HD Vs. Mem card load time

I seem to recall reading a post here where someone mentioned that the MPC load-time is faster with a memory card than a dedicated hard drive, but couldn't find it again with the search.

Can anyone verify if this is true?

I was thinking of getting a HDD to speed up loading and was surprised to read that.

I'd be interested to hear what people who have both have to say about this (I only have a memory card), but it would seem that the memory card would be faster since there isn't all the overhead that you have with a hard drive - like moving the head to the right track, getting to the right sector, fragmentation etc. But then again, if loading the samples onto the MPC's internal memory is the bottleneck it could be sixes. But my guess is it isn't and the card is faster. Anyone?

i have both and the card is by far the faster. from what i understand this is due to the connection type for the HDD in the machine.

altho with that said it really doesn't effect work flow, and have 100GB at my expense is well worth being slightly slower.

I have both and of course the memory card is faster! It loads up quicker on your MPC and it loads up quicker when you connect it via USB to your com! But I never use the Memory card at all! Actually all i use it for is to load up the image on my start screen which is "MF DOOM"... All my already cut samples are installed on my 80Gb Hard Drive. Drum Kits, Sound Effects, Even 3min long boleros.

Personally I think the Hard Drive is a must have! The memory card is useless to me after I copped that hard drive!

Lampdog wrote:CF, wired connection. HD reads from a disc.

But it doesn't even matter, the speed difference is imo not even big enough to adversely affect workflow at all, why even care about such a thing?

second that.

HDD is great well worth it, and according to sound on sound (and akai advert inside) the new black MPC1000 comes with the new/old pads and AND! has the HDD kit already mounted!! Sneeky *******

undersound wrote:

Lampdog wrote:CF, wired connection. HD reads from a disc.

But it doesn't even matter, the speed difference is imo not even big enough to adversely affect workflow at all, why even care about such a thing?

second that.

HDD is great well worth it, and according to sound on sound (and akai advert inside) the new black MPC1000 comes with the new/old pads and AND! has the HDD kit already mounted!! Sneeky *******

My new black (Bought on Dec 2007) MPC1000 didn't come with the HDM-10 Kit. I had to purchase and install it myself! It did come with the pressure sensitive pads tho'!

i dont have a scanner but the ad says
"Incl HDM-10 Hard disk Mounting kit Colour black"

March 2008 issue of Sound on sound page 56

Lampdog wrote:CF, wired connection. HD reads from a disc.

But it doesn't even matter, the speed difference is imo not even big enough to adversely affect workflow at all, why even care about such a thing?

Because I use the MPC for drum loops in a live performance application. I currently have around 100mb worth of samples, seqs, programs, etc., that I use for every performance and need to load them all at startup.

Taking this into consideration, the load time is somewhere around 5 minutes (at least it *seems* like it).
The other reason I asked such a question is, computers access data much faster via HDD as opposed to flash drive type storage and the fact that the MPC loads faster from the card seemed backwards to me.

So I do "care about such a thing".
Thanks for everyone's response.

I don't know about that. I had to google it, but it turns out that a usb flash drive is bottlenecked by the usb, so transfer time is slower than compared to a standard hard drive. But access time for a flash drive is much faster. But since people are saying that the card is faster on their mpc, the transfer times for compact flash must be better than usb transfers. Lambda Lambda Lambda.

Because I use the MPC for drum loops in a live performance application.
So I do "care about such a thing".
For the mpc, cf is faster, computer architecture is different and you can't compare them like that. But I'd say go with the cf load on stage..

Because I use the MPC for drum loops in a live performance application.
You didn't say that firstly.. So how was I supposed to know "why"?

wouldnt flash drives be faster anyways regardless of where its at due to no moving parts?
flash drives are pretty much gonna replace harddrives once the damn price per gb goes down