![]() With many different storage options competing in the technological boom at the time, these units offered a mix of floppy disk, hard disk, removable cartridges, magneto-optical disks, and CD-ROM options. They were prized for their onboard filters, envelopes, and digital effects. ![]() The SMPTE reader and hard-disk recording option from the S1100 were included as optional features on the S3000, though were not available for the S2800. Counting it as its third generation of samplers, the S3000 took the earlier 16-voice polyphony of the line and doubled it to 32 voices. In 1992, Akai released its new flagship model, the S3000, along with the S2800 (a cheaper, slightly downgraded model of the S3000). I remember, during those recording sessions, us having several Akai machines all running simultaneously, with many sounds and loops emanating from each before we committed anything to tape so that we could continually update the sound picture as we built the songs." Shop Now on Reverb We would often trigger four or five snares at once for example, with different envelope shapes and filtering on each to make a composite big sound. ![]() In 2011, while auctioning off some of his equipment, Depeche Mode's Alan Wilder said: "In particular, many of the famous 'Violator' and 'SOFAD' drums were sampled using the Akai, which was particularly good at stacking and triggering sounds tightly (much better than the Emulators, which took a back seat around this time). Importantly, it could record your samples in stereo, whereas all previous S series samplers were limited to mono. ![]() Whereas the S950 still had 12-bit processing (despite its advanced editing tools), the S1000 was a premium, 16-bit sampler that was still relatively affordable upon its release-and had all of the S950's editing tools and more. The S1000 was actually released at the same time as the S950, but included many more features. Below, we're looking at some of the major models. But plenty of producers still want the original sounds and feel of the Akai S Series.īecause of the diversity of today's sampler options, you can find these vintage S series machines for relatively cheap (and certainly far cheaper than they were new). But artists as diverse as My Bloody Valentine, The Bomb Squad, and Jean-Michel Jarre are all known to have employed S series units on their records.įrom '85 to the present day, sampling has of course only grown in prominence, and the process is far easier than in previous eras, thanks to developments in music software and any number of newer, more portable hardware units like the Elektron Octatrack and Digitakt, MPC Live, and Korg Electribe 2 Sampler. The S series samplers were famously fundamental to electronica, jungle, drum and bass, and other forms of dance music. And the use of S series samplers along with early Commodore 64 and Atari ST computer sequencers helped pave the way for the future of computer music. When used in conjunction with Akai’s MPC drum machines/sequencers or an E-Mu Sp-1200, the S series greatly extended the range of producers. A rich synth could turn reedy and gauzy, a bass could become thicker, and a kick could gain added crunch.Īkai S612 with the MD280 quick disk drive.Īkai’s digital MIDI samplers helped bring the art of sampling to a much wider range of musicians than expensive units like the Synclavier and Fairlight CMI. The combination of low bit depth and low sampling rates would introduce new timbres to your sampled sounds. Once you sampled a sound, you could play it across the notes of your MIDI controller and then use the Akai’s on-board controls to edit where the sample starts and stops, reverse it, adjust filter parameters, and choose whether the sound plays in a loop or just one time with each press of a key. (And original sample floppy disks are still sought-after today.) And you could then save your samples onto disks, the format of which would also change as the samplers progressed, from 2.8" quick disks to standard floppy disks to hard disks in later years. (You could choose between 4kHz and 32kHz, a range that would be expanded in future samplers.) At lower rates, you could fit more samples onto the limited memory. With the S612, users could record a small snippet of sound from an instrument or vocal (up to 8 seconds), using a MIDI keyboard controller to set the sample rate. But while it was a very simple machine compared to those that followed, its basic functions set the stage for the line of rackmount samplers that would help bring sample-based music-making into the modern age. Despite some fans that still love the S612 to this day, many of those samplers have been plundered for parts or left to electronics recycling bins over the years. The very earliest Akai S series sampler, the S612, isn't particularly prized as a vintage unit.
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