MPC One Losing Transients on Drums : (

This is an age old problem with samplers but is still a major problem (happens with Ensoniq Mirage and Roland S-750 ime). I cannot post audio examples here it seems so please follow the link to the thread I made about it at gearspace. Two weeks since I posted it there and crickets btw. Nobody cares that the MPC is useless for, checks notes... SNARES???????

https://gearspace.com/board/electronic-music-instruments-and-electronic-music-production/1457837-mpc-one-losing-transients-drums.html

The MPC One shaves off the transient of these snares unless double triggered or something layered over/before them to i guess open the volume envelope. I don't believe there is a solution to this please tell me if there is.

I really don't understand the problem you're trying to explain here. I'm *assuming* you are talking about how a sampler will generally place the start time of a sample when/where a transient hits loudest or crosses a threshold, and this can have the side effect of shortening the transient. But I'm just guessing.

*If* this is the issue you're facing, which I have hit before, I generally will just manually start the recording by hand, instead of letting the sampler decide when to start recording. This will give you more control over where the start/end of the sample is, to meet your own needs.

Given the number of posts you've got on gear space, I imagine you've had a lot of rompler/synth/sampler experience... which is why I'm not really understanding what you're trying to raise as a problem... as this is how most samplers work. Claiming the MPC is useless and being a bit dramatic about it is probably what is pushing people away from responding. Just taking a guess though.

At any rate, if you want more control over the transients of your samples, manually start the record process, and then tweak the start/end points to taste, it should get you sorted. Otherwise, there's probably other ways to sample like the looper, or audio tracks, that *may* be more appropriate for whatever it is you're trying to do, but haven't really explained beyond "sample snares".

He's talking about how, when triggering a sample with a strong transient, the initial transient is reduced unless you quickly trigger it twice in succession. I assume he's referring to within a sequence or during live playback rather than when sampling.

OP, Is this happening in all projects? Which firmware version were you using in those examples?

NearTao wrote:I really don't understand the problem you're trying to explain here. I'm *assuming* you are talking about how a sampler will generally place the start time of a sample when/where a transient hits loudest or crosses a threshold, and this can have the side effect of shortening the transient. But I'm just guessing.

*If* this is the issue you're facing, which I have hit before, I generally will just manually start the recording by hand, instead of letting the sampler decide when to start recording. This will give you more control over where the start/end of the sample is, to meet your own needs.

Given the number of posts you've got on gear space, I imagine you've had a lot of rompler/synth/sampler experience... which is why I'm not really understanding what you're trying to raise as a problem... as this is how most samplers work. Claiming the MPC is useless and being a bit dramatic about it is probably what is pushing people away from responding. Just taking a guess though.

At any rate, if you want more control over the transients of your samples, manually start the record process, and then tweak the start/end points to taste, it should get you sorted. Otherwise, there's probably other ways to sample like the looper, or audio tracks, that *may* be more appropriate for whatever it is you're trying to do, but haven't really explained beyond "sample snares".

that's weird....
also i'm not sure if I hear the transience being lost...I feel like the attack is being lost, no? it's the hit right at the beginning of the sound, it even shows in the waveform on your gearspace post

NearTao wrote:I really don't understand the problem you're trying to explain here. I'm *assuming* you are talking about how a sampler will generally place the start time of a sample when/where a transient hits loudest or crosses a threshold, and this can have the side effect of shortening the transient. But I'm just guessing.

*If* this is the issue you're facing, which I have hit before, I generally will just manually start the recording by hand, instead of letting the sampler decide when to start recording. This will give you more control over where the start/end of the sample is, to meet your own needs.

Given the number of posts you've got on gear space, I imagine you've had a lot of rompler/synth/sampler experience... which is why I'm not really understanding what you're trying to raise as a problem... as this is how most samplers work. Claiming the MPC is useless and being a bit dramatic about it is probably what is pushing people away from responding. Just taking a guess though.

At any rate, if you want more control over the transients of your samples, manually start the record process, and then tweak the start/end points to taste, it should get you sorted. Otherwise, there's probably other ways to sample like the looper, or audio tracks, that *may* be more appropriate for whatever it is you're trying to do, but haven't really explained beyond "sample snares".

There is a thread on gearspace from the gearsl--tz days from a respected industrial/edm(?) artist who was trying to use a Roland S-770 for drums but concluded it couldn't for this same reason. The VCA envelope of plosive one-shot sounds does not open fast enough to let the transient through so things like heavy kicks and snares get the front edge shaved off, either playing in a MIDI sequence or triggered manually.

The same thing happened with my Roland S-750 and Ensoniq Mirage and now MPC One. So I can't exactly knock (pun) the MPC without also knocking those others. I think I started getting more harsh in that thread after two weeks went buy and now still no replies other than mine.

Like, you can get the transient to play but you have to double trigger the sound quickly like MPC-Tutor said or have some other sound already playing. (Hold on, MPC-Tutor casually affirms what I am saying means no solution. D'oh!)

MPC-Tutor wrote:He's talking about how, when triggering a sample with a strong transient, the initial transient is reduced unless you quickly trigger it twice in succession.

OP, Is this happening in all projects? Which firmware version were you using in those examples?

Exactly. Happens in all projects either just playing the pads or playing back a sequence. I had not upgraded since last spring I think it's 3.4.3.12.

Drum loops are ok since the envelope stays open it's just one shots that are affected.

Sunshine at Night wrote:that's weird....
also i'm not sure if I hear the transience being lost...I feel like the attack is being lost, no? it's the hit right at the beginning of the sound, it even shows in the waveform on your gearspace post

Yes exactly, you can see in the wav image and hear the snares that keep the attack/transient.

haze3000 wrote:https://gearspace.com/board/electronic-music-instruments-and-electronic-music-production/1457837-mpc-one-losing-transients-drums.html

I assigned the WAV you uploaded to a pad on my MPC One and ran some tests, and there was no change in the transients with either internal resampling or external recording through a Zoom recorder.

Resample:

Zoom H4e:

Elijah wrote:

haze3000 wrote:https://gearspace.com/board/electronic-music-instruments-and-electronic-music-production/1457837-mpc-one-losing-transients-drums.html

I assigned the WAV you uploaded to a pad on my MPC One and ran some tests, and there was no change in the transients with either internal resampling or external recording through a Zoom recorder.

Resample:

Zoom H4e:

Yes exactly, as I mentioned this only affects one shots. In a loop the VCA remains open. If you were to chop up the WAV into individual drum hits you will get the transient loss problem. It's pretty straightforward, it's a matter of manually tripping the VCA when playing one-shot plosive sounds either by repetitive triggering or having something loud enough just before or underneath to keep the VCA open.

Here is a quote from the gearsl-tz thread from 2009 that I was talking about. Same thing happened with my S-750 and Mirage.

"Originally Posted by Disease Factory ➡️
I would never use this sampler for a kick drum. One flaw and a very annoying one at that is the S750 can cut of the transients of drum samples during playback. You wont notice it on 90% of your drums sounds but I always noticed it with kik drums so I could never use it for that. I have had a number of S750s and they all did that."

haze3000 wrote:Here is a quote from the gearsl-tz thread from 2009 that I was talking about. Same thing happened with my S-750 and Mirage.

"Originally Posted by Disease Factory ➡️
I would never use this sampler for a kick drum. One flaw and a very annoying one at that is the S750 can cut of the transients of drum samples during playback. You wont notice it on 90% of your drums sounds but I always noticed it with kik drums so I could never use it for that. I have had a number of S750s and they all did that."

Someone better tell J-Dilla, Pete Rock, and Kanye West to give their money back they've made off all the beats they've made using MPCs. This is kind of a goofy topic and really an exaggeration. You can absolutely use an MPC for Kick drums and snares. People are doing it all over this world every day. lol

Skeeter_Woo wrote:

haze3000 wrote:Here is a quote from the gearsl-tz thread from 2009 that I was talking about. Same thing happened with my S-750 and Mirage.

"Originally Posted by Disease Factory ➡️
I would never use this sampler for a kick drum. One flaw and a very annoying one at that is the S750 can cut of the transients of drum samples during playback. You wont notice it on 90% of your drums sounds but I always noticed it with kik drums so I could never use it for that. I have had a number of S750s and they all did that."

Someone better tell J-Dilla, Pete Rock, and Kanye West to give their money back they've made off all the beats they've made using MPCs. This is kind of a goofy topic and really an exaggeration. You can absolutely use an MPC for Kick drums and snares. People are doing it all over this world every day. lol

To be fair they are talking about modern mpcs. If you have any experience using classic mpcs you’ll understand the concern. Some of us accept it in exchange for the other advantages modern mpcs have but this has been a known issue since the renaissance

haze3000 wrote:

Elijah wrote:I assigned the WAV you uploaded to a pad on my MPC One and ran some tests, and there was no change in the transients with either internal resampling or external recording through a Zoom recorder.

Resample:

Zoom H4e:

Yes exactly, as I mentioned this only affects one shots. In a loop the VCA remains open. If you were to chop up the WAV into individual drum hits you will get the transient loss problem. It's pretty straightforward, it's a matter of manually tripping the VCA when playing one-shot plosive sounds either by repetitive triggering or having something loud enough just before or underneath to keep the VCA open.

This test wasn’t done with a loop. I took a snare one-shot with a clear transient from your WAV, assigned it to a pad in a drum program, and played it manually. What you’re seeing here are the results recorded through internal resampling and through an external recorder. You should be able to see that the transient on the very first hit isn’t lost.

Elijah wrote:I assigned the WAV you uploaded to a pad on my MPC One and ran some tests, and there was no change in the transients with either internal resampling or external recording through a Zoom recorder.

Yes exactly, you took a snare that only had the transient because there was enough noise preceding it for the VCA to trip and play the transient. There are no snares in my examples that have the transient and have complete silence preceding it. So you truncated the snare but preceding it was enough of a signal to open the VCA in time.

Like I said this is as old as time it's something that either happens in a sampler or it doesn't and can not be fixed or worked around. Maybe fixed, will have to see if that is possible in an os update.

Otherwise I think the machine is ok for sampling and snares actually sound good in the mix without the VCA problem. So there just has to be noise behind the snare for it to sound completely and not total silence.

Still, not ideal at all especially for a modern 'drum sampler', but considering everything else the machine can do I otherwise don't have too many complaints.

With the Amount EQs, Compressors, and other Effects we have, There should Be ZERO Problems Bringing those "Lost Transients" Back

From my tests, I haven't encountered that kind of transient issue on the MPC One.

MPC One is NOT losing transients on drums.

I performed a test using an impulse sound
There is absolutely no difference between the hits fastly triggered and the other ones.

https://gearspace.com/board/showpost.ph ... stcount=17

What the OP is hearing is either some dynamic fx applied, or polyphonic issue where the tail of the previous sound affects the attack of the next one, or some psycho acoustic thing.
On some sounds, when triggered repeatedly , we can feel some differences between them, event if there is none.