MPC500 review

cartesia · Post by **cartesia** » Mon Sep 10, 2007 1:56 pm

Cheapass P.O.S

dont bother.

output hums (worse than the 404), turning the data wheel causes pulses in the sound output...

Basically its crap and you would all save alot of time and money to not go near it.

I've played with it for about 2 hours. The only thing I can think of that might remedy the sound interference thing is if i were using wall-power rather than battery.. .

I'll post back once ive got a 240V power supply for it and tested that out... But I can say certainly at this point if you intend to use this because of its battery power (as I did) , forget about it.

Failing the power supply issue, this thing is goin up on ebay ASAP.

Dont think I will ever be touching another akai product in my life.

ColeRockLee · Post by **ColeRockLee** » Mon Sep 10, 2007 1:59 pm

Damn man that sucks. I knew Akai would have to cut some corners but damn.

iG9 · Post by **iG9** » Mon Sep 10, 2007 5:01 pm

if you live in the states you should have bought it at guitar center. they have a nice 30 day return policy which, though sullied by a 15% restocking fee, is still probably less of a hit than you're going to get selling it on ebay. you could also buy from americanmusical.com, who has a nice 45 day policy with no penalty, though i think you pay shipping. anyway for next time...

cartesia · Post by **cartesia** » Mon Sep 10, 2007 11:18 pm

i dont live in the states. hence the mention of 240V power supply. i imported it from the US.

luckily everything is more expensive over here so i can sell it for the same price as I paid new for it, but it will still work out hundreds cheaper than what people are selling it for.

As for what Im goin to do with the money. . I honestly have no idea anymore. . It seems like out of everything I've tried nothing has worked the way I wanted it to

drewzle · Post by **drewzle** » Mon Sep 10, 2007 11:22 pm

get a Machinedrum?

cartesia · Post by **cartesia** » Mon Sep 10, 2007 11:52 pm

nah . . . I'd always feel like I was missing out if i didn't have the UW, but there's no way im paying that much for a drum machine.

606man · Post by **606man** » Tue Sep 11, 2007 12:10 am

The power supply will sort out the hum; although it's a MASSIVE problem for a battery-powered unit. When my wife got hers, I anticipated hooking up a nice condenser and running around in the bushland sampling lizards and birds, making kick-drums from hitting rocks, etc etc. My dream was shattered when, while running on batteries, the thing hums like a broken server.

Has yours crashed much yet? Ours is crashing slightly less now, but still at least once per day.

Since you are a synth man, you could look at some of the older drum synths from yamaha; they are very underrated...and cheap as chips (which is why peeps don't rate them - fools!).

drewzle · Post by **drewzle** » Tue Sep 11, 2007 12:18 am

cartesia wrote:nah . . . I'd always feel like I was missing out if i didn't have the UW, but there's no way im paying that much for a drum machine.

UW?

cartesia · Post by **cartesia** » Tue Sep 11, 2007 12:31 am

^ there's the machinedrum, and the machinedrum UW (User Wave) basically the UW version has a sampler/looper as well as the drum machine.. but it costs HEAPS more.

606man cheers for the headsup . . .Maybe I will hang onto it a bit longer then .. I'm still not sure what I think of it.. the way it works and such. . the only time I've experienced crashes is when i try to load/save/format from a CF card that isn't the one that came with the MPC. .

Which yamaha drum machines are worth looking into? From my experience yamaha has been a much better brand to deal with!

606man · Post by **606man** » Tue Sep 11, 2007 1:46 am

Any of these, for a start:

Yamaha RX11
Yamaha RX21
Yamaha RX5
Yamaha RX7
Yamaha RY10
Yamaha RY30

They all have different strengths etc, so make sure you check 'em out before splashing out.

I own an RY30, and I can't recommend it enough; you can make your own sounds, and the sequencer works almost like the 'loop capture' shown in the 555 NAMM video.

You can make very realistic-sounding kits with it as well as some pretty amazing kick-drum booms (tr808 stylee).

J.Daniels · Post by **J.Daniels** » Tue Sep 11, 2007 3:46 am

yo cartesia, where did you purchase the 500 from and how much was the postage??

cartesia · Post by **cartesia** » Tue Sep 11, 2007 3:59 am

guy on ebay i think it was jrr_shop or something like that. . 599, free internationl shipping.. worked out to AU$750

dont go ordering from them yet though I'm still waiting to hear back on when exactly they plan on posting my DSI evolver (which was ordered before the MPC500

)

J.Daniels · Post by **J.Daniels** » Tue Sep 11, 2007 7:47 am

yo cartesia, are you 'gav_stillnotcrazy'?

kristoffer1989 · Post by **kristoffer1989** » Tue Sep 11, 2007 8:03 am

606man wrote:When my wife got hers, I anticipated hooking up a nice condenser and running around in the bushland sampling lizards and birds, making kick-drums from hitting rocks, etc etc.

If you have a condenser mic that does not need phantompower or you use the internal ones.. tha br600 will do that like a dream! LOVE to walk around capturing sounds and sample them in the funniet ways:D

606man · Post by **606man** » Tue Sep 11, 2007 9:20 am

Cool, I'll check that out; thanks man