Entering production in , it was intended to supplement and replace the earlier MG 34 , which was more expensive and took much longer to produce, but both weapons were produced until the end of World War II. Designed to use the standard German fully-powered 7. This ability made it extremely effective in providing suppressive fire, and its unique sound led to it being nicknamed "Hitler's buzzsaw". The MG 42 was adopted by several armed organizations after the war, and was both copied and built under licence.
It also spawned the Yugoslav unlicensed nearly identical Zastava M Even before World War I , the German military was already looking forward to replacing the heavy machine guns which proved to be such a success in that war.
The MG13 was one of the first developments toward a goal of producing a weapon that could perform multiple roles, rather than just one. The MG13 was the result of reengineering the Dreyse Water-cooled machine gun to fit the new requirement. This eventually led to the Einheitsmaschinengewehr Universal machine gun introducing an entirely new concept in automatic firepower.
By changing its mount, sights and feed mechanism, the operator could radically transform an Einheitsmaschinengewehr for several purposes. The MG 34 is considered to be the first modern general-purpose machine gun or Einheitsmaschinengewehr. It was developed to use the standard German 7. Equipped with a quick-change barrel and fed either with non-disintegrating metallic-link belts , or from a round Gurttrommel belt drum or a round spring-loaded saddle-drum Patronentrommel 34 magazines with a simple change of the feed cover for a Trommelhalter magazine holder , the MG 34 could sustain fire for much longer periods of time than other portable squad-level weapons such as the American M Browning Automatic Rifle BAR , Soviet Degtyaryov machine gun DP and the British Bren gun , which were fed by magazines , while also being much lighter and more portable than crew-served weapons like the Browning M , SG Goryunov or Vickers machine guns which also lacked quick-change barrels.
The MG 34 was also quite versatile; not only was it able to be fed from belted ammunition or a saddle drum magazine, it could also be fired from a bipod, an innovative Lafette 34 tripod or various pintle mounts for armored vehicles. Switching between a bipod and a tripod required no special tools, as the mounting latch was spring-loaded. As the MG 34 Panzerlauf , it was used throughout the war as secondary armament on panzers and other vehicles.
