Okay, before some smartass says "Oh, it must be a keyboard", I'll tell you, it's the new Alesis DM10 electronic drum kit. http://www.alesis.com/dm10prokit
It looks like a good bang for the buck to me, but not being a drummer, I can't say for sure. The specs look good and so does the unit (for the money). The feature that hooked me was that you can load up any software like BFD into the BRAIN (sound module) and bypass having to use a laptop to play the sounds.

I ran it by the two drummers that I sometime play with, one of whom has a Roland TD20 rig. They both approve but warned me not to expect a poor man's TD20. I don't. If I were a drummer and were getting it for myself, I'd get the Roland (costs a lot more so it must be a lot better, right ), but since I'm getting it mainly to have a kit in my little home studio and the fact that it will be played primarily by other people, .......the cheapo wins out. This should be an enticement for the drummer to sometimes come to MY house for rehearsal or jamming. We'll see. I will order some external drum package(s) to supplement the on-board kits. Any suggestions (Diki?). It's supposed to also trigger external modules like the SonicCell or even drum machines like my Zoom (horrible sounds). Should be fun until the novelty wears off .

The thing currently has a shipping delay but hopefully it'll be here shortly after I get back from my hip job. I'll give you a second-hand review from my drummer (the Roland one; the other guy hates electronic kits of any kind).

chas

Important question:

How much?

If only I had room for a thing like that I would buy one on a snap.

Have fun!

Sorry, Chas, but you can't run BFD on this thing. It ain't a computer...

You CAN use USB to send MIDI to a laptop or Receptor running BFD, or you can laboriously sample/export some of the BFD drum sounds and import them into this, but I don't know where you got that it can run BFD on it...

Personally, if it has a reasonable brush kit and a straight ahead kit, I wouldn't bother going off the deep end looking to improve it. At least for now. Unless made specifically for the Alesis, I think you are going to find it a LOT of hassle to make kits for it.

What I would probably do is mess with learning the MIDI maps it outputs, and hook it up to the PA1X for some more drum sounds...

From the Alesis site's decription.

"The world's first-ever drum module to let you keep it fresh
So, not only do you have an astounding collection of sounds in the DM10 Pro Kit's DM10 module, you've got the world's first-ever drum module to let you load in new sounds via USB. That way, you can always keep your sound fresh, current, and on the cutting edge. Naturally, you can also use the DM10 Pro Kit has a trigger-to-MIDI interface, for performing or working with your favorite software... be it BFD, Toontrack, Reason, or whatever else you dig. And when it's time to practice that solo you've been meaning to, you've got an input for your iPod or MP3 player... just put on your headphones, press play, and get going."

So, did I mis-read this?

chas

Street price seems to be US $1499.00. Best price so far is $1479.00. It's hard to bargin since no one has them in stock yet. I ordered mine from Sweetwater ($20.00 more but worth the "extra" service and reliability).

chas

chas

Chas, you load in new sounds by USB means you can get .wav's of drum sounds, and load them in there. Whereupon you have to map them, stack them, x-fade them yourself. So, if you have BFD, you would have to pick certain samples, export them (you realize that BFD has dozens of samples per note?), import them to the Alesis, assign them to the note you want them on, at the velocities you need them at, and slowly build up a kit like that. No different to doing it on your Korg, really. How much RAM can it hold? Those BFD kits take GB's

Alternatively, you can use a laptop to actually RUN BFD (or a desktop, or Receptor, etc.), then use the USB to MIDI into the laptop.

In neither case is the Alesis actually RUNNING BFD.

You're probably right. Anyhoo, the voice list (drum sounds) for the module looks pretty extensive so if the the quality is decent, maybe that's all that's needed. I can't tell 'good' from 'really good'. I can only tell 'really bad' (Zoom). Actually the drums in my Fantom G7 sound pretty good but I can't say that they sound measurably better than the ones in the SonicCell. They do sound 'different' from the ones in the Korg PA1x tho', which, as you know, I also like. Not a big fan of the T2 drums but the Motif ES drums are somewhat better.....ok, a lot better. When I'm just doing junk recording, I almost always defer to the Korg Drums. Probably because I can just play the patterns, without any tedious tweaks .

chas

Diki, check this video. It sounds to me like they're working with companies like BFD and others to (pre)make custom kits and/or software to work with (seamless integration?) the DM10 without all of the 'drama' you describe. Again, I could be wrong but I'm getting it with the assumption that I'm correct on this particular point. I realize that it can't run a computer program like BFD, I never thought that (not quite THAT dumb ), but basically load a kit from such a program and take it to the gig without needing a laptop to trigger the sounds from.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVCIa53ZWV0


chas

I just can't see them getting the detail into the sounds that BFD does. Dozens of samples PER NOTE is probably going to shrink to just a few to be able to be loaded. 128MB of RAM won't even get you the BFD snare by itself if you used all the samples.

Still, for what it does and costs, it should still be a pretty good tool for the studio.

Alesis manages to get some pretty good drums sounds out of just 32Mb on the SR-18. At least, they sound pretty good to me. Guess I'll just hope for the best and prepare to be disappointed. Besides, like I said, if the on-board sounds are good (and there appears to be some 'new technology' involved), it may be a non-issue. I always liked the sound of my old Sr-16. In fact, for my intended use, it's probably overkill. But I can't afford to have Russ show up with his drummer son and I have no drum kit in my studio .

chas

chas