Jump to content

Can anyone help me out with electronic drums?


goodbye,beautiful

Recommended Posts

  • Members

I used to be a drummer and I wanna play again...at least for my studio projects. I went to my girlfriends best buy and saw this:

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage...d=1099387264934

Its an electronic drum set. Looks kinda cheesey, but would it do what I want it to do? I need to have control over the individual drum pads, be able to add on some more, and be able to use it to record. Anyone? Options? Any help in this subject would be appreciated. Thank you.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

 

Originally posted by goodbye,beautiful

I used to be a drummer and I wanna play again...at least for my studio projects. ...Looks kinda cheesey, but would it do what I want it to do? I need to have control over the individual drum pads, be able to add on some more, and be able to use it to record. Anyone? Options? Any help in this subject would be appreciated. Thank you.

 

 

1. The link doesn't work so I searched and found an ION drumset for $299. Assuming that is what you are talking about, it only has one RCA out. If you want to record each pad (snare, kick, ride, crash, tom, etc.) on a separate track, you won't be able to do more than two pads at a time at the most. As for how well the pads actually work and how long they will last before breaking, who knows.

2. With any electronic drumset, you can always add on by adding another brain and pads if you reach the capacity of the first brain.

3. I can't answer you question about controll of the pads, even if I knew what parameters you are talking about. Control over the pad physically, or control over the sample being triggered? Even if you told me, the website description did not reveal any information for either.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

Its definitely the ION drumset he was talking about - I fixed the URL with the product number at the end. No point pasting the amended url again as it probably will get truncated.

 

Anyway, the set looks really, really low cost and low quality.

 

http://images.bestbuy.com/BestBuy_US/images/products/6971/6971725_ra.jpg

 

You're taking a risk buying it. My advice would be to scout out for 2nd hand yamaha/roland or something like that. To me the newer roland stuff is astronomically priced ($1000 AU for a roland kick pad? hah!) but once you get that generation before its not too bad - and probably far better than taking a risk on some {censored}ty noname kit that at the very least will not be good for recording.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

 

Originally posted by goodbye,beautiful

Well is anyone selling a used electronic kit for under 500? Or maybe a reasonably priced module so I can build my own?

 

 

I am having good luck with a roland octapad I (~180) + roland XP10 (~110) + a miniKick(~50), and a kick pedal, snare stand, drum throne...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

 

Originally posted by scarecrowbob



I am having good luck with a roland octapad I (~180) + roland XP10 (~110) + a miniKick(~50), and a kick pedal, snare stand, drum throne...

 

 

I found a ROLAND PAD 8 OCTAPAD. It looks like it has inputs and such. Whats the xp10 for? I am looking to build a more traditional drum set. Is the octaapad a drum brain too? Can I add drum pads(with triggers) to it? The auction ends in a bit so I need answers. Sorry I am so clueless about this, but this is all new and exciting to me. Thanks again!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

Funny that you should mention...

 

I have an ION kit that is similar to the one pictured in the link.

The one pictured appears to have a more advanced "controller".

(Mine does not have any type of display or knobs....just jacks). It arrived just yesterday, and I just set it up and started monkeying around with it last night.

 

For grins and giggles, I picked it up for about $75 with shipping off of eBay to play around with, as I am a guitar player.

 

I was actually surprised that it wasn't as flimsy as I imagined that it would be. For what I had in mind, which was mixing the sound with my iPod and accompanying some tunes, it works better than I expected...enough to keep me up dang near all night, and I can't WAIT to get ahold of it later.

 

However, I can see where it will fall really short, if I get into this as much as I think I'm going to.

 

But for $75, it was definitely worth it. Now, I'm going to be on the lookout for a decent quality, preowned electronic kit.

 

You drummer-folk might be onto something. Ha!

 

Harley

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

 

Originally posted by hthomp

Funny that you should mention...


I have an ION kit that is similar to the one pictured in the link.

The one pictured appears to have a more advanced "controller".

(Mine does not have any type of display or knobs....just jacks). It arrived just yesterday, and I just set it up and started monkeying around with it last night.


For grins and giggles, I picked it up for about $75 with shipping off of eBay to play around with, as I am a guitar player.


I was actually surprised that it wasn't as flimsy as I imagined that it would be. For what I had in mind, which was mixing the sound with my iPod and accompanying some tunes, it works better than I expected...enough to keep me up dang near all night, and I can't WAIT to get ahold of it later.


However, I can see where it will fall really short, if I get into this as much as I think I'm going to.


But for $75, it was definitely worth it. Now, I'm going to be on the lookout for a decent quality, preowned electronic kit.


You drummer-folk might be onto something. Ha!


Harley

 

 

I'm interested to know where you think it fall short. Does yours have any midi out capability? That would go quite far to making a very good buy. All you would need is a vst sampler and some samples and you'd probably be laughing.

 

I don't doubt that every pad is 1 zone though. Is the hat pedal just open and closed?

 

Does the cymbol mute if you play and then grab it?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

 

Originally posted by goodbye,beautiful



I found a ROLAND PAD 8 OCTAPAD. It looks like it has inputs and such. Whats the xp10 for? I am looking to build a more traditional drum set. Is the octaapad a drum brain too? Can I add drum pads(with triggers) to it? The auction ends in a bit so I need answers. Sorry I am so clueless about this, but this is all new and exciting to me. Thanks again!

 

 

 

These come up on Ebay all the time; as with anything on Eaby, look at completed auctions and decide how much you should pay before looking at the active auctions.

 

 

 

 

I use the XP10 as a drum sound module (but I also play keyboard). Any sound module will do something similar.

 

If you'll look, the Octapad has no audio out; it only produces MIDI out. The MIDI goes to the sound module, which produces audio, which goes to an amplifier sos I can hear it.

 

 

You can add 6 or so external triggers to the octapad, and I have a couple of extra ones.

 

In retrospect, I should have gotten the Pad-80 (the Octapad II), as it can produce sounds in and of itself, and I could use it without the XP10. Also, it doesn't do a very good job of controlling highhats; I use two pads, one for open and one for closed.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

Well generally you would have a computer with midi in so you can easily run a sampler with samples keyed to that midi rather than necessarily getting anything physical to do the sounds. I generally use my brain only for practice. A computer with a sampler makes for a lot of fun

 

http://userpage.fu-berlin.de/~thman/VST/vst-allinstr.htm

 

Plenty of vsts there that you can have fun with once you have the midi coming in and a host to run the vsts on.

 

The open and closed hihat thing is pretty bogus though.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

 

Originally posted by rocketeer

Well generally you would have a computer with midi in so you can easily run a sampler with samples keyed to that midi rather than necessarily getting anything physical to do the sounds. I generally use my brain only for practice. A computer with a sampler makes for a lot of fun




Plenty of vsts there that you can have fun with once you have the midi coming in and a host to run the vsts on.


The open and closed hihat thing is pretty bogus though.

 

 

I really like to run my MIDI into my computer (so I can edit the recordings and use a really nice sample set). Instead of getting a drum machine, you could just use frutystudio's demo and a nice soundfont with a 35$ USB-MIDI

 

I don't mind the HH thing though, it allows me to play different things in different ways, so it is more of a tradeoff than a loss.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

 

Originally posted by rocketeer



I'm interested to know where you think it fall short. Does yours have any midi out capability? That would go quite far to making a very good buy. All you would need is a vst sampler and some samples and you'd probably be laughing.


I don't doubt that every pad is 1 zone though. Is the hat pedal just open and closed?


Does the cymbol mute if you play and then grab it?

 

 

I wish that it did use a MIDI interface, but it is a USB 2.0 interface.

It triggers the various sounds, which I believe are in some proprietary format similar to a .wav. But, there are a very limited number of "kits", and I have yet to find out any way to control any type parameters for volume for individual pads, etc.

 

Yes, each pad is 1 zone with the exception of the cymbal, which has a second "zone" in the form of a small button toward the bottom lip on the back side. It functions as a "mute".....fairly well...if you happen to time your hit-grab-pushbutton JUST right.

 

To my ears, the hi-hat pedal doesn't sound much different than the hi-hat pad.

 

I'm still dorking with it, and I will say that it was worth what little I paid for it just for fun.

 

But, since the original post mentioned that they wanted to record with it, I thought that I'd point out that they would most likely find the results pretty "amateur-ish"....YMMV.

 

Harley

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

 

Originally posted by hthomp



I wish that it did use a MIDI interface, but it is a USB 2.0 interface.

It triggers the various sounds, which I believe are in some proprietary format similar to a .wav. But, there are a very limited number of "kits", and I have yet to find out any way to control any type parameters for volume for individual pads, etc.


Yes, each pad is 1 zone with the exception of the cymbal, which has a second "zone" in the form of a small button toward the bottom lip on the back side. It functions as a "mute".....fairly well...if you happen to time your hit-grab-pushbutton JUST right.


To my ears, the hi-hat pedal doesn't sound much different than the hi-hat pad.


I'm still dorking with it, and I will say that it was worth what little I paid for it just for fun.


But, since the original post mentioned that they wanted to record with it, I thought that I'd point out that they would most likely find the results pretty "amateur-ish"....YMMV.


Harley

 

 

Are you sure that it is not functioning as a USB Midi device? My keyboards and controllers are USB but its just a connection method and they work perfectly as midi devices with cubase recognising this. Even my dtx kit is listed as a USB device because it is plugged into a USB based control surface. They just come up as two individual usb midi devices. Give it a go, it might work.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members
Originally posted by rocketeer



Are you sure that it is not functioning as a USB Midi device? My keyboards and controllers are USB but its just a connection method and they work perfectly as midi devices with cubase recognising this. Even my dtx kit is listed as a USB device because it is plugged into a USB based control surface. They just come up as two individual usb midi devices. Give it a go, it might work.

The Ion and a couple of other sub

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

Build your own, like I and many others have.

 

http://www.electronicdrums.com

 

It's a pay site, twenty bucks for a year I believe. What you will learn there will allow you to build an electronic set that will do whatever you want it to for prices that are as ludicrously small as Roland's are ludicrously high. You can build an entire five piece e-set for less than the cost of a Roland bass drum pad. And it is not that hard or technical, trust me.

 

They have free plans for their most basic design, check them out and see what you think. If you want to go deeper into this stuff, then you'll need a subscription.

 

By far the best twenty bucks I ever spent on anything musical. Great bunch of guys on there and some of the most knowledgable you'll find anywhere.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

I hate to say this, but I tell you the truth. You will get what you pay for. I bought a "demo" Alesis DM Pro kit in 2001 and could not be more happy. Now it cost me $1049 back then, probably a lot cheaper now (harware by Hart Dynamics for Alesis, btw). I have played and heard the TD-3s, TD-6s, even TD-8s and am not impressed. Yamaha the same, though the DTX has a really cool high-hat and "tunable" drums. Depends on how serious you are about your sound, maybe the entry level drums will fit your needs; I am only speaking from my needs.

Good luck, man.

Seeker

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

Thats not really saying much considering a vdrums bass pad is something like 900 AU.

 

In other news my Roland KD8 arrives in the next few days. I already have a Yamaha Pad but I have two pedals and soon to be two pads. Double bass incoming. I decided to go this route as my current bass pad has no ability to be used with a standard double pedal. Since I was buying another bass pad anyway I figured two pedals would be cheaper and probably higher quality than one cheap double kick pedal.

 

Anyway, thats the theory.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...