Newbie question. Session Drummer or Ez Drummer or Both?

I'm rather new to using DAWs and I'm currently using the trial version of X2 while waiting for my purchased box to arrive. 
Prior to purchasing X2, I had been using another DAW and had purchased Ez Drummer. I'm wondering if Session Drummer is equivalent to Ez Drummer and or is Ez Drummer a superior product to Session Drummer or are they just different?  I've not yet had a chance to use Session Drummer as I'm still trying to get my head wrapped around all the other functionality that X2 has to offer up.

Anyway, thanks for the help.

In my opinion EZ Drummer is far superior to SD3, especially with expansion packs.
 
I'm not slagging off SD3, I think it's okay and very good for a bundled piece of software.  I still use it for a few things.
 
I think EZ Drummer, and it's bigger brother Superior Drummer are excellent.

I'm a big fan of Session Drummer 3. Paired with the Step Sequencer, it's very powerful. You can drag your own samples in to Session Drummer and create your own custom kits. SD3 is a 12 track/output sampler so you can route up to 12 drums/samples to individual audio outputs (these show up as tracks in Sonar), and add effects to each individual output.

Not sure how all that works with EZ Drummer. I've never used it.

Another thing to keep in mind is, I checked EZ Drummers site, and they said you have to have Version 8 or higher to work with Sonar X2. You may want to check which version you have.

There is a 3 part tutorial for using Session Drummer 3 on Youtube. Do a search for "sonar master class drum production". The difference between these tutorials that were done for Sonar 8.5 and what you will see in X2 is, there are Track Templates in X2 that are already set up so you don't have to manually create the audio outputs like they show in the video ... but it's still good to know how to do it.

both

Neither. XLN's Addictive Drums knocks both into a cocked hat (IMHO)   ;O)

Skyline_UK


Neither. XLN's Addictive Drums knocks both into a cocked hat (IMHO)   ;O)

No, don't tell me that! I already own Ez Drummer. I don't need to be temped by something else. 

Bristol_Jonesey

Skyline_UK


Neither. XLN's Addictive Drums BFD2 real drums with a real drummer knocks both all drum modules into a cocked hat (IMHO)   ;O)

Fixed 

Really fixed.

BTW, I have all the biggie drum romplers (BFD2, Addictive, Toontrack w/all but the two newest packs, Slate 4.0, NI Abbey Road Series, Jamstix, NI Battery and a few NI libraries) and I find that they all have a place and time. I try to take the approach that there is no "one size fits all". But that's just me.

I have Toontrak's EZ Drummer and Superior Drummer, in addition to Sonar's Session Drummer, but I probably use EZ and Session Drummer the most when developing ideas.

Platinum Samples has come out with several excellent expansion kits for Session Drummer, so I do gravitate towards it sometimes for those sounds. Also, EZ won't allow you to raise or lower the pitch of each individual drum, but Session Drummer will.

I use EZ or Session Drummer to quickly lay out new ideas, and sometimes I am happy enough that I stick with those for the final product. Often, though, I'll switch to Superior Drummer for a more polished final product.

Superior Drummer is a much more involved program, and it lets you mix-and-match kit pieces from any EZ Drummer & Superior Drummer library. Superior also allows you to alter the pitch of each kit piece and mess with the envelope, if you like.

Since you already own EZ Drummer, I'd suggest you play with both EZ and Session Drummer for awhile and decide which fits your workflow best. You can use MIDI drum patterns from EZ for Session Drummer and vice-versa.

Of the two, EZ Drummer probably has the edge, but Session Drummer gives tuning flexibility if you want it.