So why would Akai design the system like this if it makes configuration tricky and is a bit intrusive to the host machine? Well, this arrangement has a significant advantage: it lets your computer do the heavy lifting. Eventually, my Mac learned these permutations and I could then run the MPC software or plug-in with just a brief flash of my main display as the MPC screen came online. The settings also needed to be tweaked a few times at first, for example when I changed resolution on my laptop or connected to an extra 24-inch screen. This I fixed by making sure my Mac’s Display settings had the MPC Touch screen arranged as a separate display on the opposite side from my Dock. Connecting the MPC messed up my main screen’s resolution, and I lost the ability to access my Dock, which is set to appear on the right of my screen. This initially struck me as a rather messy, even hacky, arrangement, not least because I had some teething troubles while setting up.
The MPC Touch UI is then essentially a full screen window running from your computer. Rather than simply making a separate stand-alone touch interface that communicates with the MPC software, Akai have opted to use a DisplayLink driver that extends your computer’s desktop over USB. The complexity arises from the way that the touchscreen works with your computer. Getting started is somewhat complicated, but thankfully Akai have provided a master installer that guides you through a series of software and driver installs, restarts and configuration steps. On the back of the unit are audio inputs and outputs on quarter-inch jacks and a headphone output with volume control, evidence that the MPC Touch is also an audio interface that provides for direct sampling and monitoring. The other rubber buttons register your push with a satisfying click. The colour backlit pads are the same as those I recently enjoyed on the new MPDs, with their best-in-class feel and sensitivity. The hardware in question is an attractively compact, solid slab, with the standard 4x4 pad grid to the left, touchscreen to the right, plus four rotary encoders, a larger data wheel, and a modest selection of dedicated buttons. Like the Renaissance and Studio MPCs, the Touch is a hybrid system that pairs a controller with an app or plug-in running on a Mac or PC, but the touchscreen is a big change that promises (and largely succeeds) to unite software and hardware into a true hands-on production workstation. The MPC has always been about its fast, hands-on interface - can a touchscreen make it even better?Īkai’s MPC Touch joins the established line-up of current generation MPCs, but rather than simply adding another form factor it offers a fundamentally different interaction model.
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