A quick preview of the edited Steven Slate Old Zep Dry Kit for Session Drummer 3. I'm not completely happy with the balance of everything yet but I'm almost done editing. For those who had any doubts this should be a pretty obvious example of the problems I described previously and why they are worth fixing.
 
The first approx. 25 seconds are the stock SFZ files, the next 25 seconds are the "fixed" kit and the rest is an example of the fixed kit sitting in a mix. Don't expect much, I used a un-edited stock MIDI file thru SD3 and the TTS-1 to show what the kit -should- sound like without tweaking, and so anyone who is curious can verify the differences themselves.
 
Note the snare cutoffs in the unedited kit. Also notice the numerous missing hits, flams etc. during the first 25 seconds. The following 25 seconds is the -identical- MIDI track thru the edited kit, a little closer to what it really should dound like. I'll detail more later.
 
A really nice sounding kit when it's functional.
http://soundcloud.com/stoons-1
SSlate Edit

sounds good stoons,i can notice the difference here,can understand a little bit more of what you were talking about.
i usualy mask this by using effects(like a reverb or something)
but listening to the two side by side i can see the difference.
you did a nice job.
i can also apreciate the fact there is no finger pointing in this post,just clean/cut what you did to make them better and i can hear it.
the hi hat i actualy had to go back and listen to twice,im guessing the reason i never noticed this was because i dont use midi loops i create all my beats by hand using a controler so if i hear something that isnt there i try to zoom in on it and make it clearwith velocity(yea i know).
i also do alot of heavey stuff so im sure distortion hides some it.
anyway.sounds good.

That is a big improvement IMO. Curious to know what you done.

night to day difference I'd say...yes what did you do to it, why did the hi-hat not respond on the first 25 seconds?

Wow, kinda makes Cakewalk look pretty bad.

I find that SSD4,kills SD3 in every way,and I love the fact that all the MIDI files from SD3,EZ,Groove Monkey etc all preview fine using SSD4 with X1's browser,which is great as I find Toontrack,have some great fills,but I'm not so into EZ's drum sounds.

SD3 was a great introduction to drum software though.

SSD4 also has the best cymbal/hat sounds,of any drum synth....well it does to me anyway.
Bob

Good job stoons. I now hear the snare cutoff you were talking about. Previous samples that you wanted us to try didn't work for me.

Yes the hi hats were greatly improved also.

But as I listened to it, I realized during the second 25 seconds why I mostly go to ezDrummer. I never could put my finger on why though. ezd just sounded better. Now I know why.

@blade: Who's to blame? If I'm not mistaken, aren't those Steve Slate's free stuff that was included with SD3? So what did he do, just hand over samples? Or did he do the programming?

At any rate, I will listen to the kits from SD3 a lot closer now. Really good program. I like it. The UI is not bad. And it works so well with Step Sequencer.

The Andy John's kit doesn't show this type of behavior as far as I can tell.

@stoons: I liked the Breakfast song!!

stoons,heres a test i did myself using the same kit (steven slate old zep dry)
i used a basic midi loop in the track and exported it as is.
my hi hats dont seem to have the same issue,i did no tweaking to this.

http://soundcloud.com/charlie-roy/session-drummer-test

im not doing this to be a problem,as you can see i gave a rather decent comment #2.
im just trying to understand why the hi hats are dropping out and maybe learn something myself and help both of us.

g_randybrown


night to day difference I'd say...yes what did you do to it, why did the hi-hat not respond on the first 25 seconds?

The hats are there for the first 25 seconds, it's just that due to the original mapping they are hard to hear. If I dragged the hi-hat slider up full they would be more audible but still sound erratic. Part of what I wanted to show was that I found the kit took an inordinate amount of tweaking to make most MIDI files sound OK (well, as OK as missing hits can be) so I deliberately left all SD3 faders at 0dB except the master which I had to pull back to avoid passing 0dB.
 
When I have time to fill in all the details of what I did it will make more sense.

bladetragic


Wow, kinda makes Cakewalk look pretty bad.

Absolutely not my intention. I admit I'm a little confused why the kit got thru the cracks for so long but my main beef is really with sample libraries as a whole and I guess I singles this kit out as a good example. As I said before, as soon as I post up the finished files and explain what I did I'll give everyone a better idea of where I think the sample companies are going wrong. Of course in some cases it's personal opinion/taste but in others it's just really poor editing and quality control.
 
In terms of this kit it is a freebie and a very small part of a fine product so I wouldn't expect Cakewalk to spend significant time or money on it but I guess I still find it odd that such glaring weirdness in the kit went unnoticed so long. Beyond the fact that you would think Steven Slate or some representative would have first OK'd the kit for distribution as it directly reflects on their libraries, I would have thought that some other users would be intrigued to try out that infamous Bonham sound and would have thought it sounded kinda funky, and not in a good way. I mean, Sonar must have a lot of users.
 
Anyways, if nothing else this will likely end up teaching a few people how to modify SFZ files. If it ends up sparking a little discussion or even better giving a few sample companies food for thought then that would be even better.