Akai MPC5000 and MPD32 Midi machines

Akai just wrote to say its MPC5000, a $3,5000 bad-ass music making, MIDI-slinging sampler, is now shipping; a quick whip around the internet reveals plenty of places offering it with heavy discounts. From the blurb:

MPC5000 is the first MPC to permit eight-track streaming hard disk recording for real-time capture of individual tracks or even entire songs. A 20-voice, three-oscillator analog synthesizer with arpeggiator, a new sequencing engine with 960 PPQ resolution, pad and track muting and mixing, 64 continuous sample tracks and 12 Q-Link controllers highlight just some of the never-before-seen features and capabilities that make MPC5000 the most advanced MPC ever.

MPC5000's virtual analog synth eliminates the need for users to deal with connecting external analog synth modules or working with buggy software synthesizers. The eight-track, direct-to-disk recorder lets musicians produce complete songs and mix them down internally. An optional CD/DVD drive permits usage of audio on CD or DVD in songs, and also records compositions. More than 650MB of premium sounds from Loopmasters are included so that MPC5000 is ready to produce professional results immediately.

Here's a movie of it in action...

Other features include an "old school" mode for pre-Fairlight nostalgia, an 80GB hard drive and included Chop Shop sample-slicing software.

Also (re)pitched today was the MPD32 USB pad, which adds hard control to GarageBand, Ableton and Reason tinkering, with 8 faders, 8 switches, 8 360°, knobs, and three shift keys to triple the number of available assignments. An LCD display reminds you of its and your importance — $500 gets it on your desk — but, unfortunately, does not flip.

[#1 posted by pantsravaganza , June 26, 2008 12:03 PM]

MPCs are nice, but are notorious for crashing a lot with their first software release. They aren't the most intuitive boxes out there either. The Roland MV-8800 is about $1200 cheaper (and can do a lot less), but us perhaps a better entry level machine for the aspiring beat maker and sample-fiend. I'm not dissing MPCs--just saying that based on their prior models, there is typically a steep learning curve, a bit of a wait for a decent 3rd party OS, and that a beginner might find the thing confounding for the first month they have it. Or you could just go out and buy pro-tools and be done with it, but those pads are fun...

[#2 posted by toxonix , June 26, 2008 1:08 PM]

Stability was a big problem with any of the MPCs I had. I'm suprised there is still a market for these kinds of workstation machines. The midi controller paired up with Logic Pro would be OK for some people. The big one is a huge waste. You could do all that with a cheap USB midi controller and a good laptop.

[#3 posted by Wingo , June 26, 2008 2:12 PM]

Yeah, for that price, you could get a kick-ass laptop, Ableton Live, and a Padkontrol or Monome (for the geekier types).

That said, I did get my start in sampling on an old Akai. The pre-MPC type.

[#4 posted by pantsravaganza , June 26, 2008 2:41 PM]

The basis for all of these boxes is typically a processor and RAM amount that is a few years behind any bottom-end laptop on the market. It is kind of like buying a really old desktop that has been tricked out to run only one music production program on a five inch screen. As you suggest, it makes more financial sense to buy a decent laptop, some software, a midi controller, and a decent in/out box. Myself, I actually like these underpowered single-use beasts for the very reason that they don't have email or internet browsing. If they did, I would never get any beats made.

The nice thing is that the Roland MVs and Akai MPCs typically do a good job of integrating everything you need into one box: microphone pre-amps and turntable inputs, drum pads with decent velocity sensitivity (The harder you hit them the louder the drum is), and good integrated sampled instruments, effects, mixing, mastering, and CD burning. The MV-8800 has a lot of great stuff from the Roland line up--all the old 808 drum machine sounds and a decent digital emulation of the Roland Space echo tape delay. That said, it is very limited in features compared to the MPCs. I hate that I can only record one bit of audio when making a loop.

[#5 posted by teflon , June 26, 2008 4:16 PM]

Hardware sampler. Yawn. That said, this looks like a much more interesting and musical product: (Linndrum II) http://www.rogerlinndesign.com/products/linndrum2/index.shtml

[#6 posted by Anonymous , June 27, 2008 2:37 AM]

The 5000 looks desirable, but the smart MPC money goes on the 1000 - smaller, cheaper and backed by the guerilla JJOS operating system, which replaces Akai's dated features and most likely outspecs the 5000 in some areas. It's cheap, but even the free version takes the machine to a new level. We just need the (masked) programmer working on every other piece of underperforming hardware...

[#7 posted by rollerskater , June 27, 2008 11:16 AM]

another crap workstation. it would be cool if they actually tried to make a hardware sampler with a great UI. but they didnt. i'll stick with Kontakt and my antiquated Emulator II for sampling.

[#8 posted by gox , June 29, 2008 8:17 AM]

MPC 5000
3,500$, though.

;)