Honestly, I don't think Session Drummer is comparable to AD or Superior. I think it's more comparable to NI's Battery. If you have your own drum samples that you want to trigger with MIDI, use Session Drummer. If you want realistic acoustic drums, use AD or similar.

dubdisciple

bapu
If I had a gun to my head and was told my next project MUST have only one or the other...
 
Addictive by a mile.

+1  SD3 is not a bad product and in a few small areas has few advantages over AD. 
 
With AD, it's not just the kits that outshine SD3, it is the way they approach them.  Being able to control mic positions and balance of room and overhead mics delivers and experience closer to recording live drums.  There's just simply a lot more control over the sound.   Fortunately I don't have to choose just one.

I too feel that the mic'ing options offer a greater pallet of audio tools to get the sense of a real room and the bleeding that actually happens, between mic positions.   I am also impressed with the quality samples AND the FX/Dynamics tools supplied. It seems easier to me to start adjusting each of these, when they are already optimized for each kit sound.  SO - while I really appreciate SD3 and all of the past versions, I get a strong sense I will be using AD far more in the future.
 
L 

Interesting as the ssd 4 cymbals seem to be very highly rated elsewhere by many users as does ssd in general. I would say that most people couldn't get the best out of BFD which is really why the processed kits exist I guess. I bow down to greater knowledge here but I doubt most people could tell the difference. That would include myself but I look forward to trying AD when I upgrade in the next few days .

Edit: I'm a piano player, nuff said!

I agree with the person who pointed out that it is not really fair to compare the two. SD sits somehwhere between battery and AD. The rock, blues and folk music leanings of this forum make the decision between the two no contest but person producing EDM or hip-hop might would need some of the features of SD3. Although most would go with another third party solution, SD3 may be the better choice if those producers had to pick one.

I think AD is one of the top drum synths out there. I don't use the stock kit pieces as I use a mesh of several of the ADPaks. The only Pak I use by itself are the Jazz brushes. I sometimes mix SD or BFD Eco with AD though. It depends what I'm after. BFD Eco, and I would guess BFD 2.3 have the ability to do cymal swells properly so that's a huge plus.

Okay. You've convinced me. I will upgrade to X3 ASAP.

dubdisciple
 
With AD, it's not just the kits that outshine SD3, it is the way they approach them.  Being able to control mic positions and balance of room and overhead mics delivers and experience closer to recording live drums.  There's just simply a lot more control over the sound.   Fortunately I don't have to choose just one.

the thing is all of these things ARE possible in sd3. the open source drum kit project comes to mind.  there were overhead and mic position fades that you could control via midi ccs.  the problem is that most of these options were hidden unless you opened the sfz files.  unfortunately most drum library developers are either creating for a specific ui or don't want to type a lot of sfz code, so most sd3 libraries wind up flat and not fully exploiting the sfz format potential. pretty much the most you get nowadays are different round robin layers at different velocity levels.  you can totally have recorded overheads and room ambience in a sd3 kit and the ability to automate anything that goes with them, but the development is taxing.  i think if there had ever been a visual sfz editor put on the market (there are free ones, but frankly they suck in a big way) available from rene or cake the format could have taken off.

swamp..you are right.  All Most of Cakewalks synths are more powerful via sfz files, but I think most find it too impractical.  I suspect that even if there was a free and easy to use editor,  think it would still be a niche market. 

i started building one about 7 months ago in visual studio but life happened (in a good way)... it's on the back burner for now, but it's sort of like a cross between kontakt's editor and reason's nn-xt.  the big hassle is that so many companies build extensions into the format.  plogue is diff than dimension (which i have crashed numerous times with unsupported sfz combos) is different than alchemy.  the kind of abstraction that goes into picking your target environment/synth for the end product is just freaking nuts, not to mention building the code to port something that will work in dimension to alchemy.  

Great discussion. I find the BFD drum sounds to be my favorite. I use BFD2 and ECO as needed. My second choice is the NI studio drummer in Kontakt. I really like the kits. I've only tried the Abbey Road 60's drums and just don't like them.
 
As usual, Danny is on the money IMO. The nice thing about SD3 is that it's real simple and easy to use. For me, the more complicated the interface, the more likely I am to waste time messing around. Once you get into more sophisticated samplers it's hard to back. I really noticed the difference once I started using a drum pad and sticks. The SD3 samples just don't have enough layers.
 
Addictive drums? Some place in the middle of everything, so I won't spend much time on them unless something catches my ears.
 
I'm passing on BFD3 until black Friday. Way to many purchases this Fall.