su200 I hated. Loved the su10 though - first bit of gear
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Iāve been playing around with my Octatrack mk2 lately, and it does do some things that nothing else doesā¦ but, I got into recording some live keys/synths into it to chop and work with and got to the point of āwhy arenāt I using my MPC for this?āā¦
I realised that every time I have a flirtation with another sampler, they always make me appreciate my Live 2 more and I come back to it.
Itās happened to me with the SP404 mk2, MC707, TR8S, the Force, Pioneer SP16, Octatrack, Rytm mk2, Push 3 and probably some more Iām forgetting.
Donāt get me wrong, they are all workable and have their strong points, but:
As much as the current MPC has its quirks, itās still the best all round sampler/workstation you can getā¦ and Iād even say the Live 2 in particular is the pound for pound greatest.
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Anything that inspires you can be the greatest from moment to moment. On paper Live 2 is arguably the best integration of standalone hardware and software. I canāt comment for ableton users because I know push 3 standalone caters to a specific workflow.
There are times when the elektron workflow makes more sense or is more fun, but for most of it there is some way to do it on the current mpc platform and usually you can find it by googling.
One thing that recently came to my attention which was in my periphery but not the first thing on my mind was when I saw someone say "if youāre using an MPC and any kind of daw, and you arenāt using the MPC (beats) daw to some extent, youāre missing out on a huge benefit of the integration between the hardware and the software. Talking about bringing whole projects over to the computer and moving them back seamlessly if you wanted to, and that made total sense to me.
Iām not currently using the MPC daw on my computer and I mostly got live 2 because I wanted to stay away from daws and computers right now, but itās made me reconsider how I should be tracking things out because it seems silly to record from the hardware when the project can just be moved and loaded and worked from there, already multitracked for me.
It comes down to my comfort zone and whatās familiar and comfortable for me. I guess Iāll have to break out of that if I want to really make the most of these tools. I enjoy the way elektron devices interface with the computer for recording, but itās just a different type of integration where mpc is more like a suite, where everything (hypothetically) works together, and itās all by design.
I donāt have the kind of errors and paranoia about will my shit crash with my elektron devices and thatās reassuring, but Iām for the most part pretty happy with the akai device capabilities despite the sort of computery workflow. It certainly ticks a lot of boxes, no doubt about it.
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I am an Ableton user, and I still prefer the MPC over the Push 3 for working standalone.
This is why I still own and like a lot of the devices I mentioned, especially my Analog Rytm (A4 and Syntakt), they inspire creativity in different waysā¦ so I will normally feed the MPC or Ableton with these as the source material.
I get thisā¦ for me itās about creating and evolving ideas/vibesā¦ I donāt think Iāve ever completed a track with my MPC but Iāve started tons of them and got to the point where I know what needs doing. I usually then switch to Ableton to finish them.
Iāve had it in mind for a while that Iād like to complete a project, maybe an EP, fully with the MPCā¦ Iām going to check my diary. 
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Iāve just got hold of a MacBook Air and looking at using the MPC software with my MPC one plus.
How do you get the projects into the software? Is it a case of saving it to the SD card and then moving that across the the computer or is there a better way?
What āextraā features do you get within the DAW environment that arenāt available in standalone? Sorry - all new to me!
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I really donāt know because Iāve never done it, however I believe your project file contains everything, samples, sequences and all, and I assume youāre moving the project file or a copy of it, so you could likely do it by corded transfer or sd card. Iāll have to figure it out as well.
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Yeah, I tried via USB with no joy so think it will need to be via the SD card, which is slightly annoying. I wish the MPC had the same class compliant ease of use as the SP404.
Canāt try it though as will need a usb c/sd card adapter
Yeah better way than that. Plug your MPC and running the software on the computer and then on your MPC you go into controller mode.
Now you have everything you had on the standalone plus you can add any vst you have installed on your computer. You could just pretended youāre standalone for the most part and only look at the computer screen when you need to interact with the plugins. That means your already loved MPC workflow is even more powerful cause now you have access to all your vst effects and instruments within your MPC.
In order to open your already started standalone projects all you have to do is open them. You go to the browser and places and find the drive where youāve saved your project. Presto.
I wouldnāt use the software on its own but together with the hardware. I mean you could. But if you have the hardware, why would you? Sounds so silly just thinking about it 
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If you want to do post processing or share your music you need to get it tracked out on the computer somehow, I was mostly thinking in that capacity.
Thanks, Iāll give that another go. For some reason controller mode wasnāt working for me - so I couldnāt connect the two. Iāll give it another go.
When doing something that seems like it should work but doesnāt, if at all possible, always try a different cable (even if itās the cable that came with it). I donāt know why but I have bad luck with USB cables and sometimes a different cable will work. I havenāt used the MPC in this capacity though so Iām not sure what advice to give you but make sure youāre trying the USB B port with a B to A cable.
You also may need to set the mpc beats software to controller mode first, but not sure.
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Yeah Iāve you get to that point what i do is i bounce stems to audio and just finish on live.
Another way you can do it is if you open the MPC plugin within live and have every track from the MPC into a live audio channel (or any daw) and go from there. You can also drag and drop audio and midi from the mpc plugin like that so thatās pretty neat to flesh out the project.
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How is arrangement possible on MPC without arranger mode?
I want to make full tracks can you bounce a full 10 minute track into one solid mp3 file?
Thereās Song Mode with a bunch of options after that.
Easy to bounce mixes out too.
Sequences can be 999 bars, you donāt need an āarranger modeā.
There is a pattern chain mode called Song mode.
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3 ways:
- Build a whole track in a sequence
- Build multiple sequences, one per section, then put them together in song mode
- See number 2, then use the option to bounce the song to a new sequence, on the new sequence add variations and effects automations and extra stuff, then export that sequence
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I think this is the way in general, donāt be dogmatic about trying to finish up work to a point of completion before moving to the daw, that way of thinking is just an arbitrary limitation that wonāt serve you.
No, keep the diary free and keep using the best tools for each part of the job. Mixing on the MPC isnāt fun, and thereās no master or bus track automation anyway. 
For what itās worth, that integration wasnāt flawless for me and I much prefer stemming things out than trying to embed the MPC plugin with the daw. If the project is relatively simple, perhaps itās worth it but then again stemming out is even more straightforward.
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I been skirting around the idea of getting a mpc again since its more mature as a product, and well I invested in some plugins and packs. However, I have an OT mk1 but yeah I was like do I need the MPC since the OT does everything so well already, and more. The only thing I miss is stuff like lazy chopping, and maybe easy to get stuff out to daw.
If I had known about this a year ago, I probably wouldnāt have bought my P3SA. That sounds like an incredibly smooth workflow. Is the MPC plug-in stable in Live?
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Yeah I have just started to use Ableton this week. You can use it as VST. It works fine. But I donāt like the look after you go to another track. So I still produce in MPC Software so far. Not sure if I will change my workflow since Iāve used it for 3 years now. I will be using Ableton for final automation and mixing mastering though.
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