Best DRUM software plug-ins or stand alone

  • Thread starter Thread starter mattkw80
  • Start date Start date

Best Drum Software ?

  • BFD

    Votes: 22 22.2%

  • Toontrack / Drums from Hell / EZ Drummer

    Votes: 40 40.4%

  • M-Audio: Strike

    Votes: 1 1.0%

  • Reason and Reason Re-fills (Drum Kits 2)

    Votes: 10 10.1%

  • Battery 3

    Votes: 10 10.1%

  • M-Audio: Drum and Bass Rig

    Votes: 0 0.0%

  • Other - (please specifiy in a post)

    Votes: 16 16.2%
  • Total voters
    99
M

mattkw80

New member
Argh!

Pulling my hair out trying to decide which Drum software I should buy.

I have the Roland TD-6 V-drums electronic kit, and I MIDI in to Pro Tools.

So after I record the Midi-performance, I need to get some Drums sounds happening.

Not sure which way to go - too many options, and the demo's I have tried sound stale and mechanicle.

Any thoughts people ?
 
DFH2 and DFH Superior are both great VSTi plugins. DFH2 is best for metal and rock. The DFH Superior has many more samples and is much more versital. But, DFH2 has served me well for several years now.
 
I use regularly Stylus RMX in Nuendo 3. I love their sounds. Of course much comes from the roland x sound designer
 
Anybody here using one of those software title's and as well a set of Electronic Drums ?


I swear.... the midi isn't being recorded accuratley or something.

The performance seems slow or lifeless whenever I run the midi data through DFH, BFD, REASON, etc.

But then I can run the Midi data back into the Roland TD-6V V-Drums, and it sounds fine again.
 
I can't find alot of info on this topic...... do people not do this?

Or do they do it.... but are not having the issues I am ?


Somebody told me to make sure I turn General Midi on.......


......general Midi was off on my V-Drums so far.........


What is General Midi, and why would it be off by default ?
 
You need to set your latency pretty low to record drums very well. Thats the thing I think really low latency is most critical for because drummers, good drummers, tend to have a really good sense of time and can feel the latency. Try the lowest buffer setting and see what happens.

btw, I voted BFD. I have NFR's thru my work of most of the drum stuff out there, but I actually bought a BFD and BFD XFL because I liked it that much more.
 
mattkw80 said:
Argh!

Pulling my hair out trying to decide which Drum software I should buy.

I have the Roland TD-6 V-drums electronic kit, and I MIDI in to Pro Tools.

So after I record the Midi-performance, I need to get some Drums sounds happening.

Not sure which way to go - too many options, and the demo's I have tried sound stale and mechanicle.

Any thoughts people ?
Click to expand...

I feel your pain on this. I've tried programming realistic drums with midi and it can be a headache, makes me miss my Tama kit. You just have to realize that it's a completely different thing and try to find value in the digital rhythms good qualities. The machine like, cold style can be really cool for somethings. When I'm listening to things like ambient, electronic, Radiohead, Bjork, whatever I pull out the midi stuff. But if I;m going for more Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, rock, jazz type things, forget it, nothing's going to replace an acoustic set.

Also another thing with those programs is that you have to at the very least heavily tweak the samples, or better yet create your own. Get a mic and if you don't have any drums of your own find some and chop up new samples in Audacity or something. Record all the drums, cymbals, cowbell, pot, pans, bottles, anything... and you'll be able to build up a cool library of sounds to use. Plus you'll learn about mic placements, get to experiment with audio, and it's fun too. Then you won't have to rely on the mostly shitty samples that come standard with most of those programs.

As for programs, I love Ableton Live, check it out I think you can get a demo at the official site. I know it has full MIDI support, but I haven't had a chance to try it yet since all my MIDI gear is in another state right now. But it's very intuitive and might work for you.

Also, I use FL Studio(Fruity Loops) a lot and really like it just cause I've been using it for awhile and know it well. A lot of people put FL down, but I've heard some amazing things done with it. I've used it with recording MIDI and it worked fine for me.

Reason seems good too, only messed around with it a little, not sure about the MIDI, the thing I liked about it is how you can flip the rack around and re-wire everything like a real rack. But I wouldn't want to use it as my main program maybe just by routing it into something else and using it like an effects loop.

How are those Roland's anyway? Playing drums might be my favorite instrument but sometimes the acoustic kit is not always an option (space and neighbor factors). I've been looking at the Yamaha DD55 for a cheap MIDI interface for banging out some real-time beats for song sketches.

Good luck
 
oroboros said:
I feel your pain on this. I've tried programming realistic drums with midi and it can be a headache, makes me miss my Tama kit. You just have to realize that it's a completely different thing and try to find value in the digital rhythms good qualities. The machine like, cold style can be really cool for somethings. When I'm listening to things like ambient, electronic, Radiohead, Bjork, whatever I pull out the midi stuff. But if I;m going for more Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, rock, jazz type things, forget it, nothing's going to replace an acoustic set.

Also another thing with those programs is that you have to at the very least heavily tweak the samples, or better yet create your own. Get a mic and if you don't have any drums of your own find some and chop up new samples in Audacity or something. Record all the drums, cymbals, cowbell, pot, pans, bottles, anything... and you'll be able to build up a cool library of sounds to use. Plus you'll learn about mic placements, get to experiment with audio, and it's fun too. Then you won't have to rely on the mostly shitty samples that come standard with most of those programs.

As for programs, I love Ableton Live, check it out I think you can get a demo at the official site. I know it has full MIDI support, but I haven't had a chance to try it yet since all my MIDI gear is in another state right now. But it's very intuitive and might work for you.

Also, I use FL Studio(Fruity Loops) a lot and really like it just cause I've been using it for awhile and know it well. A lot of people put FL down, but I've heard some amazing things done with it. I've used it with recording MIDI and it worked fine for me.

Reason seems good too, only messed around with it a little, not sure about the MIDI, the thing I liked about it is how you can flip the rack around and re-wire everything like a real rack. But I wouldn't want to use it as my main program maybe just by routing it into something else and using it like an effects loop.

How are those Roland's anyway? Playing drums might be my favorite instrument but sometimes the acoustic kit is not always an option (space and neighbor factors). I've been looking at the Yamaha DD55 for a cheap MIDI interface for banging out some real-time beats for song sketches.

Good luck
Click to expand...



Hi oroboros, thanks for the reply.


For performing and jamming - the Roland TD-6 kits is great. Love it much more than acoustic drums for that.

It so nice to be able to press a button and shut the annoying drummers off who feel the need to flail all over the place, while you are trying to hear the playback from the last take.

I need to check into this latency thing...... I believe I am having an issue there,,,
 
I REALLY like discreet drums Heavy Mental Drums. They have a great sound!
 
I am now torn between BFD and Toontrack EZdrummer dfh.

I've tried them all now.

Here is my opinion, please tell me if I'm off the mark on any of this.


BFD -->

Sounds great, but very resources intensive. Not instantly friendly with my Roland TD-6 V-Drums. Luckily, it has Midi learn, so I can re-tweak the midi triggers quickly as needed. With some tweaking, I might be able to get this to work for me. There is a rumor floating around that BFD 2.0 will be fully compatible with Roland V-drums. Which means I could use my double triggering, triggers. If that is true, I will buy BFD 2 instantly.


Toontrack / dfh Ezdrummer / DFH -->

This thing works as soon as I turn it on. It instantly sync's up with my Roland TD-6 V-Drums. Also - it sounds incredible. However - if I want to get advanced with it, like use one of the Chinese cymbals or splash's instead of my crash, I cannot find away to re-map the midi triggers. Oh well, I can still play the Chinese cymbals or splash's with the mouse, or with my midi keyboard. Unless BFD 2 is released right away, the this will be what I buy.


East West Drumkit from Hell 2 -->

Okay, this package really confused me. Toontrack's web site makes NO MENTION of a Drumkit from Hell 2, but there is a package out there called East West Drumkit from Hell 2 that seems to be toontrack affliated. Anyhow, for what I am doing, this thing SUCKED. It looks nothing like "Toontrack / dfh Ezdrummer / DFH ". Does anybody know the story on this piece of garbage? It seems to be little more than a hacked up Native Instruments Midi sampler, with some drum sounds behind it. Anyhow, it worked horribly with my V-Drums, and I uninstalled this thing, and deleted all files associated - as I never want to see this crap again.

Seriously though - does anybody know why this thing is called Drumkit from Hell 2 ? Can it really be the sequel to "Toontrack / dfh Ezdrummer" ??


M-Audio: Strike -->

I was not able to get a demo or a Try-before-buy on this. Too bad, as it sounds great from the sample on the web site, and I think the interface looks really easy to use. Sorry M-Audio, but I am not going to risk $300+ US Dollars to take a gamble on your software. M-Audio should post a demo, or someone should leak a Try-before-buy, or else, why would anyone buy this over Toontrack / Ezdrummer. If I can't try it first, I'm not shelling out the bucks. This software does look promisng though.... has anyone here used it?


Reason with Reason Drumkits 2 refill -->

I know reason is great for 1 million things, but for what I am doing, it's too clunky and cumbersome. The kits sound okay, but not as good as Toontrack or BFD. (To my ears). Reason just doesn't seem drummer-oriented, and kind of sort of work instantly with V-Drums, but looks like it would require much tweaking. There is also the learning curve - I am not very good with reason, and after 1/2 hour of messing around, was not able to find a way to re-map triggers. Could just be my lack of knowledge, but this one ain't going to work for what I am doing.


and the last Drum / Midi software I installed was.......


Native Instruments Battery 3 -->

After installing 12GB+ of library files, I was excited that this was going to be the one. But, it did not sync up with the V-drums at all. I think maybe the Kick and Snare worked, but nothing else, and the latency was so bad, it was unusable. The control surface on this was far too complicated - I'm trying record midi drums, not pilot a jet-aircraft. I can't remeber what else bothered me about this one, but It must have been fairly severe, as I instantly deleted it, and the many many gigabytes of installation files.


So...... now only 2 are left standing.........


BFD or Toontrack dfh ezDrummer



Any thoughts ?
 
Guru is a very good Drum software.. you can download the demo
 
Check out Addictive Drums. I bought it after downloading the demo of that, and the demo for BFD.

I think AD is gonna take a bite out of the sales of the standard drum sampler plug-ins.
 
MK-Ultra said:
Check out Addictive Drums. I bought it after downloading the demo of that, and the demo for BFD.

I think AD is gonna take a bite out of the sales of the standard drum sampler plug-ins.
Click to expand...


Definitly worth checking out. I played with the demo over the weekend, and as a matter of fact am going to buy it as soon as I have the $$$
 
It's too bad Battery 3 didn't work out for you. I'm a big fan of it because of the level of control you have. I thought it looked to be one of the easier drum programs to use. Right-click on any cell and you can assign any drum in the library to it, or load a kit from the dropdown menu. I haven't tried too many other programs aside from GURU so I don't have much to compare it to. BFD seems to be a popular choice and the price is very good.

I downloaded the Battery 3 demo and got hooked on it so that's why I got it. Also like how you can import apple loops, which I have a few DVDs of, and they'll play either as full loops or it will split out the instruments, depending on how you have it setup. I also like the articulation options and the ability to edit the samples. Not very useful if you want it to sound like a studio kit but good for electronic stuff.
 
There are drum maps in the User area on Fxpansion's site for registered owners of BFD, This includes the TD-6 as well as other V-drum modules. Just import the proper drum map and youre good to go.
 
go and get addictive drums, bought the full version and blows away the other software plugs away IMHO
 
WOW..................... thanks so much !!



Hard2Hear said:
There are drum maps in the User area on Fxpansion's site for registered owners of BFD, This includes the TD-6 as well as other V-drum modules. Just import the proper drum map and youre good to go.
Click to expand...
 
Oops...... I don't own BFD yet........ so.......... I can't access the maps to see if it's gonna work for me yet.........

Would anybody here, who has access, be kind enough to grab me the TD-6 map ?
 
Just played with an Addictive Drummer demo, it's very cool.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top