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By machien2000 Wed Apr 25, 2007 9:08 am
Hi there, i am quite new to the mpc. Formerly, in a live setup, i used the electron machinedrum sps. As main sequencer I use either ableton live or a Yamaha RM1X. The Machinedrum was the first machine in the midi chain after the sequencer, and it received only notes, no timecode. It received its notes on one midi channel and sent the rest of the midi information/channels thru to the next machines in the midi chain (an Akai Z8 and a Nord Lead Synth in this case).
If i replace the machinedrum by the MPC1000, the machines behind the MPC in the midi chain do not recieve the thru-midi notes like i want them to.

What settings should I apply if i like the MPC to receive midi information on track 14 and send midi information for track 1-13 and 15-16 thru to the rest of the midi chain? I tried every setting, but they all won't work!

Thanks
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By fastgraph Wed Apr 25, 2007 12:09 pm
From http://stereoroid.com/music/mpc1000/mpc1000-midi-tutorial/

The MPC1000 has no Thru ports: instead, it uses Soft Thru to pass information from the MIDI In ports to MIDI Out. Understanding Soft Thru is crucial in using the MPC1000 (or any powerful sequencer) in a complex MIDI setup. (Soft Thru is sometimes called MIDI Echo in computer-based sequencers.)

On the MPC1000, this function can be set to operate in one of several modes:

* Off: no information is passed from In to Out.
* As Track: All incoming MIDI is passed out to the MIDI channel set on the Active (selected) Track.
* Omni-A, Omni-B, Omni-AB: All channels of MIDI are passed through unchanged, to Out A, Out B, or Both, respectively.

In the Omni modes, the channel number on incoming data is unchanged: so, if you want to control more than one channel on a multitimbral module, you need to change the channel at the source.
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By Mr modnaR Wed Apr 25, 2007 12:44 pm
also remember: with soft thru, you do get slightly more latency than with hard thru. only really noticeable when triggering the same piece of audio from the sequencer, and something down the midi chain, but sometimes it can make drums out of sync too, only very slightly, but it's there nonetheless.
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By joeybells Wed Apr 25, 2007 8:59 pm
^^ I'm gonna have to check that out. thanks for pointing that out mr. modnar.
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By elektrik_muz Thu Apr 26, 2007 2:44 am
Yeah midi soft thru sux. Not the MPCs specifically, all of 'em.

My solution? I had a couple of old MOTU midi timepieces thrown at me. These are the two previous generations before the current USB model. They aren't the greatest midi to computer interfaces, but they make pretty good programmable midi patchbays. No throughput worries here...

By machien2000 Thu Apr 26, 2007 9:53 am
So how would you set the mpc if you want it to receive for example channel 14 and transmit the rest of the midi tracks to thru?
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By elektrik_muz Thu Apr 26, 2007 10:12 pm
Simple. Set active track receive to the desired channel and use one of the omni options for midi thru.

By machien2000 Tue May 01, 2007 11:30 am
That doesn't work!

I posted the same problem under a new topic just minutes ago; I can not find a setting in which the mpc plays only the notes it receives on the active receive channel AND sends the rest of the midi information (diffferent channels than the active receive channel) through midi thru. Maybe my machine is broke?
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By elektrik_muz Tue May 01, 2007 5:16 pm
No it isn't broken. Active track receive channel will only really affect which notes are recorded. The soft thru isn't that complex and I wouldn't recommend using it for that purpose anyway as you are begging for increased latency and midi log jams. A routeable midi patchbay or a good,low latency computer midi interface (rare) with software routing is the only proper way to achieve what you are trying to do.