They should have PC changes for their OWN plugins by now. Too bad we can’t record from multiple external tracks at once without getting bite by the Note off bug.
At least with MIDI we can up the BPM speed when recording as a short cut. Just be aware that this can record the less accurately with some device.
I agree, Plugins should have Program Change capability by now.
Not sure how other people use the plugins, but I use them a lot as placeholders for my hardware synths… so I’ll use Tube Synth, Jura, Mini D, OP-X, etc, until I can get to my Sub 37, Digitone, Prophet 6, etc… and all of these I do send PC’s to throughout a song or project.
8 plugins without PC’s can be tight to make work across a project, and more work than it needs to be.
8 plugins with PC’s would make the 8 limit more than enough. I think I would only want/need 4 or 5 plugin slots to use if we had PC control, and I would use and record them more.
Yeah totally. It would make sense commercially too as I’d consider buying some plugins, plus would save myself carrying hardware synths to gigs.
I’ll try & see if the Force Snapshoot feature can switch plugins per Scene/Sequence. If so that can kinda act like PCs & that would be some to request for the MPC if Akai won’t give the plugs PC numbers.
Out of interest, would you mind also checking whether the snapshot can include routing of a midi track, on the beta this is called Send To.
I think this would probably be my number one request as of now - like I definitely accept that you have to change up if you’re going to use this firmware, but it seems like a relatively simple change that would at least partially restore some of the advantages of independent sequences / tracks / programs in at least some scenarios.
One thing I am noticing from some of the videos is that there seem to be a lot of shortcuts that I hadn’t twigged e.g. when you double tap the touchscreen. I think one of the reasons I’ve tended to focus on the imho bad changes is that I’ve been pretty underwhelmed by the improvements I’m getting in return. I’d been disappointed with navigation - was one of the areas I’d expect to have seen major improvements in to justify reduced flexibility. But it felt like it was taking far too many button pushes to do straightforward things, but I guess this might be why - I don’t tend to use the touchscreen much outside of midi editing and fine changes to start/end points.
I don’t have a problem with touchscreens in general - even with the MPC I never really bought the “ATM screen” criticism, it was always ok to me, although only ok. On Logic in a 13" iPad Air it was really nice to have 40 chops laid out on a screen, especially for some tasks and with Apple Pencil it works great for DAW stuff like editing and arrangement. But it’s still not as good as 16 pads in a lot of other scenarios. I’m not some wild finger drummer by any stretch, but tapping in rhythms and playing mutes is a lot of what makes the MPC what it is for me.
In principle be pretty tempted by an MPC Mini - even though I got the iPad to hit a similar spot after considering stuff like the Tracker Mini and M8 - for me it would need to be handheld i.e. smaller than the 404 which is imho just slightly too big to use on the go - battery powered, but also have 16 usable pads. Really not sure how feasible this is. If they update the main hardware I think they need to really increase the available processing power for where they’re going with this, even if that means dropping support for my old 1st gen Live. In general, to my ears the plugins / fx sound like about 2008 compared to the current stuff I have on the computer / Push / iPad.
I was also thinking about what else I’d actually want to see as the firmware progresses. First would be skip back sampling - killer feature on the 404, it kinda feels like 3.0 is going in a different direction but it would change my opinion a lot if it was available on the MPC.
Other big one would be audio quantise and/or groove extraction/follow. Goofy timing from chopping, pitching, 16 levels is a lot of what I like about a sampler like this, but at the same time 5-10% quantise can really even things out, and groove tools make it so much quicker to add other parts to chops with goofy timing - I know MPC swing and everything, but there’s a lot more you can do these days. Something like this would be a far bigger reason for to stay on the box for longer and not jump into the DAW than the linear arranger.
Saving the plugin patch nor MIDI Send get saved with Snapshot. I think I tried this when this feature first came out, but just forgot. Shit that would’ve so cool & efficient if it did.
Yeah there’s all kinds of little “hidden” things like this on these machines. Like when you touch a parameter value on the screen that you can drag from horizontally or vertically, if your finger is in the way, you can move it over & still change the parameter value, just don’t lift up your finger. Most probably know that buy if you don’t, it can be helpful.
You can kinda get some of that by using the sample offset & pitch randomization in the drum program editor:
AKAI Sound Design Tips: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLLpZIQRx5DqkmQt3uwLEazNueWsvFekcW
Don’t forget you can set the mutes as macro knobs: https://youtube.com/shorts/DVkXYS_mfZc?feature=share
I think you can do it with automation. I do that with the audio sends. but drawing in automation isn’t the best. it would be nice to have a few different draw tools, linear, bezier, free, maybe have snap to.
Lol yeah, I have plenty of ways to get goofy timing in chops, when it ends up being something I like I pretend it was intentional.
Really what I’m talking about is going the other way around - like above I often want chops to be structural, i.e. define the groove, rather than setting up a sequenced drum pattern first then fitting chops around it. But a lot of times if I’m leaving in e.g. hats or bass there will be just a slight hiccup that can throw things out of wack. Usually on the MPC I’d spend a lot of time nudging around midi events and start points to try to hit the sweet spot, as often as not I give up in the end.
But if I bounce into Logic / Bitwig / Ableton, I can apply a small quantise to the loop that will normally even it out just enough while not losing too much of the feel that I was going for in the first place. Takes about 30 seconds, as against hours of trying and usually failing. And then when I want to place sequenced parts around the loop in Ableton I can extract the groove and use it as a swing template to get everything working together in 30 seconds and in Logic I can do that or just designate my loop as the groove leader and other tracks as followers so they fall in line, instead of hours nudging things around by a tick or two over and over.
I must try again to automate Send To per sequence, it didn’t work for me last night but maybe I was doing it wrong, I just started recording the sequence with automation write switched on and changed the parameter but it didn’t register.
It looks to me like this and the per sequence bank/program request for plugins are pretty much two sides of the same coin.
ya…its super finiki…I found you gotta set the automation, at least for the sends to werk, on each sequence. if you have sends on five seqs set like OFF, OFF, ON, OFF, OFF, you need to automate the OFFS on either side of the ON. its not like the initial setting is the main setting. once you hit that ON, if you dont do the OFFs on either side, it just moves the dial to ON globally. It werks, but it’s kind of a pain.
so ya, having those settings be Per Sequence, would be huge.
[I dunno if what I wrote makes sense the way I wrote it]
Does anyone have a copy of MPC Desktop Software 2.12 in their download folders?
Or a download link?
(Where do you have to go for these normally>?)
(I’m having to roll back pre 2.13 because you can’t use external Sysex transport commands from 2.13 on…)
I’ve got MPC-Installer-2.12.1.35 for the mac installer if that’s any use?
Oh, I’ve also got a mpc-2.12.1-update .img which I think is the file you put on a usb to update on standalone
just a reminder
2.15.1 is out so they are still developing OS2 
Maybe they’ll fix the note off bug. -only on OS2 
Yeah Conan is one of the better YouTubers.
He just made this video on the arranger:
The more I use my MPC One as a sound module, the more I understand the position of the old school MPC heads who don’t want to lose programs. I had a blast yesterday chopping samples, converting to programs, and experimenting with different drum breaks. The process is definitely clunky, but I think it would’ve been even more clunky if I were on 3.0. It feels like I’m getting the rack sampler experience, with some quality of life updates.
I saw that this morning. More lunchtime listening.
I am still feeling like a stranger in my own home on 3.4.080. Feels entirely different while being completely the same, like someone rearranged all the furniture in the house and put up some new walls while taking down others. 
Overall I like it, but it is taking a minute to get used to it. I am very surprised at how stable it is, which is welcome!
@Symian Are you permitted to talk about the pacing of the beta releases? For example, whether Akai has a set schedule, or whether it takes weeks/months for a new beta to be released for testing.
Thanks!
If only I were privy to that kind of info, I’m just like you guys as far as the beta goes now, once the there’s another build we’ll all get the email 
My MPC One with OS3 beta gets stuck on boot screen every 3-5 uses.
Anyone having the same experience?