Akai Professional MPC One – Drum Machine, Sampler & MIDI Controller with Beat Pads, Synth Engines, Standalone Operation and Touch Display

This thing is crazy. I absolutely love it.Most of you buying this are either familiar with the legacy of MPC or just want an all in one standalone music production hardware solution.Here are some things you should know before buying:- It comes with 1] 3 Months Splice Membership(with the Ethernet port you can connect it to internet and integrate your splice sound library) 2] Full MPC DAW (You can use this inside your existing DAW like Ableton/Studio One etc. or as Standalone with the MPC One in Controller Mode) 3] F9 Instruments, The Vault 2.0, Essential Instruments 2.0, Deep House, Drum n Bass, Techno, EDM & Future House , The Bank, The Wub, The 809 etc. (These are Expansion packs for the MPC) 4] AIR instruments like Hybrid 3, Xpand 2, Loom, Velvet etc. (These can only be used in the Desktop software with your MPC in controller mode)- It has and SD card slot for memory expansion(I am using a 64 GB card and it is enough for now)- The back has only one USB 2(you can use this to connect MIDI keyboards, Hard drives, Pen drives etc.).You can use a USB hub to connect multiple devices- MIDI in and MIDI out for sending direct MIDI messages to your DAW/External Synth(Best use case is using the pad perform mode to play chords on an external synth/iPad/desktop)- 4 stereo(or 8 mono?) CV ins for modular gear connectivity(I don't have modular gear so don't know how that works)- 1 Stereo(or 2 Mono) IN, 1 Stereo OUT and 1 Headphone outNow coming to the experience:- If you are not familiar with the MPC flow it might take sometime getting used to since it is not linear like in most DAWs. But once you learn that workflow the possibilities become endless with this machine. Its a beast honestly. It took me about a week to get hold of how things work. YouTube videos have helped me a lot to understand. (Hint: "Programs(Drum Kits, Instruments)" make "Sequences" make "Songs")- The pads are smaller than you would expect but are nice and responsive(you can change the setting according to your wish).I found them a little stiff to be honest but that means I can bang on them with my fingers haha- It doesn't seem to accept any soundcards as of now(maybe future updates will solve that),so you are limited to two line inputs. But you can use a soundcard's preamps if you want by by connecting your soundcard to an external USB device or power supply and then using its stereo out to MPC stereo in.-The Step Sequencer is crazy especially for automation.- Sampling obviously is the USP of MPCs and this doesn't disappoint. You might need a Stereo Split TRS to 3.5mm jack to sample from your phone but you can also put samples on your SD card/USB device and start chopping them up. The Audio Warp Algorithm can be better(maybe next update?)- Features like XYFX 16 Levels/Pad Perform, Note Repeat/Arpeggiator make it more like an instrument, less like a computer for programming beats.- Oh also there's a looper to which I plug my guitar and start looping.- It comes with 3 VSTs inbuilt Tubesynth, Bassline and Electric. For other sounds you can use Keygroup Instruments(Sampled instruments). You can also Auto Sampler your favourite vsts, external synths etc.-The inbuilt effects are from AIR and Akai and they are pretty good. MotherDucker is my favourite lol It is a sidechain plugin.Now everything is not great. At the end of the day I had to export the audio stems (which took me 1 hour and 2 YouTube videos to figure out lol) to Studio One to layer down my vocals and do the mixing. So yea, while you can complete a beat in this and probably also mix it using inbuilt plugins I prefer my DAW since it is faster that way. So you better think of this as an instrument like your guitar or synth and enjoy discovering yourself through it.I have had it for a month now and I'm already making more songs and beats than I used to. I feel when you are creating something you want to be inside this new world that you have created inside your head and this machine exactly does that. It helps you discover this world, pushes your limits unlike Desktop DAWs where you get distracted and lost with loads of options(and internet lol).For the same price you wont get a full standalone DAW experience. You can get the Ableton Push 2 with Live 11 Suite but for the 69k(nice lmao) but you also need a laptop. So for me this was the best investment. Switch it on and in 5-10 secs you are ready to go. Using this makes me feel the same way I felt when I started learning guitar(a new way of expressing myself and that freedom is priceless).Ok! This has been a long review but I hope this is all you need to make your decision. I should probably start a music gear review channel hahaAnywaysMake music, change the world :)

Simple to use, provides easy control and is a monster of a hardware device.

Excellent

I've been making music primarily on PC for at least two decades, mostly using Renoise as my DAW. Towards the end of March of this year, I decided to go ahead and get an MPC One in hopes to spice up my recording artistry. I bought the unit before Akai raised the retail price a hundred dollars. The new price is still totally worth it though. Especially after their massive 2.10 system upgrade which packs the MPC One with even more Synth and Effect plugins to choose from.The learning process has been super easy. What I quickly found out, is that when you become an owner of an Akai MPC, you're instantly accepted into the worldwide club of MPC enthusiasts...kind of like the phenomenon of owning a Harley or Corvette, all of a sudden you're 'in' and everyone is happy to help you out. The MPC enthusiasts make tons of helpful tutorial and tips videos on YouTube, and not only that, any of the videos that apply to the workflow of the X and Live models will also apply to learning the One as the One packs the same exact features as far as production workflow. So between the countless MPC One, X, and Live tutorial videos, you'll be able to find plenty of great teachers free of charge. There's also a reasonably priced MPC bible that is supposedly to be the go to print resource to learn from and reference when needed, though I still haven't purchased this yet.The sound quality is crystal clear. Definitely pro quality. I uploaded tracks I had made with my One to the Free Music Archive and a couple of them ended up being smash hits and even ended up being used as background music in other people's videos and multimedia projects. This box has what it takes to create professional quality music that people will want to listen to and share.There are a couple 'bugs' I ran into while using my One, for instance, my unit happens to have the Q-Panel bug and I had to switch off my q panel monitor... and there was a couple times when things got buggy in the recording process... but that's when you just simply make sure your project is saved and then load the project up again and the bugs are gone. These issues I won't hold against Akai as they'll most likely iron out these issues over time. Any of the bugs I may have come across in the six months using it so far aren't the kind that will screw up any recordings I make with it.Speaking of the six months of owning it so far... this whole time I haven't opened or used my computer DAW for any of my compositions. With the One, I can record all my guitars and vocals right into the unit and then produce from there. I even find the hardware limitations of four effect slots for each channel inspiring. On the PC I'm used to having as many effects slots as my PC can handle, but the One's effect limitations cause me to think about the production more and I ended up learning a thing or two in the process.The effects are top notch as are the synth plug-ins. It comes with plenty of drum kits and instrument samples to use. I enjoy the F9 expansion it comes with. Probably won't invest in more expansions and just make my own, but it's nice that there are plenty of third-party expansions one can buy for their MPC to beef up their sound and instrument palette.The unit is built nicely and pads feel great. I love the expressiveness of the sensitivities of the pads. I'm finding out that I'll never want to program in another bass line when I can simply record it by playing it with way more expression by using the pads. All the ports feel sturdy. I love that it has an SD slot so I can expand the storage. Tracks save at a decent speed when saving to the SD card.Might update this review later, but so far, all in all, I'm madly in love with my MPC One. It's a great little all-in-one machine. I had originally planned to buy it to enhance my studio, but the thing quickly ended up becoming my studio altogether. Love it. Definitely will stick with MPC for now on.

Das ist was feines man kann sehr vielseitige Sachen damit machen.

Sicuramente non è uno strumento per principianti , anche se sembra intuitivo ha un sacco di funzioni nascoste .Un po' scomoda la necessità di collegare un sd esterna per caricare i sample.Altro punto negativo la mancanza di un manuale o magari video corso integrato.Tolto questo strumento davvero bello e interessante che ancora devo scoprire al 100% , spero che mi regalerà soddisfazioni.

I'm loving this machine but thank God for YouTube. I wouldn't have stood a chance of setting it all up without help videos as the instructions are vague and non existent. Fantastic groove machine / sampler though.

Maquetter, trouver des idées et produireJe souhaité du DAWless, j'ai hésité entre Maschine+ et AKAI, le prix ma fait choisir la MPC ONE et je en suis satisfait d'autant plus que sur internet certain lui reprochait de pas être facile a prendre en main, je doit dire que je n'ai rencontrer aucune difficulté, c'est un produit très accessible mais comme tout autre produit aussi complet il faut passé un peut de temps pour apprivoisé l'appareil , lire un peut la notice et chercher quelques tuto sur youtube. Je conseille les tutos de (Audiorial) très bien pour débuter et être vite opérationnel ainsi que le Discord: MPC Francophone (MPC X / LIVE / KEY / ONE)