Change the beat from 4/4 to 5/4

Hello !!
I'm using the MPC-X
Anyone know if it's possible to change the beat, im recording on, from 4/4 to 5/4 ?

Would love to know if this is possible.

Have a lovely day

Found the solution.

System Settings - > Project Default

This is one of the biggest flaws in my X, and why I have to keep my MPC 4000..

Because you can only insert new bars with different time signatures, or have a project default..

You can NOT change bars that you have already recorded on.. And this sucks so bad that it is faster for me to record in Cubase and cut up the recordings in order to alter timesigs, than it is to do all the workarounds required in the X..

But if you just want to change single baroof a 4/4 sequence to a 5/4, then at least that can be done quickly nu adding a 1/4 before or after the selected bar if you say want to do a time signature switch-up..

But I really miss the time sig features of my 4000, and I think it may have been available on the 2kxl as well, where you could open the timesig window and scroll through individual bars on an already recorded sequence, and edit them one by one to have whatever timesig you wanted..

This could be used to sort of "Chop" sequences as you could do with loops, because it would cut/add, according the set timesig, from the end of the bar..

On the X, you can insert a new timesig if you want to expand a bar, but you can not cut by setting up the bar with a timesig that renders a shorter bar - you'll have record the entire thing all over on a new bar, and then delete the one you wanted to change...

I mean it is supposed to follow the tradition of legendary rhythm boxes, but it really screwed up this one.

Same with the missing 2nd Sequence feature from older MPC's..

You can no longer loop different sequences independently to create polyrhythms.. You can set individual tracks of a sequence to have different lengths, but they start over with the sequence so does not loop independently.

From everything I've read so far that makes comparisons between the OG Akai MPC units and the ("Nukai") InMusic MPCs it appears that these new ones are kind of dumbed down. I can't imagine any musician at InMusic who worked on the design of these units making the decision to exclude all other time signatures outside of 4/4. I almost made an expensive mistake before reading about this omission elsewhere.

m1ckDELTA wrote:From everything I've read so far that makes comparisons between the OG Akai MPC units and the ("Nukai") InMusic MPCs it appears that these new ones are kind of dumbed down. I can't imagine any musician at InMusic who worked on the design of these units making the decision to exclude all other time signatures outside of 4/4. I almost made an expensive mistake before reading about this omission elsewhere.

Hi, not sure what I have, but my MPCX is of the first produced lot. The only opton to change time signatures is as discribed above - Project Settings or insert of new parts. This is basically a "NO GO" to my opinion. Luckly I needed that just once in the last years, but thinking of people doing timing changes within the song - or just re-thinking a song and doing a beat change later on, this is a horrible situation.

Another problem is to adjust accentuation later on: Once recorded velocity changes can not be corrected by a certain time frame (e.g. every first and third beat within a bar). You need to go through the whole sequence - followed by all other sequences if required, and adjust it. My ancient Yamaha RS7000 was able to do both - a late signature change and altering beats (pulling beats ahead or making late beat changes ..and probably many other beat boxes can do this too...)

The RS7000's Phrases were also independently looping, and each could have their own length, and didn't have to rely on the Pattern/Style/Sequence length. It's terminology revolved around Phrases, which were the MIDI information on individual Tracks (16). There were 16 Tracks per Section, and up to 16 Sections per Pattern/Style (to put it another way: up to 256 phrases per Pattern/Style). Each phrase was linked to either the internal AWM2 sounds or your loaded samples, and different Phrases on the same Track in different Sections could be playing different instruments (although that could be confusing). All at 960 PPQN resolution, way before other gear like the MPCs started having it.

What I wouldn't give for a modern version of the RS7000 with the same original sequencer features, modernized with 2+ GB RAM, faster processor, and modern storage capabilities (i.e. not the SmartMedia cards or SCSI the RS7000 had, but the SDCards, USB Flash Drives and HD/SSD capabilities the modern MPCs have).

I praise my tracker for complete flexibilty on pattern legnth.
I can set the ticks per pattern for each pattern (not only time signatures).
usualy I use 48 ticks per quarternote (like the sp12/1200 in double tempo). So one bar in 4/4 has 192 ticks.
But I could also add another 48 ticks to make it 5/4 or set it any number (for example 190 tick per bar so the next bar starts slightly earlier than the normal 192 ticks per bar). Full control over time

peace


EDIT: Love your Dali Avatar.

Komatos Records wrote:....
What I wouldn't give for a modern version of the RS7000 with the same original sequencer features, modernized with 2+ GB RAM, faster processor, and modern storage capabilities (i.e. not the SmartMedia cards or SCSI the RS7000 had, but the SDCards, USB Flash Drives and HD/SSD capabilities the modern MPCs have).

A couple of things you did not mention: switching voices (MPC = Program) causes no MIDI delay and the timing is rock-solid....
Yes indeed - the only reason why I bought the MPCX is the better storage options.
Mentioning it, the SD-drive of my MSCX is fu***ed - one of the pins inside broke and destroyed a contact of a SD card when getting it out (and no, I did not rip it out - but I used it very often. Only a complete replacement of the whole front connection would be the solution. Luckily the USB is able to manage a multi-cards reader (USB3 Trancend - TS-RDF8K, just in case somebody is interested).
I have lost the drive but now I am not limited to SD cards anymore. Good.