Akai MPC 2500 5000 Pro Tools setup

Click the Operation tab.

In the right hand side of this tab, you’ll see two options: “Record online at Time Code”, and

“Record online at insertion/selection”.

Choose “record online at insertion/selection”, and put Protools online with the MPC as the master – to do that, do this:

(this bit comes from the official AKAI website at http://www.akaipro.com/syncprotools, thank you guys!)

In Pro Tools:

1. Go to the Setup menu and choose “Peripherals…” Click on the Synchronization tab and verify that the option “MTC Reader Port is set to “Any”.
2. Put Pro Tools online by pressing the online button to the left of the stop button on the transport at the top of the edit window. This will be verified by a blinking blue “online” button.

On the MPC5000 / MPC2500:

1. Go to the MIDI/Sync menu.
2. Set Sync Out to the MIDI output port on the MPC into which you have plugged your MIDI cable. For instance: “SyncOut: A (Master)”
3. Set Mode to MIDI Time Code. Set Frame rate to 30.  Note: Do not use “30D” which is a drop-sync and is intended for video equipment.
4. Set Send MMC: to ON
5. Press play or Play Start on the MPC and Pro Tools should now be playing along to the MPC.

Now, you should be able to record arm the track you have the MPC connected to for audio input, then arm the Pro Tools transport for recording and make sure it’s in Online mode. Now when you press play on the MPC, Pro Tools will start recording from the location your transport is currently set to.

If this doesn’t work, try the other option in setup/preferences, “record online at time code”.  See if this works.

This way, you can start recording in Pro Tools when your MPC triggers playback!

Hope this helps you guys,

-Brian @ OBEDIA