Stiff Pads, Pad Replacement?

One thing you might could do to see if you have any velocity sensitivity at all would be to hold the timing correct button while a sequence is playing and then press a pad and just alternate the pressure, pressing harder and then softer over and over to see if you can notice a difference in the volume of said drum pad. If so, then you may just be experiencing the fact that the 3000 does have to be hit rather hard to reach full velocity. I'm with you, I don't really like knocking the shit out of my vintage gear - so I understand; however, I have new pad sensors on mine and I still have to hit it rather hard to reach full velocity.
I have only owned 3000's and a 60mkI and they both behave similarly, so this may be normal but I just can't say for sure - but it is probably worth mentioning that I have owned two 3000's - one of which I bought brand new back in the early 90's and I do remember that I had to hit it pretty hard to reach full velocity - and that it's display wasn't all that bright either, FWIW - but if buying a new one makes it brighter than stock then I'm all for it.

my mpc 60's pads are alot stiffer than my 2000xl never messed with the 3000 tho

Tvent, thank you. I do have velocity sensitivity, yes. But does that mean that replacing either the pads or sensors will have no impact?

Has anybody here replaced the pads on a 3K?

Any instructions on how to do this? mpc-stuff actually told me they don't know either as they have never done this. Seems a bit strange...

I would have taken some pictures and made some notes when I did mine had I known there were no instructions/videos out there.
It isn't too difficult, but I don't know your level of comfort moving around inside your equipment.

Once you get the case open and hinged up, you will need to unplug two cables that run across the bottom of the metal plate that holds the pad sensors. There is also a ribbon cable that runs over to a small board that is mounted to the metal plate, unhook that cable too.
Once you do that, unscrew the 6 screws that hold the metal plate in.
You can unscrew the three screws that hold the little electronics board onto the metal plate and go ahead and disconnect the cable that connects the pad sensors to this electronics board (The black connector will have a part that will kind of "click" out and you can remove/disconnect that flat clear ribbon cable) if you want to be safe - you can do the replacement without unscrewing this board, but I'd go ahead and remove it incase you need to scrape any of the adhesive on the other side later.
Once you have it out, you will see that the pad sensors are attached to the metal plate with some adhesive - you may have to scrape a bit, but I just peeled mine off and cleaned the metal plate with some adhesive remover of some sort.
Once you do that, attach your new pad sensors to the metal plate and put it all back together, don't forget to hook up all the cables on the way back together.

hth,
Tim

Thanks Tvent,
I think I'll go ahead and replace the pads, not the sensors. the black ones look nice.

In that case, you shouldn't have to remove the smaller board from the metal plate and can get by with just disconnecting the three cables (In fact, if you wanted to you could actually replace the pads without disconnecting the third ribbon cable that goes to the smaller board, but you may as well so you can set the entire plate aside and take this moment to clean any grime around the square holes that the pads go through on the MPC's face.
I put some black pads in my 60 a while back. Kinda gave it an updated look. I like it, but I think the original grey ones were a bit softer. They actually ended up in my 3000 that I acquired a few months later (I think someone must have used the pads for an ashtray and then poured coke on them to extinguish the ashes - a real mess until I got a hold of her.)
Sure do wish they still made those gigantic fat pads you see in some of the forat pictures.
Best of luck,
Tim

yeah no doubt i have been looking for the FAT pads for a while!
yo man new pads or just clean those suckas! take them out rubn them down with alchol or throw it in the dish washer (not on the bottom shelf make sure it on the top)
let them dry and you should get a much better feel... if you clean up the inside of the MPC use compressed air in little spirts... it helps keep your gear nice and clean and also keeps you from having to pay forat buku bucks!

and the 3000 screen is dumb bright! that baby blue indiglo...
telesis.com is the best palce to get it at (cheapest too)

dem $hits $300.00 when Forat sold em - could see cats charge as much as 4

i know this is an old topic and may have already been fixed/closed by the creator, but.....

i just got an mpc 2500 a few weeks ago, and i noticed the pads were a little stiff. the floor model at guitar center was really loose though (im assuming from alot of use). eitherway, when i got mine, new, the pads felt stiffer than the floor model that i liked at GC.

i would hit the shit out of them even after adjusting the velocity sensitivity and in the PAD window i would see maybe 70-80 out of a full 127 velocity. i wondered what i was doing wrong...? turns out, i needed to use more than just one finger apparently when i use two or a group of three fingers at a time, the velocity would spike to 127 easy and i could get the response i was looking for.

maybe someone else can benefit from my experience. or maybe everyone already knows this and im being redundant