Akai is back at NAMM this year

40Beatz wrote:See me....If i was performing Live....I would have a Laptop with me performing all those features. Putting the Faith of my Performance in the MPC alone would be silly. Or I'd grab some Serato Turntables.

Sure, live is critical but as long as it's stable, why not use the MPC over alternatives?

Also, what you'd want to do live in terms of improvisation may be just as desirable to be able to do on a recording in the studio. Anything that can be recorded and saved on the MPC standalone is a huge benefit over the need to hook up a setup of different pieces in order to replicate a session.

40Beatz wrote:I can kinda do that with the WARP Function in realtime....to a certain degree before it sounds terrible. Reversing in realtime is possible as well.

See me....If i was performing Live....I would have a Laptop with me performing all those features. Putting the Faith of my Performance in the MPC alone would be silly. Or I'd grab some Serato Turntables.

Why do you think it's silly?
These are not complicated features, they were present on samplers of the 90s with fractions of the cpu power of today.
Is it MPC not a sampler?
At least, did it not start as a sampler?
And is it not itself a computer running Linux with Arm chip and 2gb Ram?
These kind of features just require the wish to do them, it's nothing so difficult, it's not even high tech, it's basic sampling features of the 90s.

John Schaefer wrote:Just thought I'd pipe up in response to the people saying 'what else could Akai do in the sampler'?

The modulation section is so basic compared to what existed on the MPC4000. Where the 4K had a modulation matrix, and two free-running multi-shape LFOs, the current line of MPC firmware/software has one LFO that is not an LFO. If it retriggers on every pad/keyboard note then it's not an LFO, just an LFO-shaped envelope. This single thing is a massive block on sound design on the current MPC as you can't modulate anything that will freely move over time, e.g. filter, pitch, start point of sample. There were rack samplers as far back as 1990 that had these features, and 35 years later we don't have one in these machines.

Beyond that, the sort of things I can think of are that some samplers can freeze on a wave and let you 'travellate' the sound using either additive or granular windowing, and you can assign that to a controller (the MPCs have plenty of q-links waiting for this). They're really just one-shot machines right now that no serious samplist or sound designer would invest much time in.

Another function that the CPU on the MPC is more than capable of doing but hasn't been considered by the developers = in Ableton when it analyses waves that are in a folder, it guesses the tempo of percussive samples based on their transients. When these samples are dragged into a Drum Rack in Ableton Live (the equivalent of your MPC pads) it adjusts the playback rate of the samples to be playing in time with your song tempo. If you have resample/varispeed normal mode then it will just slow down or speed up a percussive sample, if you have a Warp mode on then it will retain the pitch but match your sample carefully to the song tempo and you can divide by 2 or multiply by 2 the playback from there.

The MPC5000 used to have a feature in the file browser where if you selected a folder of samples, it would load everything that it found inside the folder onto pads, one by one, until 64 pads had been filled. If it then ran out of space it would automatically generate another new drum Program and carry on dumping samples onto pads until it had loaded every file from your chosen folder. This was incredibly useful and time saving, and you could end up with great happy accidents, taking you beyond the predictable basic kit format. This is such a mundane and easily programmed feature yet it's completely absent on the current machines, which require manual assignment of samples onto pads. I worked a lot faster on the MPC5000 for almost this reason alone, and never had to think too hard about which samples went where because I could just fill up folders with all sorts of sample chaos and the machine itself would make my programs for me, which was great for coming up with unexpected material.

Another missing feature = Microtonal tuning. While desktop samplers like Logic's Sampler, Ableton and Kontakt support this, the MPC does not. The Sequential synths like Pro 3, Prophet 5 etc have microtonal tuning. Hardware synths like the Kodamo EssenceFM have it built in too. Many VST plugins support it, even 'simple' samplers like TAL. It's an almost CPU-inconsequential addition to a box like the MPC since it's only pitch scaling values for the sample playback, but again, these boxes are just one-shot drum machines with a few bells and whistles.

All this aside - I bought the X SE with the intention of running it tethered to get access to Audio Unit/VST plugin effects and more audio tracks than standalone, however the MPC.app is a travesty on Apple Silicon machines and can barely operate under a 512 samples buffer without the audio breaking up into pops and clicks, and the tempo going all over the place. They better have a wholly rewritten MPC v3 desktop app on the way or I'm completely done with the platform.

I hope you don't mind me adding this to post about more advanced sampling features. This is gold! Please check out that thread & add more to when you can to keep all our ideas in the single spot. Thanks.

Advanced sample features thread: viewtopic.php?f=48&t=216022

40Beatz wrote:I'm hoping there is New Hardware at the NAMM.

The only feature I would like to alter in the Sampler Section...

Is the ability to add a "End Loop Point" Marker.

Do we really need new hardware to add this basic feature?

Straker wrote:

40Beatz wrote:I can kinda do that with the WARP Function in realtime....to a certain degree before it sounds terrible. Reversing in realtime is possible as well.

See me....If i was performing Live....I would have a Laptop with me performing all those features. Putting the Faith of my Performance in the MPC alone would be silly. Or I'd grab some Serato Turntables.

Why do you think it's silly?
These are not complicated features, they were present on samplers of the 90s with fractions of the cpu power of today.
Is it MPC not a sampler?
At least, did it not start as a sampler?
And is it not itself a computer running Linux with Arm chip and 2gb Ram?
These kind of features just require the wish to do them, it's nothing so difficult, it's not even high tech, it's basic sampling features of the 90s.

Exactly. Also why don't Akai add Force 16 envelope followers that can used a 16 LFOs to the MPC? Maybe that's coming down the line as well as the rest of the Force macro capabilities.

HUBA wrote:

40Beatz wrote:See me....If i was performing Live....I would have a Laptop with me performing all those features. Putting the Faith of my Performance in the MPC alone would be silly. Or I'd grab some Serato Turntables.

Sure, live is critical but as long as it's stable, why not use the MPC over alternatives?

Also, what you'd want to do live in terms of improvisation may be just as desirable to be able to do on a recording in the studio. Anything that can be recorded and saved on the MPC standalone is a huge benefit over the need to hook up a setup of different pieces in order to replicate a session.

Words of wisdom. The more we can on the box using less gear the better.

Straker wrote:Why do you think it's silly?
These are not complicated features, they were present on samplers of the 90s with fractions of the cpu power of today.
Is it MPC not a sampler?
At least, did it not start as a sampler?
And is it not itself a computer running Linux with Arm chip and 2gb Ram?
These kind of features just require the wish to do them, it's nothing so difficult, it's not even high tech, it's basic sampling features of the 90s.

Its Silly to rely on One Piece of Gear for a Live Performance. The MPC can accompany the Live Performance indeed.
The MPC started out as a Sequencer that had Sampling Capabilities. Akai had a Whole separate Sampling line of Products.
Yes a Trimmed down version of the Linux Software!
I agree...Akai should implement more sampling Features...But as of now...Its a Powerful Sampler in my book!

B-Wise wrote:

40Beatz wrote:I'm hoping there is New Hardware at the NAMM.

The only feature I would like to alter in the Sampler Section...

Is the ability to add a "End Loop Point" Marker.

Do we really need new hardware to add this basic feature?

No You're right. I was just making two points to shift the Arguing on this thread lol

And I suggested "End Loop Points" Markers in another Thread

I've requested this feature for years.
But I am hopeful...because they answered my other Request for Being able to Shuffle Tracks/FX Inserts.

40Beatz wrote:

Straker wrote:Why do you think it's silly?
These are not complicated features, they were present on samplers of the 90s with fractions of the cpu power of today.
Is it MPC not a sampler?
At least, did it not start as a sampler?
And is it not itself a computer running Linux with Arm chip and 2gb Ram?
These kind of features just require the wish to do them, it's nothing so difficult, it's not even high tech, it's basic sampling features of the 90s.

Its Silly to rely on One Piece of Gear for a Live Performance. The MPC can accompany the Live Performance indeed.
The MPC started out as a Sequencer that had Sampling Capabilities. Akai had a Whole separate Sampling line of Products.
Yes a Trimmed down version of the Linux Software!
I agree...Akai should implement more sampling Features...But as of now...Its a Powerful Sampler in my book!

I don't understand why you find it silly to use just Mpc to perform live.
It depends what kind of music you want to make.
Obviously I would not make hard rock with just Mpc.
Anyway, let's jump to the other thread and leave this for Namm, for respect to mr. AdrenaLinn, the genius behind MPC.

Straker wrote:I don't understand why you find it silly to use just Mpc to perform live.
It depends what kind of music you want to make.
Obviously I would not make hard rock with just Mpc.
Anyway, let's jump to the other thread and leave this for Namm, for respect to mr. AdrenaLinn, the genius behind MPC.

3 days to smile as MPC owners

End Loop Points and sample end/start loop should theoretically be a real easy fix . It already exists in the form of clips on the Force. The Force can play a billion clips with independent timelines and looping for audio and midi so I don't see much technical reason the MPC OS can't do so as well. You could probably do an endless plethora of LFOS and sample based LFOS with envelope followers. Most of everything wished for can in some respect be done in Force/MPC, but not in a very intuitive way at the moment.

I'm very happy to see that the most actively discussed NAMM related topic is sampler features! There is still hope.

Native Instruments, indeed.

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DFIWCllP ... tvMDhwdw==

https://www.akaipro.com/mpc3

so we got 3.0 going live as expected at this time; as it was always presumed that Q1 3.0 would go live.

But the NI intergration is underwhelming to be honest; would of preferred xpand2 standalone.

But kinda seems unlikely there will be any new hardware;which suprising as would of assumed new hardware would accompany 3.0