Technical questions for the MPC2000xl and the MPC2000
By beesting Wed Jan 07, 2004 11:50 am
hi =)

i think i read somewhere that it was not possible to read mpc2000xl formatted zip disks on a computer with windows xp (due to ntfs instead of fat 32 formatting). is this true?

is there a program out there that will let me do it? how else would i do it without having to partition my hard drive and install a different operation system just to load sounds onto the zip disk (which i am not prepared to do).

any help would be greatly appreciated.

By cooocooo1 Wed Jan 07, 2004 12:20 pm
The MPC can read PC formatted disks so just format the zip on the computer and you're all set. Actually, now that I think about it, I've never even formatted a zip myself, I always buy PC formatted zip disks.
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By MPC-Tutor Wed Jan 07, 2004 1:24 pm
You are right - any OS that isn't FAT formatted will not read MPC formatted disks.

There is software you can buy - Partition Magic will convert your NTFS C drive to FAT32. You don't need NTFS to run XP.

There may also be a way to convert your C drive to FAT32 without buying partition magic - try searching on Google (Tweakxp.com is a good site)
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By young_keyz Wed Jan 07, 2004 2:30 pm
this is the problem i had a long time ago i had alot of mpc formatted disk and xp wont read them...my father had a computer with windows Me and it did read mpc disk so what i did was just took everything i had on my zip disk and put it on his computers hard drive then took those disk and format them to FAT (not fat32) then i just went to my fathers computer and put all my info back on my zip disk and it was all good. thats what i did. Also if you buy a new zip or floppy disk before you use it in the mpc just format it for your computer first
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By Lampdog Wed Jan 07, 2004 3:54 pm
I have XP NTFS but I formatted my ZIP disks on my PC using FAT16 or just plain FAT (samething), that way I can transfer my samples between my PC zip drive and MPC zip drive easily. I can read my ZIP disks in both machines.. But.. I must stick to 8 character filenames in order to avoid problems.. CK Rename freeware batch renaming utility helps with the batch renaming..

By D_Samp Wed Jan 07, 2004 7:41 pm
lampdog...

batch renaming is built into XP.


and for the record XP can read FAT... so im unsure why mpc-tutor says otherwise. my main HDD is NTFS for XP and programs, but my sample and recording HDD's are FAT.

my MPC formatted zips have no problem either.

By Madness Thu Jan 08, 2004 4:41 am
Thats kinda wierd...

It seems some Cats' have problems then others don't.... Perhaps if you have a Fat32 formated drive on your system XP will detect it when it installs and then install the capacity necessary to be compatible if it was formated by a different OS. Weird though because XP will format a FAT 32 no worries, must be different somehow...
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By Lampdog Thu Jan 08, 2004 5:17 am
D_Samp wrote:lampdog...

batch renaming is built into XP.
and for the record XP can read FAT... so im unsure why mpc-tutor says otherwise. my main HDD is NTFS for XP and programs, but my sample and recording HDD's are FAT.

my MPC formatted zips have no problem either.


I know, I just prefer CKRename, I've been using it forever and the XP thing turned me off..

NTFS can read the bits of "PC" FAT you are right, but when a disk is formatted via PC FAT(FAT) and used for transfer, NTFS can only read the first 8 bits of a file from the MPC, hence, the reason why after transfers long names get truncated ie. 123456~1.snd... "MPC FAT" differs from Windows FAT..

Do this for me, check again, right click on:
local disk c
properties
tools (tab)
Defragment now.

And see what format your drives really are..
Lemme know w'sup..

Mine say C:NTFS - E:NTFS - F:FAT32

I cannot read my MPC formatted 250ZIP disks at all..
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By MPC-Tutor Thu Jan 08, 2004 9:13 am
D_Samp wrote:l
and for the record XP can read FAT... so im unsure why mpc-tutor says otherwise. my main HDD is NTFS for XP and programs, but my sample and recording HDD's are FAT.

my MPC formatted zips have no problem either.


I never said XP could not read FAT, obviously it reads standard FAT disks, - I said an XP system with NTFS will not read MPC formatted disks. If you have a dedicated audio partition with its own OS installed on FAT32 then you'll not have any problem reading MPC formatted disks because the drive will be controlled from a FAT32 file system.

Hence to carry samples from XP to MPC and vice versa, either use standard PC formatted FAT disks, or make sure the partition holding your XP OS is FAT32.