Live discontinued?

MPC-Tutor wrote:It's been nearly 3 years since the last MPC release so it's always reasonable to assume a new MPC coming around NAMM time. But I seem to remember that the Live went mysteriously out of stock in the EU before (year or so ago), so might be nothing.

Most of the 'wish list' features for the Live are fixable via software updates, so I had assumed that the hardware might possibly stick around while they implemented stuff like disk streaming, with additional revenue coming from software upgrade fees.

Really hard to tell what's happening ATM with the MPCs and the Force. I can't see them changing anything on the Force hardware front, not after only 12 months, but I think they've realised the the force was overpriced, so hopefully it will start selling now at the new price, especially if they release the promised arrangement mode asap.

But if there's a new Live coming, I'm intrigued to see what new hardware features it will have over its predecessor. More Qlinks? Zonal pads? Tilt screen? More memory? Better I/O?

Ahah now we start to fantasize.
I would just need more ram, a better cpu and maybe 8qlinks and maybe more outputs.
Just that.

They could drop the price of the MPC X, to the original price of the MPC Live, then release a new flag ship. Or separate the MPC into it's own independent brand/company.

I'm not fantasizing at all about a new MPC. If they kill the Live without addressing these things we've been griping about, why on earth would I buy another Akai product? If that's the case, I'm most likely dumping this and getting some other sequencer that already has the features I need in place.

CharlesRandolph wrote:They could drop the price of the MPC X, to the original price of the MPC Live, then release a new flag ship. Or separate the MPC into it's own independent brand/company.

Uhm that's interesting.
I can already see Mpc X dropped to 1700 euro here in Europe.
That's near to the original Mpc Live price (1300).
Also Force now it's under 1000.
Of course something is happening.

Updated.

They could drop the price of the MPC X, to the original price of the MPC Live, then release a new flag ship.

Or

Just turn the MPC, into it's own independent brand/company. Then release the following:

MPC X (Current Form with a Lower Price.)
MPC K (Keyboard Workstation with MPC Live interface.) Elyac!
MPC XL (Higher End Enthusiast/Power User Limited Edition.)

The MPC Software, when then become an utility program for the MPC Eco system. In which the 3 devices listed above would 100% communicate with each other. Remove splice and Ableton and keep that strictly for the Akai Force and Akai Fire.

Frisbi wrote:Uhm that's interesting.
I can already see Mpc X dropped to 1700 euro here in Europe.
That's near to the original Mpc Live price (1300).
Also Force now it's under 1000.
Of course something is happening.

MPC-Tutor wrote:Most of the 'wish list' features for the Live are fixable via software updates, so I had assumed that the hardware might possibly stick around while they implemented stuff like disk streaming, with additional revenue coming from software upgrade fees.

But if there's a new Live coming, I'm intrigued to see what new hardware features it will have over its predecessor. More Qlinks? Zonal pads? Tilt screen? More memory? Better I/O?

Some of what I've read on some of the software features, simply may not be as feasible as they should be with the current hardware configuration and would require a more deep detangling of how things currently are designed. The effort needed to do that would need to be funded by new hardware, and they wouldn't want to throw away the effort already done - so if there is something new on the horizon...

Expect more of the same, just beefed up, allowing them to continue support for the Live/X as its still the same platform, but with an injection of money from a MK2 or whatever to fix things that have been requested, or to provide the horsepower to cheat it under the current design.

I wouldn't expect too much from a "new hardware feature" stand-point, maybe a slight redesign of certain elements on the Live (OLED OLED OLED OLED), and the X might get some more configuration options via expanded I/O. Or we may get a more unified MPC, somewhere between the two *doubt it, but the internet whispers*. But anyone holding their breathe for drastic changes will most likely turn blue in the face.
- Unreall

Unreallystic wrote:

MPC-Tutor wrote:Most of the 'wish list' features for the Live are fixable via software updates, so I had assumed that the hardware might possibly stick around while they implemented stuff like disk streaming, with additional revenue coming from software upgrade fees.

But if there's a new Live coming, I'm intrigued to see what new hardware features it will have over its predecessor. More Qlinks? Zonal pads? Tilt screen? More memory? Better I/O?

Some of what I've read on some of the software features, simply may not be as feasible as they should be with the current hardware configuration and would require a more deep detangling of how things currently are designed. The effort needed to do that would need to be funded by new hardware, and they wouldn't want to throw away the effort already done - so if there is something new on the horizon...

Expect more of the same, just beefed up, allowing them to continue support for the Live/X as its still the same platform, but with an injection of money from a MK2 or whatever to fix things that have been requested, or to provide the horsepower to cheat it under the current design.

I wouldn't expect too much from a "new hardware feature" stand-point, maybe a slight redesign of certain elements on the Live (OLED OLED OLED OLED), and the X might get some more configuration options via expanded I/O. Or we may get a more unified MPC, somewhere between the two *doubt it, but the internet whispers*. But anyone holding their breathe for drastic changes will most likely turn blue in the face.
- Unreall

Yeah exactly.
But an Mpc with upgraded motherboard would make a lot of sense.
Same hardware, just a new cpu and more Ram.
Am I the only one who thinks that current Mpc just reached its potential and it needs more powerful cpu to put more features?
I mean, we are dealing with not more then 1gb of Ram and an ordinary tablet cpu at the moment.

lordradish wrote:I'm not fantasizing at all about a new MPC. If they kill the Live without addressing these things we've been griping about, why on earth would I buy another Akai product? If that's the case, I'm most likely dumping this and getting some other sequencer that already has the features I need in place.

Akai has already stated that they plan to support the current hardware for some to come, so even if they EOL'd the MPC Live hardware production tomorrow - we'd likely still get software updates in 2020 (and presumably further).

That said, them addressing the things we've been griping about may never happen no matter what. They can't please everyone, and one user's demands may be completely different than another user's...

lordradish wrote:I'm not fantasizing at all about a new MPC. If they kill the Live without addressing these things we've been griping about, why on earth would I buy another Akai product? If that's the case, I'm most likely dumping this and getting some other sequencer that already has the features I need in place.

Which is the way people should be buying all their gear, i.e. buy it for the features it actually has today, not the features you hope/expect/assume it will have.

If Akai do release new software features with the new hardware, I would expect most of those new features to still be available to the Live/X, I doubt Akai is going to forcibly block features unless the older MPCs simply don't have the resources to cope with them.

When they released MPC 2.x, most of the new features worked with the Ren/Studio (although the implementation in the bluescreen UI is often only half hearted). Obviously some stuff was never going to work with the older, non-touchscreen hardware , e.g. XYFX.

lordradish wrote: If that's the case, I'm most likely dumping this and getting some other sequencer that already has the features I need in place.

Out of curiosity, what would that other sequencer be?

Frisbi wrote:Am I the only one who thinks that current Mpc just reached its potential and it needs more powerful cpu to put more features?
I mean, we are dealing with not more then 1gb of Ram and an ordinary tablet cpu at the moment.

Well, if people want silly amounts of high end DAW features adding on top of the existing features then I guess we would need more CPU. But with disk streaming, the 1GB memory becomes a non-problem, so it depends on whether disk streaming is possible under the current CPU. I suspect it is, but I have no technical understanding to back up that assumption. We know that Hype works with the current hardware, but apparently we would need to add an SSD to store the wavetables, but the current hardware already allows for this user-upgrade.

My understanding is that samplers like the OP-1 and the elektron oktotrack are still using the same CPU/memory internals that they were using on their original release several years ago. There is no pressing need to continually update the hardware in these systems as long as the firmware is well coded and works around the hardware limitations.

It would actually be refreshing to see akai actually stick with the current hardware and instead focus on polishing the software. I'm more than happy to pay for software upgrades, plus there are other ways they can generate money from existing users - for example, creating optional 'add on' plugins (fx and synths etc), it doesn't have to be about continually discontinuing and replacing hardware.

Agree, This is one reason, having pre install sound set, that can't be removed without causing an error was a bad idea. Give people the option of what to install, when it comes to effects and sounds. I pretty sure without all the bloat in the code, these machines run pretty well.

I say stop making a groove box and get back to making a Kick A$$ Sampler/MIDI Sequencer. The all in one, that does a little of everything, is bad idea. The MPC LIVE/X has no identity, that's why people request so many random features.

MPC-Tutor wrote:
Well, if people want silly amounts of high end DAW features adding on top of the existing features then I guess we would need more CPU. But with disk streaming, the 1GB memory becomes a non-problem, so it depends on whether disk streaming is possible under the current CPU. I suspect it is, but I have no technical understanding to back up that assumption. We know that Hype works with the current hardware, but apparently we would need to add an SSD to store the wavetables, but the current hardware already allows for this user-upgrade.

My understanding is that samplers like the OP-1 and the elektron oktotrack are still using the same CPU/memory internals that they were using on their original release several years ago. There is no pressing need to continually update the hardware in these systems as long as the firmware is well coded and works around the hardware limitations.

It would actually be refreshing to see akai actually stick with the current hardware and instead focus on polishing the software. I'm more than happy to pay for software upgrades, plus there are other ways they can generate money from existing users - for example, creating optional 'add on' plugins (fx and synths etc), it doesn't have to be about continually discontinuing and replacing hardware.

I believe you can remove the internal sounds, but you must retain the folder structure, not tested this personally though. I prefer to just ignore the internal drive. My understanding is that the actual firmware and OS is not installed on this drive, it's on a separate 16GB drive built into the motherboard, so in that respect they probably have a lot of room for more code including more synths, fx, progressions etc (as long as existing CPU/memory can cope).

EDIT!

Reading the spec's of the SOC, and it does support eMMC 4.5, so the 16 GB is for the system software. So the SD card that is used holds the sound sets. So if the SD card is swapped out with a larger one, could more sounds be install on it?