Akai is now known for their range of samplers which still have major part in most production studios around the globe. And it is no surprise that it was them that produced the world's first sampler and sequencer integrated rhythm machine with such a flexiblity in sampling. It was back in later '80s that Akai produced the first Midi Production Centre MPC60 in collaboration with Roger Linn, One of the originators of what is now called Drum machines with his expertise of producing Linn Drum series (You've surely heard the famous electric tom-toms haven't you?)

Combination of sequencers, keyboards, and sound modules were becoming popular in music production at the time as the MIDI standard was coming of age, but there was no way to benefit from the sampling technology especially in live performances due to the sheer size and the cost the system required, unless you've already had more than enough money to spare. (it was more than a price of a house you know?)

MPC was designed to give us musicians the technology in one neat box that don't need qualified electricians around just to keep on working. Unsurprisingly, he was soon popular along producers and studio technicians whose main concern is practicality. His name also become a mode in many hip hop producers and there are still people coming into studio with just 2 turn tables and a MPC.

MPC60 was then followed by MPC60mk2 which incorporated a SCSI port and more memory, and was superseded by the MPC3000 of which the design was based on the 16 bit sampler S3000 which was already becoming popular at the time. (But there are still many people using MPC60's for the 'lo-fi' sound quality coming out of its 12 bit sampling engine. and surely the MPC sequencer was already such an advanced system.)

However, although the MPC3000 was undoubtedly a great machine, but its cost (it was probably the most expensive rhythm machine at the time, though much cheaper than other sampler co-operated systems) prohibited the use of those who weren't making music commercially. At the same time, Akai's normal sampler (?) division was finishing off the designs of S-XL range and the S2000 which in simple terms had higher specification with a modest price tag, which rang the bell of their MPC division. In fact MPC2000 has almost the same sound engine as that of S2000.

Anyway, what we got now is the MPC2000, the third generation of MPC series that anyone serious about music could reach and have enough money left to eat.

MPC2000 specifications (with my personal comments)

Sampler section:

• 16 bit linear PCM always at 44.1khz 32 notes polyphonic
• 12db/oct dynamic resonant low pass filter for each voice (can't be tweaked real-time like 303, but can do similar things)
• 2 MB RAM (memory)  as standard expandable to 32 MB with two 72 pin SIMMs (parity or non parity, EDO or non EDO. any SIMMs really)
• Two SIMMs don't have to be identical (wow!)
• Maximum number of sound can be loaded in Ram: 128 (only. sometimes painful when building several complicated programs, but okay if you are mainly using loops)
• Maximum number of programs in Ram: 24 (only 1 program can be used at a time)
• Max. number of sound samples in a program: 64
• Option board EB-16 gives 2 multi effects, and 2 reverbs (total 4 FX buses). Fully editable
• With the current operating system, you can't assign a sample and play it like a piano from external MIDI keyboard like 'normal' samplers, without complex program editing which is not only cumbersome but less useful as it wastes note space. After all MPC2000 is a rhythm machine. It should be possible with the sound engine thou. Reverse engineering the OS, anyone?

Sequencer section

• maximum notes: approx.100,000
• 100 sequences, 20 songs in memory.
• 64 tracks for each sequence
• 96 ppq but sounds much tighter as it is driving the sound engine directly (NO MIDI delays!)
• Editing: copy and paste, transpose MIDI tracks
• Rather excellent step editing ( but no drum grid ) and real-time recording
• Quantise with resolutions ranging from a Quaver to Demi-semitriplets and triplets inbetween (That's 8th note to 32nd triplets in normal English and for you Americans) with shuffle (lovely)
• 0% to 200% real time velocity control on each track
• with OS 1.31 and above, you can use 16 pads to mute each tracks like on MC-303 or MMT-8. You know how useful it is.
• by pressing Tap/note repeat key and any pads (or even external MIDI keyboard), you can do 'Drum rolls' in realtime. (like Roland R-8)
• Synchronise with MIDI Clock, MTC, or SMPTE (optinal)

Effector section (optional)

• 2 multi buses, 2 reverb buses. Total 4 FX buses
• a multi consists of Distortion, Ring mod (only sine wave as carrier signal), Filter (4part  parametric equaliser with auto modulation), Modulation (Chorus, Flange, Rotary speaker, Freq.Mod/Auto Pan, Pitch shift with feedback), Delay (tap, stereo, etc), Reverb.
• Multi effect can really screw your samples up. which is excellent.
• Reverb sounds quite metalic. You might either hate it or love it. (I'm the later)

• SMPTE board
• 8 output expansion
• The price vary from countries to countries. And please don't ask me for a shipment of IX-802P to Austraria, France, Malaysia, etc.etc.

ZIP drive:
I believe the first thing an MPC owner needs other than a pair of headphones would be a Larger storage device. If you got anything more than 2MB of RAM, you really can't not have this. (a Floppy disk can only store 1.44MB of data in case you didn't know) Most MPC owners I know (including myself) choose Zip drive as it's one of the cheapist options available. Although I an NOT happy with the reliability of the drive (maybe it's just mine that's faulty. But I can't get any support 'cos I bought it overseas. It started acting weird after 2 months of purchase and it wasn't a second hand)

There are ones sold differently for Apple Mac and PC SCSI/Parallel, but as long as it says 'SCSI' on the box, there should be no problems using it on MPC2000 (Drives are the same for both). But watch out for PC-Parallel ones. It does not work at all. Zip plus drives has been out for a while now, and I've heard people saying that it works fine with MPC2000.

Strictly speaking, the Zip drive needs to have firmware (that's the software inside zip drive) of version D.09 or higher, but this shouldn't be a problem now unless you buy it second hand. (mine was ver. D.13 when I bought it in summer '97)

By the way, there isn't much point in buying Zip Plus unless you are using it with a computer. MPC2000's SCSI port (or the operating system) is not very fast, so the SCSI transfer speed would be the same whatever you connect.

The speed of SCSI transfer is dramatically improved in OS version 1.50. If you haven't got the latest version, goto Akai web site and update as soon as you can. You are not getting what you deserve for what you've paid with old versions of the OS!

But be warned, if you put a Zip disk you are using with MPC2000 into a Windows machine, You can be pretty sure that something bad happens. The worst of all is that if you've devided a disk into partitions when formatted on MPC2000, everything stored on the disk except those in the first partition WILL BE LOST as soon as you do anything to the disk on Windows.

Now I decided not to devide a zip disk into partitions and use it with windows machine only when transfering samples.

MPC2000's SCSI ID is set to 6 permanently, make sure you set Zip drive's ID switch at the back to ID5 or it won't work.

SCSI Hard Drive:
On old Akai samplers, HD larger than 500 MB can not be used very efficiently. And considering the fact you can only store 512 files in a partition (this is improved in MPC2000XL), I really don't think it's worth buying a HD just to use with MPC2000 unless you wanna burn your own CD-ROM for MPC or something.
Update: Well SCSI harddrives are REALLY cheap now if you know where to look. Best bet would be to try your local computer place where they deal second hand / junk items. 3.5inch Hard disks ranging from 500M to 1Gig are commonly seen changing hands for around 10-20 pounds (20-30 dollers) if you find a bare drive and looking for a case and PSU, any old SCSI case would work fine so go get the cheapest you can find. But watch out for wide SCSI or SCSI-3's. they are too good to work with MPC2000. The type of old scsi standards used for MPC2000 is often refered to as SCSI-1, SCSI-2 or fast-SCSI

SCSI CD-ROM:
Same as for harddrive goes for these too. They are damn cheap nowadays. and MPC or any other sampler don't need anything faster than 16 speed drive so go figure. I got my NEC 32x drive for a tenner. (around $15). Just about any make should work as long as it's faster than 12x or so. (meaning the drive was build within past 3-4 years). Or if you'd like a portable one, try looking for external CDROM drives for laptop PC's. As long as they are SCSI and you have the right cable they work fine too. But remind you they are a bit more expensive than a bare drive. (mine was 9800 yen (~$100) inc. PCMCIA SCSI card in Japan) Dealers specialising in Apple Macs tends to have a wider collection for these as it used to be the standard in Macs, but they also are likely to be charging for premiums so be wry.

Where should you buy them from?:
I've refered to "computer places" a few times, and by that I mean places like Akihabara in Tokyo or Norhtern Computer Market at Bowler's in Manchester. (sorry, never been to the US so I don't know what the equivelent would be) but if you are not too keen on computers those places can be like hell while trying to find that perfect bargain for your musical needs.

That's why many music shops also stock those as well as music instruments and sell them to you with a small premium, so that you don't have to go run around chasing for extincting 72-pin SIMMs or Google'away just to find out what the hell a SCSI terminator is. They also even have information on usable drives and compatibility matrix either made by themselves or the manufacturer, and even let you test them with your system for a complete worry-free shopping (many computer shops don't take refunds on basis of incompatibility with a sampler, or just don't offer any kind of after support as they are sold 'as-is'). So if you would rather get on with your musical life and not bother with this frail of technical jargon then by all means stick to your local music shop!

Internal expansion:
They could all be fitted easily by a user, and how to open up the machine is at the back of the manual. So there shouldn't be much problem doing that even though the manual tells you to go to Akai authorised technicians. But as always, you will be responsible for whatever happens if you decide to do it yourself. No-one else cares for it. (including myself that is. Don't blame me if anything goes wrong!)

However, once they are fit into place, there is a minimum chance of it going wrong afterwards. And I don't think it affects the gurantee either.
If you haven't already got the machine, it might be a good idea to buy the options with the machine and ask the shop to fit it for you.
There is a slight confusion but the 8 output board is NOT compatible with other Akai samplers. So they are not likely to be cheaper in the future, unlike other electrical things. if you are planning to use MPC2000 for a long term, then plan carefully and think 10 years ahead.
Now people are already having difficulities trying to find expansion boards for old samplers such as S50, s1000 etc. if you miss it now then you won't get it in 10 years time when it's most needed.
EB-16 and RAMs are easier to fit as all you gotta do is simply pluging them into the sockets inside MPC2000. and 8 output is not too difficult either. it's actually finding a space to put the card as there are lots of cables in where it's meant to be placed.

(but I couldn't put the screw to hold EB-16 as the metal frame was actually slightly bent so the holes was about hald an inch away from where it should be. It is cheap and assembled in China after all.)