Any tips on buying a midi drum kit to use with Reason?

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Jagwah
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Joined: 16 Jan 2015

19 Jan 2016

Looking at getting a kit pretty soon would love to hear any advice / tips / experiences.

Wouldn't mind getting a 2nd hand kit as I see quite a few around pretty cheap, would anyone advise against this?

Very new to drums in general so any feedback would be welcome.


Cheers!! :wave:

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mcatalao
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19 Jan 2016

Nothing against it. I have one myself that i use mainly for rehearsals.

My only tip is to get away from FAME and other non standard brands as they are really crappy (experience talking). I bought my ddrum mostly for other guys playing and i always get the drummers mad, because the fame ddrum i got is hideous.

You will need a really stable and fast audio card because you will feel latency a lot (mainly as flam effect between the hits and the sounds). You might use the sound from the ddrum for midi recording and then change it to a reason drumkit, so that the drummer doesn't feel as much flam, but i know drummers who complain about the head itself being slow.

Mind that a top notch digital drum kit can cost more than a normal kit - i have a friend with a 12 piece drum kit that costs more than 2000 eur. But the build is amazing, the control is so huge, the hits are different if you hit the middle of the drum or the side or even the rim. Same for the cymbals, hi-hats etc... they all have gates, and stop ringing when you touch with the hand after some time. Amazing stuff. A Fame Ddrumm is so simple compared to this, and i understand, that a drummer does so much different things with the instrument, that an electronic midi device will never be perfect!

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Vince-Noir-99
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Joined: 02 Dec 2015
Location: Russia

19 Jan 2016

I bought a second hand Yamaha DTXpress a few years back, for around 500$.
Needless to say I didn't use the presets from its module, but sent MIDI to the computer to lay down realistic drum parts, using some nice multi-layer acoustic sampler. At the time I was still on Ableton and Logic, so a part from the instruments and sequencer layout, the interaction with the drumkit works in the same way.
I was happy with it, and adapting the trigger sensitivity made it possible to work in different scenarios with different drummers. No complaints on latency.. in my experience it was barely an issue.

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selig
RE Developer
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Location: The NorthWoods, CT, USA

19 Jan 2016

I have a second hand V-drum kit that while a few generations back is still excellent IMO. I've played drums all my life and am picky about the feel. While the cymbals are the older rubber variety, the drums themselves feel great. I even practice more, sometimes with the drums off!
I use both the internal sounds and trigger Reason Drums and others, both with great results.
Selig Audio, LLC

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mcatalao
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19 Jan 2016

You guys talk about Yamahas and Rolands.
I say , stay away from white labels, and stuff like Fame.
Mine's worse than bad...

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Lizard
Posts: 464
Joined: 16 Jan 2015

19 Jan 2016

My advice is of course mimicking others here and say that stay with known brand names that have established themselves in the field of MIDI drums and even then... be aware that you get what you pay for. I would look into Roland, Yamaha and Alesis brands. I've been fortunate over the past couple weeks of playing around with my friend's new Roland TD-25kv drum set. It is beautiful but is an upper end model. It is about $2500 USD so not exactly a toy or whimsically chosen. I've also played around the likes of the Alesis DM-Lite kit which you can pick up for around $300 USD. It gets the job done but it cheaply built and many have stated that the pedals go out after a short while. It is a good kit however if you are looking to learn how to play the drums while looking to get the added value of triggering notes via MIDI.

I find the best mix of them all comes in the Roland 1KV. It is built to a fairly high quality standard and a ton of features for an affordable price. You can pick this up for around $600. This has a mesh snare and the rest are rubber triggers. Mesh heads would ultimately be the way to go as they feel much more natural but they of course are more costly. Here it has mesh where it counts in the snare. Also, it has a crash, ride and hi-hat. Pedals are independent so you don't have to worry about getting a hi-hat stand that will fit comfortably or aligning the kick pedal right... etc. I haven't used the drum brain on this but I expect it to be similar to the same assignment and control system as the 25 and assigning drum signal to MIDI note was very easy.

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Jagwah
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Joined: 16 Jan 2015

22 Jan 2016

Really great input everyone, thank you all!

I have seen a few Alesis kits around second hand that are dirt cheap so I think I will grab one of those!

Thanks again guys!!!!

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mcatalao
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22 Jan 2016

Careful with alesis... My take is that they are just a bit better than Fames, but VERY far from Roland and Yamaha...

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Jagwah
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Joined: 16 Jan 2015

22 Jan 2016

OK thanks dude, they are a bit too cheap to be true really. Might take my time with it, cheers.

Justin Roach
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Joined: 26 Dec 2017

26 Dec 2017

An even better solution would be for Propellerheads to integrate electronic drums into their software instead of years o ridiculous workarounds and patches having to be devised by their customers. I have been waiting for years for Propellerheads to step up and fully integrate edrums. I am upgrading to Reason 10 as I type this. Reason is my DAW of choice and I want it to be as full functional as I need it.

Ostermilk
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Joined: 15 Jan 2015

28 Dec 2017

I built my own kit around a £130 mesh head practice kit and some home made triggers going through an Alesis TriggerIO. The whole setup wasn't as cheap as some of the budget kits but it has bags of flexibility, it's dead quiet, and the feel is pretty good if a bit heavy going.

I don't use it as a 'drum kit' per se, but it's great for sketching out percussive grooves, not necessarily out of triggering drum sounds either.

I've not found an e-drum set yet that wants me to play like an acoustic kit does. There's some really good hybrids out there now but they ain't cheap.

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Jagwah
Posts: 2549
Joined: 16 Jan 2015

29 Dec 2017

Ostermilk wrote:
28 Dec 2017
I built my own kit around a £130 mesh head practice kit and some home made triggers going through an Alesis TriggerIO. The whole setup wasn't as cheap as some of the budget kits but it has bags of flexibility, it's dead quiet, and the feel is pretty good if a bit heavy going.

I don't use it as a 'drum kit' per se, but it's great for sketching out percussive grooves, not necessarily out of triggering drum sounds either.

I've not found an e-drum set yet that wants me to play like an acoustic kit does. There's some really good hybrids out there now but they ain't cheap.
Decided against it in the end, it was either have a couch in my room or a cheap midi drum kit that was probably too cheap for its own good ;)

stxlm
Posts: 85
Joined: 20 Feb 2015

20 Jan 2018

Justin Roach wrote:
26 Dec 2017
An even better solution would be for Propellerheads to integrate electronic drums into their software instead of years o ridiculous workarounds and patches having to be devised by their customers. I have been waiting for years for Propellerheads to step up and fully integrate edrums. I am upgrading to Reason 10 as I type this. Reason is my DAW of choice and I want it to be as full functional as I need it.
What are you missing? I got a kit yesterday, was so easy to play The A-List drummers with it. And tight! The latency was very low.

Harmen
Posts: 68
Joined: 12 Jan 2018

20 Jan 2018

i use a norddrum 2 with the nord pads . itś very velocity responsive, for ghostnotes etc....
next to this you can add a kicktrigger, the nord drum acts as a Trigger to midi device, but you can also use itś own sounds. Aside from the pad you can put anny trigger pad drum etc,.. in the device,.. verry responsive setup,.
If you can find a Nord drum, that is.

ahoi

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