2 questions about electronic drumkits + Sonar

To get the most from your money, you should get a (reasonably) cheap kit and use it with a software sampler program, such as the ones from Toontrack, FXpansion, Native Instruments etc. These drum sounds will almost certainly be Superior (pun intended) to the ones included with your kit, unless you get a super-highend kit. Furthermore you will get limitless flexibilty in terms of mixing/processing after recording.

As others have recommended - you'll primarily use your electronic drums to record midi patterns in Sonar - then route those midi patterns through drum software for great sounds.  Personally I love FXPansion's BFD2. 

Depending on how much you're planning on playing the drums - less expensive kits tend to have harder rubber pads, which I find very different to regular drums and hurt my wrists after a while (I likely hit them too hard) - so I highly recommend checking out different kits - some will be more fatiguing to play than others.  If you're not going to play them much (only for recording) then maybe this isn't an issue for you.  Roland makes several models (as others do)with 'mesh' pads - basically they look like real drums (only not quite as deep) with a mesh skin - which feels much more similar to a regular acoustic drum then a hitting a hard rubber pad. 

Hope htis helps.
Russ

SvenArne, with a software sampler program you mean something outside of Sonar? Not a plugin but a stand alone program?

Tripod


SvenArne, with a software sampler program you mean something outside of Sonar? Not a plugin but a stand alone program?

All of the drum software out there can be used in your host. 
If you are wanting to use it in stand alone then I think I'm right in saying that fxpansions BFD2 and BFD Eco are the only
ones that can be used this way. If you check out BFD2 and the price puts you off then there's always it's little brother BFD Eco but BFD2 is a little better for E-drumming.


Steve

karma1959


Actually I thought most separate drum software packages can be used in standalone mode as well as a VST plugin - however please correct me if I'm mistaken.

Also.. to the original poster - if you already have X1 producer, you can use session drummer in the manner as described above.  The acoustic samples aren't as good in SD compard to BFD2 in my opinion, but it may be good to try that first before spending more $$ on a separate package. 

I know RMX, Addictive Drums and Ezdrummer don't have stand alone and I'm sure superior drums doesn't either.
All the kontakt drums such as abbey road I think can be played via the kontakt stand alone player come to think of it.
Obviously Session drummer is tied to sonar.


Not only is the sample quality well below BFD2 (and Eco) it's not the most suitable for e-drummers either but as you say,
a good place to start.


Steve

I have Superior Drummer which came with Toontrack Solo. If I understand correctly Toontrack Solo is the "stand alone" software for EZ Drummer and Superior Drummer.

Apologies, I stand corrected, I have the darn thing too but not sure I ever used it since I have no e-drums.

Steve

I use a Roland TD-4K kit, which is cheap but has a few bells and whistles such as double zone pads for the snare and cymbals, which really helps in terms of playability. 

I use it with Superior 2.0, BFD Eco and NI Abby Road 60s Drummer. They all have their strengths, but feel that Superior wins in terms of instant playability with no tweaking required to get up and running!

The thing about recording midi drums where drummers are concerned is latency. I have a pretty mean system, can record w/o incident @ 32 samples, but drummers still complain about the gap between strike and note sounding. You can monitor the sounds off your module to get the instant response, then mix drum rompler to taste afterward.

Steven Slate Drums 4 is killer. Zildjian samples are the best I've heard. Enjoy recording!

ive got an alesis sr 16,probably one of the lowest price drum machines out there,its also been around for years,thing with that is x1 has the drum map built in to its defaults so all you have to do is plug a midi cable in to the sr 16 midi out put and then load session drummer up then start hitting the kick pad on the drum machine and you hear a kick from session drummers kit,same with the snare,tap the snare pad..you hear the snare drum triggering sd3.i usualy write all my parts in the drum machine then arrange them in the drum machine,then hit play in sonar and it triggers the drum machine to play the whole song(you need to set up your midi settings first)its the easiest way ive found of doing it.so you dont need a nice expensive drum machine,you need a basic one with good arragment capabilitys and midi outputs(most have them)..your panning is done within sonar your velocitys can be done in both but i chose to use my sr16's velocitys.
 
by the way you can pick up a used sr 16 for about 100.00 bucks,sometimes even under a hundred.

I just purchased an Alesis DM8 USB kit for $420. and am using it to control BFD2


Does anyone know how the DM8 PRO kit sound compares to Superior and/or BFD2?

Another vote for BFD2 here - and at the moment it's going for £99

I think it was around the £250 mark when I got it.

If BFD2 is only $99, GET IT!!!!!!!!!!  Well worth it!

Hey Steve, I know you're usually spot on, but take a look at this mate:

http://www.google.co.uk/p...A&ved=0CIMBEPMCMAM

I suggest getting a kit with at least a good snare. So the material type one, not the rubber. Makes rolls on the snare much easier and they sound more realistic because it behaves like a real kit.

If you want realistic sounding drums, you're going to struggle from the cymbal side of things. Unless your cymbal playing is SUPER simple, it just doesn't sound realistic. A great option is to use a MIDI drum kit, sample the drums through BFD, and then set up a nice REAL set of cymbals over the kit. Get a pair of suitable overhead mics and record the cymbal playing as well as the MIDI playing. Combine the two for a professional sounding drum kit on a very limited budget. Hell, the entire drum kit is often replaced digitally after recording so often these days that you might as well just do this from the start! This is how I record my drums and I think it sounds great. I have not got any audio samples up on the internet yet but if you want to hear the un-mixed result, let me know and I'd be happy to put it up for you.

Also consider second hand, but you'll want to play it first to make sure the velocity pads are working properly.