Another vote for the Polyend Tracker. That screen just makes so much sense and whizzing through the start, end and loop points with the clicky jog wheel is great. I even prefer chopping on the Tracker to a computer. Also, built in radio for insta inspiration (or static/noise in my case) is great.
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A bit of a cheat but the Koala app is killer for quick grabs. I have been exporting and loading into my digitakt.
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The Waldorf Quantum because of the UI.
SSC Kyma system to dive deep into sound design.
Elektron Analog Rytm mk2 for quick and simple sample.
Plogue Chipsynth SFC to put a bit of character.
And for the forever expanding field/foley recordingās I have my eye on Soundminerās Radium sampler. When reading these 2 post it seems to be the perfect sampler for what I like to do.
Multichannel is also going to be important in the future the way I work. Wish some hardware sampler could do that.
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+1 Polyend Tracker. Huge screen, intuitive, clicky buttons, and a really big and fast jog make zooming, trimming and slicing a breeze. I wish its various sample-processing options (eq, normalize, various fx) could be previewed more real-time, but you canāt have everything.
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Probably the korg esx. If you gel with the workflow (which is fairly simple) you can do a lot of editing/ mangling/ resampling super fast. Itās flow makes up for its dated feature set for me.
For super low feature set but tons of fun, the Yamaha vss-30 is awesome! Layering samples and messing with the simple envelopes is surprisingly great. I wish I still had that thing.
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I love using the MD sampler, It sounds goood, you know, p locks, etc. And the Bitwig sampler, well, Itās a beast.
Iām such a fanboyš¤£
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Isla Instruments S2400
Octatrack
I think the MPC1000 has the easiest and most intuitive sampling process, which is ironic, because I find everything else about that deck really counterintuitive and hard to use.
I hate to say it, but the Digitakt is my favorite deck for everything except sampling, because you canāt trim or chop out samples after youāve saved them.
Thatās a big hurdle for me because I donāt have a dedicated turntable or CD player for sampling. So if Iām going to reconnect all those cables (and commandeer the HiFi for the afternoon), I typically sample as much stuff as I can all in one go and then take my time cleaning them up later. Every other true sampler* Iāve played lets you do this.
My personal favorite is the ESX1, probably just because thatās what I learned on. No GUI in sight, but I got pretty quick at listening for those non-0 clicks!
*(i.e. not a sample player like the Volca or M:S)
1 Like
MPC Live
I dislike the OT sampling. So I just load samples via the card. Do all chopping and such on my computer. Itās awes with samples tho.
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ā¦all 19" rackunit samplers were a little pita to sample withā¦or better, to edit what u sampledā¦
the devices i sampled the most with, were mpcāsā¦never saw the sampling and get it ready to funk process that immediate and easy going as thereā¦
all sampling i did with otās was just via pickup machinesā¦for realtime funā¦no real need for storaging laterā¦
and, er, wellā¦with the taktā¦to be honestā¦i sampled only a handful of timesā¦easy and directā¦
but āsamplingā does not really happen anymore that much straight to hardware in my lifeā¦
even if re sampling is one of my big ones in sounddesign methods stillā¦
itās simply too much comfort to record stuff into a daw to pick and edit whatever u might need straight from thereā¦
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iām gonna advocate again for the SP line here. when you listen to LPs like Madvillainy, some of the donuts tracks and Samiyams material really does demonstrate the power and creative coercion within their limited environment.
iāve just refurbed my first ever piece of hardware, an SP-505, 20 years old now.
the FX and sequencer on these things is just unreal and iām really into the Phrase algorithm, an acquired taste but when when you get the right sounds into it has a really addictive flavour.
Iām all for powerful sampling capabilities but imposing limitations forces creative decisions and outcomes that makes for really interesting music.
5 Likes
My fave is the OT, but over time Iāve just become so dependent on it and know all the features/key-combos backwards. Itās a powerful instrument for completely mangling and making samples unrecognisable even by their dental records, butā¦
The ARmk2/Digitakt (theyāre near enough identical when just capturing audio) is certainly significantly easier and more convenient for the end userā¦Iāve owned and loved both, if I had the coin Iād have another ARmk2 instantly. Itās pretty low on features, but itās meant to be. The way samples sound when they are ran through it though, are superb. The OT may be showing its age but it again just requires a bit of finesing, but the ARmk2 just sounds next level.
Iāve always been a fan of Simpler and Sampler on ableton, as they are both extremely deep. Watching a lot of Ned Rushās stuff on youtube made me start using it more recently, and even without the update to Live 11 (which truly takes about 90% of the pissing about building midi tool utilities to batch process a bunch of samples by velocity out of the way) his videos are amazing if you make Jungle/breakcore, IDM, techno and all that good stuff. Go check him out on YT if youāve never heard of him and would like to see what an ableton pro can do with a couple samples. He also has modular and some outstanding Octatrack videos altho Iāve not seen him post any OT related videos on a while.
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I had totally forgotten about the Ensoniq EPS. That is a true time machine. Turn it on. Work with it. Dive in deep sound and when you turn it off, itās 4 hours later. 
Love that thing. Has microtuning! And soooo great filters! And Aftertouch! Too bad itās so huge.
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Going way back. The Ensoniq EPS-16+. Itās been a while since I owned it. But sampling was pretty sweet. After sampling, it would place the sample on the key you pressed. Or would stretch it across a zone that you set by hitting a high and low key. I miss it.
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Exactly, I so wish this had become standard practice with other manufacturers.
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My newer favorite is definetly Morphagene that and OP-1. Copying a tape section to the sampler is such and underrated feature, itās awesome for remixingā¦
I have a real love hate relationship with OT mostly because itās so illogical to set up. But on the other hand capturing synced loops once set up is easy peasy
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Iām really enjoying my current set up, which is a Zoom Sampletrak and a Digitakt
For me, samples start in the Sampletrak. I use it as a sketchpad. Itās really easy to chop things up quickly and play around with them. As far as process goes, I think itās really important that there is limited sample time and that I can record, save and discard a sample without so much as having the option of naming anything. Recently, Iāve been sequencing it and then sampling it directly into the Digitakt. It just sounds very good to my ear. I really like the filter in particular.
I think using the Sampletrak in this way, gets around the main weakness I think the Digitakt has, which is that itās hard to chop samples unless you have an idea of what exactly you want to doā¦in which case itās very easy to just scroll through and set start and end points. Not having set slices I think is easier, since sometimes I might want to reverse a portion and start from the middle or set a loop point for one fill in particular. Also, not having a band pass is less of an issue if youāre figuring out what you want to do with a sample before it goes into the Digitakt. I still wish that was an option.
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Blackbox. Hands down the easiest sampler I have ever used and doesnāt get in the way. Too lean to do that! 
Incredibly inspirational and build like a tank.
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I love this setup for boombap style hiphop. I did this entire album on the DT+sampletrak combo:
The Sampletrak really is the poor manās sp1200: it does the aliasing like no other and forces creativity with its limitations. It is my favorite as far as sound goes, everything you put in sounds like 90ās hiphop when it comes out.
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OT is really amazing, but DT is still my fav piece of gear. Itās so efficient.
Had an SP303, yeah itās cool but damn itās so slow on the smartmedia card.
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