Support and discussion for all of Akai’s modern standalone MPCs including the MPC X / X SE, MPC Live 1, 2 & 3, MPC One / One+, MPC Key 37/61.
By markr04 Sun May 19, 2024 11:02 pm
The MPC One has a bad decision for a headphone jack. It's just a 1/8" (3.5mm) jack soldered to a PCB instead of being mounted to the front panel, so it's prone to lifting from the PCB traces and causes an intermittent connection. Just bad all around. A good friend of mine and I did this to it today.

Switchcraft jacks are about the best you can buy (I'll testify to that). I don't want to redo this mod anytime soon, so I spent more on my jack. It has a nice, solid feel when inserting a plug. However, the budget-minded person can do this starting at $4 or less with a generic, open jack (also on Amazon). Quite a price difference, but it's mah MPC and I don't want future problems from the jack. :-)

All of that said... I followed instructions I found on YouTube. I'll include a link to his very helpful video and to the jack I used.

Here's the jack. I paid $22 for it last week, but I see it's $12 today. Your gain!
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00C5B272Q

This is the YouTube video we followed, but note that the center screw on the bottom of the One+ is a Torx head (all the rest are Philips).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hzU8Yy9b1io

-Mark
Last edited by markr04 on Sun May 19, 2024 11:25 pm, edited 2 times in total.
By markr04 Mon May 20, 2024 4:38 am
The black tape is Akai's work. From what I could tell, its only purpose is to hold down the ribbon cable. We didn't have to mess with the ribbon cable anyway. I laid down some clear tape to insulate the PCB from the jack to prevent any possible shorts. The jack isn't touching the PCB, but ideally it would be a couple more mm from the PCB.
By 40Beatz Mon May 20, 2024 1:18 pm
Akai Should Pay You For This Redesign!

Good Work!!!
By markr04 Mon May 20, 2024 3:28 pm
Christov wrote:So you got two headphone outs now or is the little one disconnected?


Yes, I have two headphone outs now :-). The MPC drives both pairs of my headphones together just fine. I'm the only musician in my circle of friends, but they find the MPC interesting for various reasons. This way, I can do some things as they listen in headphones. :-)
User avatar
By Ultros Mon May 20, 2024 3:56 pm
B-Wise wrote:Plot Twist:
Akai is suing a dude on MPC-FORUMS.COM for manually improving on their hardware! :shock: :mrgreen:


They can't. It's his object. Once you pay for an object and its in your ownership you may do with it as you see fit. If you want to rat-rod it you can go nuts, if you want to reprogram its chips, go crazy. You bought it, it's yours. If you wanna beat it to death with an aluminum bat, have at it.
By B-Wise Mon May 20, 2024 4:21 pm
Ultros wrote:
B-Wise wrote:Plot Twist:
Akai is suing a dude on MPC-FORUMS.COM for manually improving on their hardware! :shock: :mrgreen:


They can't. It's his object. Once you pay for an object and its in your ownership you may do with it as you see fit. If you want to rat-rod it you can go nuts, if you want to reprogram its chips, go crazy. You bought it, it's yours. If you wanna beat it to death with an aluminum bat, have at it.

It's a joke.