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By angus Wed Nov 23, 2005 2:02 am
Greetings from Vancouver BC to the MPC crew! My name is Angus. I have a (hopefully) quick question. I just gained a new MPC-3000 into my personal studio, and I'm havin difficulty loading samples into it. I have a

1.44 MB floppy with some free samples I downloaded off the net.
It currently has 1 .pgm file on it
and about 16 samples on it

Now this free sample pack is supposed to be for the MPC 3000. Which I believe it to be. Now I put the disc in...

press the DISK button

then press 7 (Load, Erase, Rename.)

(If I press 8 I get "This disc is either bad.......use a different disc" ERROR FF02)

Now, the disc I bought is brand new, I formatted it in the MPC itself, then dumped the samples on the disc using my PC. So I don't know exactly whats goin on there.....but I really don't think its bad, but if you think otherwise, please enlighten me.

SO...I instead I press 7 (Load, Erase, Rename.)

I'm then taken to a page where I can see all the samples in the upper left hand corner, and the .PGM file on the disc. I can rotate through all of them using the DATA ENTRY wheel.

BUT, when I try to load either the .PGM file or any of the samples, the MPC takes me to a new window that asks where I want to write the .PGM to.

Now here's where it all falls down, cause I try to load the program, but the MPC tells me...."The requested file was not found on this disc." ERROR FF00

This is p***in me off, cause the MPC saw all the files on there, after I load the disc and get to the LOAD, Erase, Rename window, So, I'm really unsure as too where Im going wrong, so I figured I ask an MPC Yoda out there and see what you cats have to say. Thanks for your time,
Angus
By mpc3000le Sat Nov 26, 2005 6:57 am
angus wrote:Greetings from Vancouver BC to the MPC crew! My name is Angus. I have a (hopefully) quick question. I just gained a new MPC-3000 into my personal studio, and I'm havin difficulty loading samples into it.


Greetings ... Angus, don't be afraid even if a newby to drop your question in at the 3000 list.

Here in the newby section a lot of 3000 users don't even bother looking ... so your question can often go without an answer for a while.

angus wrote:I have a
1.44 MB floppy with some free samples I downloaded off the net.
It currently has 1 .pgm file on it and about 16 samples on it. Now this free sample pack is supposed to be for the MPC 3000. Which I believe it to be. Now I put the disc in... press the DISK button then press 7 (Load, Erase, Rename.) (If I press 8 I get "This disc is either bad.......use a different disc" ERROR FF02)


Assuming the PGM and SND files are indeed for an MPC3000 ...

The actual error:

If when loading a file from disk and an "address mark not found" FF02 error is encountered then the MPC3000 will display:

This disk is either not formatted, or
formatted by a different device such
as the Akai S3000, or possibly bad.
Either format it or use a different
disk. This error could also appear if
a CD-ROM is the selected SCSI device

If when formatting a disk and an "address mark not found" FF02 error is encountered then the MPC3000 will display:

This disk is unusable--a defect was
found in the area reserved for the file
directory. Please insert another disk
and try again.

angus wrote:Now, the disc I bought is brand new, I formatted it in the MPC itself, then dumped the samples on the disc using my PC. So I don't know exactly whats goin on there.....but I really don't think its bad, but if you think otherwise, please enlighten me.


The fact your MPC3000 doesn't encounter a bad address mark on disk while formatting suggests that its internal floppy drive is working fine.

It's possible that your PC floppy drive is messing things up.

It could have dirty heads of a diffent mechanical alignment.

Try using a floppy disk cleaner in both the MPC3000 and PC floppy drives.

Or ... try formatting the floppy disk in your PC and not the MPC3000.

angus wrote:SO...I instead I press 7 (Load, Erase, Rename.)
BUT, when I try to load either the .PGM file or any of the samples, the MPC takes me to a new window that asks where I want to write the .PGM to.
Now here's where it all falls down, cause I try to load the program, but the MPC tells me...."The requested file was not found on this disc." ERROR FF00


You mean error FD00 ... :-)

It sounds like the SND file "external names" could have been changed from the original names referenced in the PGM file.

Try loading the SND files one by one. Then load the PGM file last. Make certain that the option to "replace same sounds in memory" is turned off.

Skip any errors encountered during load at this stage.

Once the PGM file has been loaded. Re-save it to a new disk with the sounds.

Any joy with this process ?

Rohan.
By angus Sat Jan 07, 2006 8:57 am
Hey man, Angus here again.

Alright my plight continues......
So.
I have a friend who's a tech at a big studio here in Vancouver. He hooked me up with a "SCSI Iomega 100ZIP drive". Connects to the MPC3000 no problem...
-SCSI ID 5 (done)
-Termination (on)

Problem: I have no SCSI card on my PC.

Solution: I went into my work at OnlineBroadcasting.com and nabbed a 2nd "Parallel Port Iomega 100ZIP drive" from the IT guy...

So.....

-I hooked up the parallel port ZIP drive to my PC.

-downloaded the MPCeditor after almost pulling out my eyes and scrappin with the wife after hour 4 of " What the ***k is wrong with this thing!!!"

-Was the able to finally format the ZIP disc in a way that the MPC recognizes that there is actually a ZIP disc in the drive of the SCSI ZIP attached to the MPC3000. (2 ZIP drives, one for getting samples off the PC, and a SCSI drive for dumping those samples onthe the MPC3k) see what Im doin?

-Now I can load the ZIP disc onto the 3k.

-The .PGM file and all the .SND files I CAN SEE THEM ON THE LCD DISPLAY!!!

-However when I go to load them, I get a "The requested file was not found on the disc" message.

Why would the sample and PGM all show up if they're not actually on the disc?

So to recap...
2 ZIP drives.
1 on PC----load samples to disc. (thanks MPCeditor!)
eject disc.
1 on MPC----load samples to MPC3000
I can see the samples on the LCD screen, they're actually on the disc Im assuming. But I CAN'T load them!

As a side note, because my friend got this MPC for 100 bucks off a crackhead, (it is in MINT cond. though irrespective of what you may logically think about a 100 dollar MPC3000 crackhead purchase...)IM RUNNING OSv3.03 I have not upgraded to v3.10 or higher.....

Im soooooo close to getting this thing to making a sound I can almost taste the bass.....

Anyways, to all you MPC heads out there, any help would be greatly appreciated and if I get this thing working due to your advice I'll twistoneup, puff away, :oops: and think of you most favorably...! Thanks for your time,

Angus