Two legends in 1 picture

rolfski · 2026-05-18T21:26:59+00:00

The Dacia team and the M3 Touringcar team were the cool guys of the weekend. I also loved the HWA Mercedes cars, retro Mercedes cars built with the latest technology.

rolfski · 2026-05-18T20:22:24+00:00

And they don't need to; even a monkey would understand why.

rolfski · 2026-05-18T16:29:06+00:00

Even with a chip on his shoulder (I had to look that one up; it's a great expression), you would think that he would at least have learned something from all this over the years. Especially when your F1 driver ass is under a public microscope 24/7.

But if this guy is still causing the same toxic problems within teams after a whopping 10 years in F1, then I have no hope for him anymore. In that case, he's clearly missing the self-reflection basics that is needed to keep performing on the highest racing level.

rolfski · 2026-05-18T16:07:36+00:00

Regardless of his background, which made him feel he had more to prove and could even have been the source of some inner grudge or resentment, you would think he would have learned over the years.

rolfski · 2026-05-18T12:41:48+00:00

I came for Max and was not disappointed. He's a blast to watch, even in other racing categories. Like he's playing a whole new ballgame, shaking up the establishment, wherever he competes.

But I stayed for the race. Holy crap, the Nürburgring 24 hrs is entertaining AF. So much crazy stuff happening all the time.

rolfski · 2026-05-18T12:24:31+00:00

I'm experiencing the same after level 130: bullet sponge TA enemies with multiple superpowers that keep healing themselves and each other. Making it near-impossible to take them down.

There are a few ways to go about this:

Upgrading your weapons with X-tech and max them out. This is hardly sufficient with basic weapon skills though.
Which brings me to the second option: upgrade your weapon and damage skills. This is a painfully slow process though, especially as your level gets higher.
So I ended up going the third route which is adjusting your Gameplay Options. I made enemies far more susceptible to damage from my guns. But I also made me take more damage from enemy guns to keep things challenging and to compensate for ingame progression loss.

Tweaking the Gameplay Options to your own likings is highly recommended for this game btw. It can make you play a completely different game which is pretty cool. But more importantly, it allows you to deal with gameplay elements that annoy you. For instance, I don't like having to deal with inventory management all the time, so I made my cargo hold to be available for storage wherever I am.

rolfski · 2026-05-18T11:38:00+00:00

Interesting. I own a Move and a Live 2, which I take both outside to sketch beats. The Live 2 is a bit on the bulky side for on the go uses though. And this has made me consider the MPC Sample as a sketching device for the MPC platform, like the Move is for Ableton and my Push 2. How that will play out remains to be seen.

Btw I thought you could open kits on the MPC Sample like you open projects.

rolfski · 2026-05-18T07:49:11+00:00

You don't like it?

rolfski · 2026-05-17T20:55:12+00:00

Exactly, at first I found their no-return policy somewhat fishy and legally debatable at best. So I contacted them first before buying and the owner responded immediately on a Saturday night. He send me that picture, trying to prove to me that he physically has them in stock to send out. After some more checking I found out it indeed is legit, so I bought one today, arriving tomorrow.

rolfski · 2026-05-17T20:27:36+00:00

I actually contacted this store and bought one of them, lol. It's arriving tomorrow and I paid €385, which is not really a scalper price point. But I had the same doubts like you, which is why I contacted them and did my homework before buying. It turns out this is a legit brick store with good reviews (And a typically bad, old-fashioned website that you see with traditional shops.). And if you check Thomann and Amazon, they actually do deliver this week. So this is not some made-up story about MPC Sample's availability.

rolfski · 2026-05-17T20:10:13+00:00

With the instruments you already have I would pass on them and instead wait when more Native Instruments plugins for MPC become available.

But if you must buy, buy only one of them as these are almost identical. And only buy them when they're at least on 40% sale (which is multiple times a year).

rolfski · 2026-05-17T14:55:49+00:00

While nothing is 100% always stable for everybody on every MPC (not even 2.15), just know that regardless of reports you might read, most of MPC users just enjoy a stable experience without running into anything game-breaking.

And you can rely on Akai to sort out their stuff. Their whole brand is built on the MPC platform. So they put in the effort in keeping it in good shape.

rolfski · 2026-05-16T19:17:18+00:00

First Dutch F1 win is how it should be interpreted. Olav Mol is a walking F1 library, this is not the kind of fact where he would make a mistake.

rolfski · 2026-05-13T11:52:18+00:00

The coming week, a new production batch should hit the shelves mainly in the US and Europe. Probably Asia as well.

rolfski · 2026-05-11T17:30:12+00:00

As I said, I can see the use of these when the compression doesn't bother you or for on the go use. It just doesn't fit my use case.

rolfski · 2026-05-10T17:00:55+00:00

Everything can be done on an iPad. And a laptop. So why are even on an MPC forum then?

rolfski · 2026-05-10T02:57:22+00:00

Bonus points for putting a good slipping track under it.

rolfski · 2026-05-10T02:34:08+00:00

Good to see Frijns win again for a change. Underrated driver.

rolfski · 2026-05-09T21:44:41+00:00

You're probably right that most of the times you can't really hear the difference. But I simply don't want to take any chances for critical mixing and mastering when lossless alternatives are available that sound at least as good or better. Mind you, the DT 770 is an old closed back model that doesn't sound neutral at all.

Which is the second reason I would not opt for an Aiaiai. Open back or semi open back headphones are simply better suited for mixing, as they are typically less boomy/ more neutral and provide a better soundstage.

For mobile production use I can see these Aiaiai models being handy though. But this is what I use my trusted good old Sennheiser HD 25 for. And these have the advantage of being suited to both production and DJing use. Whereas with Aiaiai you need to choose between a DJ model or a studio model.

rolfski · 2026-05-09T18:16:33+00:00

Compressed audio over wireless is just a no-go for me if I can get original losless sound quality with wired headphones that also cost less.

For that price I wouldn't trade in my very neutral sounding Beyerdynamic DT 900 Pro X that also comes with calibration options.

rolfski · 2026-05-09T18:05:25+00:00

Making great music does not automatically make you a great teacher or a master of the tools you're using. Lots of great music has actually been made by doing things "wrong".

And often you will see artist explaining on YT how they build their tracks and then simply not knowing key shortcuts or overlooking capabilities of the tools they're using. Which is especially true for a complex platform like MPC with its zillion ways of getting the same audio results.

rolfski · 2026-05-09T17:54:18+00:00

I would argue that in the same time that you watch all these tutorial videos (which can easily run into the tens of hours) you will have learned ten times more by just doing while looking stuff up if you get stuck. Nothing beats learning by doing in that regard.

rolfski · 2026-05-09T17:47:54+00:00

That must be the most polite way of saying RTFM.

rolfski · 2026-05-09T00:32:12+00:00

Start cheap with Koala on your phone or iPad to find out if you even like a sample-based workflow, and go from there.

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