Product: Akai S3200XL
Price Paid: US $650 used
Submitted
08/20/2002
at
12:41pm
by
Holger Vocke
Email: holger<at>planet-goth dot de
Ease of Use
:
9
I've read the whole manual before I turned on the unit! That's only because I got mine the day I went on holidays and took the manual with me. The manual is great, funny and interesting to read. So I was able to unlock the full potential of this unit right from the start. It has a big display (pretty dark and without any contrast though!!) and a cool user interface. You always have every function accessible from one page, that's pretty cool if you're not familiar with this sampler. Almost every function you except is there.
I give it only a 9 out of 10 because of the dark display, mine us used (as I said) it is pretty dark.
Features
:
8
The S-3200XL is an almost fully expanded S-3000XL with everything Akai has to offer as options for the S-3000 plus space for an internal SCSI-ZIP (which I have and which is the preferred medium), MO or Harddrive because it needs 3 rackspaces (S-3000 needs 2 rackspaces). It comes with 16MB RAM (mine is expanded to the max. of 32MB + 32MB Flash ROM), the EB16 4-channel FX-board, the 24db resonant multi-mode filter board, an SMPTE facility, 10 analog outs (+2 digital outs) and 2 analog ins (+2 digital ins).
You cannot expand this unit (except for the flash rom and harddrives) because it has everything Akai offers.
* Memory: 32 MB RAM plus 32MB flash are enough to do some serious multi-track stuff, but if you want to load your whole Orchestra Library and do a film-soundtrack, this is definitely not your unit.
* FX: The FX are the great sounding and cover every bread-and-butter-situation. You have 4 independant channels and they work like you expect them to work in a multi-mode setup. Download the S3000 manual from Akai and see by yourself!)
* MIDI: You can control pretty darn everything via assignable MIDI controllers. Very easy. Plus a very useful MIDI-monitor to debug your MIDI-setup.
* Sequencer: You do not have a sequencer, but you have an SMPTE cue list where you can play samples at given SMPTE positions. You can load multiple SMF-Files and let them play (good for live or rehearsal situations). I have a Yamaha RM1x which does the rest...
* HD Recording: You can record/play direct to/from HD while playing your multi-mode setups. This facility allows only 1 stereo/mono sample but is very useful if you want to play some backing stuff (long intros, samples etc.)
Expressiveness/Sounds
:
8
Sound? In my opinion I don't want a sampler to "sound"! The Akai doesn't sound, it replicates! 1:1!
It's more a production machine than a sound creation machine. I think it's made for people who want to do a whole multi-track production on one machine. Add a sequencer and you have everything for a complete production.
Reliability
:
No Opinion
Hmmm... The OS crashes sometimes but as far as I experienced, you know on what situations it crashes, so you can avoid them.
I have no opinion because I didnAt use it live yet.
Customer Support
:
No Opinion
Never called Akai.
Overall Rating
:
10
First: I bought mine for some fantastic 650$ on ebay (fully equipped with flash-rom and CD-ROM drive), so it's easy for me to rate a 650$ unit "10".
I've used my PC for some years and had one serious problem: I had an idea and it took hours to setup my PC and minutes to forget the idea.
Now I switch to real gear with real knobs and switches. I switch them on, press some buttons and there I go. As I said, the core of my gear will be the RM1x, the S-3200XL and some synths plus a 8 or 16 track HD-recorder which I need to buy in the near future (andd a mixing console of course). That's all I need and the Akai fits perfectly into the plan to make my PC become more and more dispensible.
Conclusing: This sampler is old (introduced 1996), but it still competes pretty well against current units from Yamaha, Emu and Akai themselfes.
