Chopping on the s950 is easy and fast. But then again I dont like that "autochop" garbage that a lot of gear has today.
If theres a loop I wanna chop I just make enough copies of that loop based on how many chops I want. (This is where the ram upgrade is a must).
The key is to always remember the end point of your previous sample and use this as the start point of your next. I can chop shit up super quick on it like this. Don't forget "edit sample" pg. 10 to truncate left over material.
Other things that help:
- On pg. 2 of edit sample, make sure Selected program is set to the name of your program, not monitor. This will allow you to chop while your sequence in playing and a few other things. Everyone raves about doing this on newer mpc's and new OS upgrades but you could do this with an external sampler like the s950 for ever. (good looks to DFACE for this pointer).
-The space button will let you bounce between the two last visited pages under whatever category you are working on within the s950. So if you gotta work between two pages for a little bit, no need to use the key pad or the control wheel, just one button and bam you're there. **Make sure you press enter in the page u want the space button to "remember"**
-When I use a sp-1200, I have a preset Keygroup disc that I "boot" the s950 up with. This gives me 32 keygroups that are already set to the sp-1200 32 possible empty pads.
So when I chop I dont fool around with Keygroups and high and low ranges. That takes forever. I just place the samples where they need to go.
-Make sure you learn to use midi offset for each Keygroups. This allows you to have different kg's respond to different midi channels on samplers that will support this (sp1200 doesnt, but mpc, asr, eps, etc do).
Why?? Since the s950 can only play one program at a time. You might need the full keyboard range on a bass stab sample and this range might cover the keys you used for your drum samples. Put their keygroups on different midi channels and they are now independent and do not conflict (unless they are assigned to the same sound output)
-Decay used to confuse me on the s950. If you want to have the decay work on things like one shots, make sure the sustain value has been changed as well.
S950 is a beast no matter how you cut it. That thing will always have a place in the studio. Its just to straight forward and easy to operate.
If you are an sp12/1200 user as well and you wan't to make a keygroup boot disc for your s950, use this chart I put together. DFACE has had it up on the sp-1200 forums for a while. It'll tell you what notes to use for your High and Low key ranges when you make keygroups on the s950.
http://img272.imageshack.us/img272/9045/spchart13ck.jpg
Don't forget to check the beats:
www.myspace.com/jaeone3345
