolph wrote:Only an overtly sensitive hobbyist would take, what I typed as boasting. If I was, you would know.

It's not the content of the reply, it's the reason you replied. The talk about disc streaming as an answer to 90% of people's issues with running out of RAM for large live sets. You're wrong about it, streaming on the MPC would greatly reduce the RAM use, it's not rocket science, but somehow there seems to be "camps" here about it. You bought a machine with 2GB of RAM, that probably has that RAM soldered in. So complaining about it now is pointless.

If you want more tracks use a computer or better yet buy TWO and sync them together. Disk streaming is good, but it also forces the user to have another back up drive.

Disc streaming hasn't needed two computers for years, especially with SSDs. Hopefully people would be wise enough to follow through with a stems approach to all of this. Disc streaming is coming. These aren't camps BTW, I would appreciate more RAM for sure, but I don't foresee AKAI going the way of upgradable RAM, unless they took it back to their factory and charged an arm and a leg for it.

As far as the MPC LIVE/X/FORCE, their board is made to support up to 8GB of RAM.

Right, but the device as we know it right now is not upgradable. So what's the point?
Kicking water uphill is all I see people doing here.

I bought the MPC Live because it's a well though out device with a lot of great features.
Maschine had dried up, Spark is a dead man walking, and I like the stand alone + controller idea of the MPCs, it's forward thinking.

I knew beforehand the limitations, but IMO it's pretty freaking amazing for $1K. Currently I'm using it stand alone, because of the limitations, not in spite of them, and beat clocked to Reaper, Live, DP etc. I have no interest in the other MPC's, I like the fact that this is stand alone, but I also use it in VST mode with Reaper primarily, because these types of VSTi's (Maschine, MPC2) tend to kill CPU in Live and DP.

I'm still not convinced by the Force. Don't see it, until we have disc streaming, and more information about how it works with other DAWs on the computer besides Live, including the MPC2 software which it's starting to look like it doesn't work as well as the Live and X do, which is IMO a bad choice on AKAIs part, hopefully that's about integration slowly and not a permanent thing.