Latency compared to other gear

My MPC Live 2 has 6ms of latency compared to all my other gear. If i Make a new project on it as well as on MPC1000, add a drum program on first track and same kick sample on pad1 for both machines with a 4/4 pattern, the mpc live has 6 ms delay compared to 1000. I use exactly same cables going directly to my SSL Big Six. I did this test also with my Rytm and other gear, switch cables, switch channels on the mixer. Nothing seems to get rid of this delay.

I am struggling to like this new MPC but from the moment I bought it only issues have been brought to my setup. I am an experienced studio guy and I know how gear works and I usually am able to map everything so that it works with my setup. But this thing it's been a workflow killer for me. 3 seconds Lag when switching drum tracks or pads in a drum track, this 6ms of latency, which becomes even more when using plugins (each plugin adds latency, only the AIR ones don't), the sequencer is far less intuitive and fun to play then Elektron's one, the software is useless if you wanna use the outputs on the MPC, the support takes forever to answer a simple question (it took 2 weeks to answer 1 simple question)...

The MPC 1000 is simple and intuitive, everything works, no bugs, every time i get the same thing and I know what to expect from it. MPC Live 2 seems to always have some kind of issue hidden in the menus or bugs that can't be solved.

Letting all this frustration aside, I would love to be able to integrate it in my setup, but now, finding that it has such a big latency it got me to my limits, there is no other gear that does that. MPC Live, starting with a completely blank project, has 6 ms of delay compared to all my other gear and I already tried to switch cables or to change mixer channels.

Do you guys know why this might happen?

sorry but... 6ms of latency is considered a lot of latency?

I get that you want the latency to be lower, but given how modern hardware and software works with a complete OS and all, coupled with how interrupts are handled... well it's far more complicated to figure out where the issue might be. how are you measuring this latency? have you tried triggering from an external sequencer to see if there are differences in timing between starting a track versus triggering a sample? Just curious is all...

I'd like to see what/how you are changing programs, because I haven't had it take 3 seconds, though if you're loading from disk some very large projects sure... but if they are already in memory I'm skeptical, but would like to see it in action... I don't feel like it takes that long to change between program tracks for me... but I might have a very different workflow

I used to use the MpcX when I was mostly making downtempo type stuff. I would notice the latency on akai plugins like the distortion and such, especially when stacking. I didn't really like the FX in the MpcX so I started using it as a traditional Mpc rather than a Daw a handful of years ago. It was ok for that. Eventually I just started using it to control an S900, because I didn't enjoy the X's sound a ton. As time went on I switch genres of music randomly and now the MpcX collect dust most of the time. It sucks. I did install 3.4 Tried it a couple times. It's ok, but I could care less. I will be going back to 2.xx and then... I dunno... Sell it? or just purely use it as a controller/drum-machine. I bought a Mpc2000Classic I found for only 300.00cad to try to scratch my Mpc itch but honestly I sorta miss the 2500 with Jjos. Didn't care for its sound so much but how it functioned was nice.

The new Mpc's are alright. Like I do sh*t on them a lot, but yes the whole bugs that never get fixed are digging under my skin. It's like your a starving child and you see your father go out and buy crazy things for himself but then buy noone anything else, barely even share food. Just like... Help other people and not pay attention to the original customers... This is how I feel akai is. They are like a spoiled father releasing new things to bring in more newbies before actually helping it's own faithful original customers. I sorta hate Akai these days. Not gonna lie.... It's fine though.. I come to piece with it, it's just... What shape/form-factor will they release next? What color of paint will be slapped on? Like who cares anymore... I wish Akai would make the machine work the way it was intended instead of giving half-ass-ish results.

I will on and off use the 2000 because of it having less latency, it sounding better, even it's fx do, but honestly... it's so slow using it. I got an scsi-to-sd but it still pretty slow. I'm just so used to visualing seeing a grid in the 1000/2500/5000's over the years because they were the most common I would run into. I was gonna sell the 2000 for around a grande but I'm thinking about keeping it now just to make the first half(intro) of dnb/jungle/jumpup tracks, for its FX like distortion, and try to get to know it's midi better. I sorta have been neglecting it as well and using other gear. None of my other gear has the weird latency issues that the MpcX/Live2 or whatnot have. Sometimes I love the MpcX, and other times I do not.

Sometimes I feel like I know too much about Ableton, other DAWs, sound design and a such for the MpcX these days. It's really just for the 1st half(intros) of tracks as well these days but mostly just creating new breaks. Like resampling from other samplers into it, and then use it, but I really have not been compelled to use it lately. That's me. Everyone is different, or makes different music. So maybe it suites there needs better than mine. Ya know?

What are you comparing with what, to get a difference of 6 ms? Where do you take the zero point, to which you compare the MPC and measure 6 ms difference? I don't understand what you're measuring.

Probably not related, but I've measured that it takes 10 milliseconds for a MIDI event to pass through the Force, compared to MIDI thru. viewtopic.php?p=1848489#p1848489

To me it looks like, the best way to use a Force and so probably MPC as well, is to use it as a master device that decides where "one" is. All others adjust.

NearTao wrote:sorry but... 6ms of latency is considered a lot of latency?
I get that you want the latency to be lower, but given how modern hardware and software works with a complete OS and all, coupled with how interrupts are handled... well it's far more complicated to figure out where the issue might be. how are you measuring this latency? have you tried triggering from an external sequencer to see if there are differences in timing between starting a track versus triggering a sample? Just curious is all...

Hmm, I might have misplaced the words. delay it's more apropiate. All my gear has latency, and that's normal. But the lantecy is because of the AD convertors and buffer size of my project in ableton, it's the same across all my gear, all drummachines / grooveboxes and sequencers, the only one that has a +6ms to the audio is the MPC Live 2. which will need another clock source so I can sync it up. I am not sure if you have notice, but every plugins adds some delay to the audio that is on. If you put 4 MPC60 plugins on a track, that audio will be delayed around 4 ms from the rest of the channels. which is killing the phase of the drums.

NearTao wrote:I'd like to see what/how you are changing programs, because I haven't had it take 3 seconds, though if you're loading from disk some very large projects sure... but if they are already in memory I'm skeptical, but would like to see it in action... I don't feel like it takes that long to change between program tracks for me... but I might have a very different workflow

I made a simple project, with 7 empty drumtracks that are sending midi to one drumtrack which has all the sounds (to get the older MPC kinda workflow). And in main view, by selecting a track and moving the data wheel it takes around 2-3 seconds from the moment i move the data wheel to the moment it changes my track on the screen. I am not sure if this was an issue before 3.4. The project it's almost empty and it is loaded from an external SSD formated xFAT.

BeatWilson wrote:I used to use the MpcX when I was mostly making downtempo type stuff. I would notice the latency on akai plugins like the distortion and such, especially when stacking. I didn't really like the FX in the MpcX so I started using it as a traditional Mpc rather than a Daw a handful of years ago. It was ok for that...

I feel you at this point, this device makes me always ask a simple question: "why am I not using Ableton for this", cause Live 2 really feels like a daw, but a very sluggish one that is way less powerful then Ableton. Just the fact that you have hands on control makes it more special, and maybe the workflow, but the workflow on JJOS is so smooth and easy, it's really lovely, direct and imediate, the sound of 1000 is also much better. So I am not sure why should I keep Live2 when it always seems to show me weaknesses and issues.

HouseWithoutMouse wrote:What are you comparing with what, to get a difference of 6 ms? Where do you take the zero point, to which you compare the MPC and measure 6 ms difference? I don't understand what you're measuring.

I clock my drummachines and grooveboxes so that they come on the grid in ableton, and all of them are always on the grid, I've been synchronising everything like this for years. the MPC is the first one that needs a different clock as it is behind the grid. It either receives the clock later, or, most probably, the internal processing takes more to spit out the audio to its individual outs.

HouseWithoutMouse wrote:Probably not related, but I've measured that it takes 10 milliseconds for a MIDI event to pass through the Force, compared to MIDI thru. viewtopic.php?p=1848489#p1848489

To me it looks like, the best way to use a Force and so probably MPC as well, is to use it as a master device that decides where "one" is. All others adjust.

It might be related, as I am also concern that the internal processing takes longer inside the MPC Live 2. but that's weird as Elektron boxes are also complex but don't have any more delay than any other gear. I also have project that east almost 100mb on MPC 1000 and don't have this delay that MPC Live 2 has with just one sample inside the project.

6 ms latency is about 2 meters at speed of sound, so if you drop a dish or stand quite close next to your band mate or hit a note on a piano, thats about the order of magnitude of this latency.

If I understood correctly, multiple drum machines or other external sequencers are synced as slaves to Ableton Live via MIDI Clock. And the MPC has 6 ms more latency than the other sequencers/drum machines when it is all brought to a common timeline.

There is a feature for this in Ableton, MIDI Clock Sync Delay. If you want to decrease your MPC's latency relative to the other external devices, you use negative six milliseconds as the sync delay for the MIDI output port that's connected to your MPC.

If they were to incorporate the automation in the new Mpc's more like Ableton(a line with dots) rather than the whole jittery boxes thing... I would enjoy the Mpc a lot more, but the whole 6ms isn't a lot, but when adding to the machine I feel like it can get sluggish, with buddy here noting that a root cause of that being Akai FX makes sense because I do remember noticing it mostly when I would stack FX.

And now we'll have MPC3, and public beta and new bells and whistles.
Latencies will just grow and midi issues not solved, but we'll have Disk streaming and colourful pads shining as you hit them with hands full of rings.
MPC is not for pro studios and midi chains, let's face this reality, AKAI doesn't want that. If that's what you are looking for, change brand, time to understand that, and I am very sorry for that too.
It's a sophisticated toy to be used alone, I like it, good to be used as a sampler, or to build some basic drums and fast ideas.
Then you can port them to a computer and keep going without MPC.
Or you can put all inside MPC and just use it without MIDI connections, using the extra outputs for some external effect.
It is what it is

6 ms is not considered latency. You get longer response times in an acoustic piano between the time you press a key and the hammer hits the strings.

Most people can feel the difference above 10ms..So 6ms is ok

Yorgos Arabatzis wrote:Most people can feel the difference above 10ms..So 6ms is ok

Do you mean that it's ok to shift any rhythmic instrument in your drum-based production by 10 ms in any direction? Like, delay drums by 10 ms compared to bass or rhythm guitar - unnoticeable, and cannot be a problem?

weird.

128 / 48 000 = 0.00266666667

should be alot less.. something is going on in your chain.

I use a Sequential Tempest along with my MPC Live and managed to be dead on time by using MPC’s stock Sample Delay plugin in all of the internal tracks.I’m sending all internal Programs/Plugins to a submix track that has the Sample Delay plugin loaded and set a 15ms delay.I’m afraid that’s the only workaround..In this scenario onboard metronome should be off so you need to create a metronome program of your own.AKAI should give us the option to send onboard metronome to a submix track which would be much easier to set this up..
Cheers!

The OP is using the MPC as a clock slave.