Roland TD50 product intro

[Murgen]

As far as I understand it is an expensive proprietary kit (± 8000 euro's in Europe) with limited sample possibilities. Someone came up to 128 MB space for samples.

How is everybody on this new expensive product of the Imperial Army?

[edtc]

seems to be a great product ...  this vidéo is interesting   
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tmNmJEPkNac

putenvr's next drum module ?

[Murgen]

seems to be a great product ...  this vidéo is interesting   
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tmNmJEPkNac

putenvr's next drum module ?

1. I want to hear something else then bashing. How handles the module and kit on softer and subtle playing? Because that is where most e-kits fail.

2. Wanna bet he won't buy it. Btw 8.000 euro .... Come on.

[Jman]

I won't put my $$ in that direction. They have chosen to continue on with the COSM, Supernatural, Prism, or whatever name you want to rename the new sound engine. Still not VST quality, and won't be. I do notice the cymbal sounds at least have more sustain ..... No doubt it will be better than the previous Roland flagship sounds, but no temptation for me. I think Mimic Pro at least is headed in the right direction. But it will be interesting to see if 2Box puts anything new out at NAMM 2017.

As far as USB connected pads, I really wonder if it is about improved triggering technology, or simply the latest way to put out a unique trigger that Roland can have a patent on that it can aggressively defend..... LOL

[Murgen]

@Jman, my thoughts exactly. Thereby, my kit has everything I need. My next GAS attack will be about my aging game PC, not my drumkit. 

[Jman]

@Jman, my thoughts exactly. Thereby, my kit has everything I need. My next GAS attack will be about my aging game PC, not my drumkit. 

For me it is really easy to stick with what I have. If 2Box puts out a new module in the near future, our GAS might kick up again ...... 

[Xenu]

Yup. What an utter disappointment the TD-50 is.  No surprise there though.

Did I hear that clavia (Nord) will be putting out an edrum? I have a Nord drum 2 and would love to see a hybrid synth/sample based unit.  They have the technology to do it (Nord Stage Etc)

[puttenvr]

putenvr's next drum module ?

Nope. Still the same weak basic samples with some tone control on top,
And why should you merge your own samples with sounds which aren.t good?
That.s what we call in Holland: putting the horse behind the car.

i am still waiting for the mimic pro, although plans are not to release it in Europe or the drumit 6
Suprises can be made by the Alesis Strike Pro (although I never liked the Alesis sounds) or a massive update for the ATV d5 (or its successor)

[Xenu]

The thing that irks me the most about Roland's product release information is the marketing jargon.

They are far too lite on Tech specs and opt for meaningless jargon like 'prismatic', 'Digital snare' etc.  They also have the audacity to claim such things are a first (Mandala Drum anyone?).

My last roland kit is a TD20 Expanded (which I still use to trigger vst's at home) and its looking to be my last.  Time for a new competitor to take it to the next level until then, it'll be 2box for me.

[Murgen]

The thing that irks me the most about Roland's product release information is the marketing jargon.

They are far too lite on Tech specs and opt for meaningless jargon like 'prismatic', 'Digital snare' etc.  They also have the audacity to claim such things are a first (Mandala Drum anyone?).

My last roland kit is a TD20 Expanded (which I still use to trigger vst's at home) and its looking to be my last.  Time for a new competitor to take it to the next level until then, it'll be 2box for me.

To me prices of 7000 to 8000 euro's for their best kit puts me off. Especially when you look through their marketing jibber jabber. Yes, Rolands hardware is very good, no, their module is still based on old principles.

[tower of p]

I don´t get it, guys...
On the drum tec website it says:

“To enter into this new world of sound 70% of all instrument samples have been newly recorded in the hottest high-end studios in the UK, the USA and Australia on flagship drums from Gretsch, Sonor, Tama, Pearl, DW and even some exotics. Each sample was recorded in hundreds of layers (dynamics from quiet to loud and positions from rim to middle). Most of the cymbals were also recorded anew in all nuances from a great range of Paiste cymbals.“
(http://www.drum-tec.de/roland-td50-p-3100.html)

So... are the td50 sounds recorded real drums with multiple layers as in the 2box or is it something different?


(not that I would think about buyin it... I´m perfectly comfortable with my 2box)

Cheers,
Lutz

[puttenvr]

They lie and it is something different
Roland uses basic samples (blocks) on top of which they give us flexibility in sound editing with computer based models, mainly eq
Using better samples would lower their flexibilty
On a few snare drums you can hear that, good sounds, but almost nothing to change
There is a video now where a guy changes the thickness of a ride cymbal. Within a few turns, the sound becomes unrealistic. In other words: so much artficial synthesis and eq is added to the basic sample that is getting a worser sound

I still don.t know why Roland can make realistic sounding v pianos and not realistic sounding drums

[drumsonly2002]

I can tell drum sounds from a Roland module a mile away. As much as they do this and that with impressive technology they cannot seem to remove the baby bottle from their COMOS fed child so it will develop properly. I find my ears get tired listening to the irritating sounding snare drum samples after several minutes. Initially sounds great then gets annoying like chalk scraping across a black board. On a positive note the triggering dynamics and feel of the Roland products are very impressive. But so is my DIY 12" mesh headed snare with internal trigger attached to my trusty 2 box module for a fraction of the price. Dry sample that sounds killer and real, with layers of dynamic samples to mimic the acoustic properties of a real drum. I am a fan of Roland products but prefer 2 Box for real sounding drums. I use 2 Box live.  Really glad Roland moves ahead with innovations like the TD-50. At the end of the day, 2 Box is my all time favorite followed by DDrum.

[Jman]

Yeah, it is a completely different direction with the Roland way of sounds and editing. Generally you won't find any specs on number of layers that are actually included in each module sound. And you won't find specs like how many Megabytes or Gigabytes the module's capacities are, or how many Kilobytes or Megabytes the individual sounds are. But generally the size of the samples is very small, and amount of actual layers also very small. Just because when the studio recordings were made of the instruments, they were sampled with 100s of hits does not mean there are 100s of layers in each internal module sound. Generally, at least in the past, that has not seemed to be the case ...... just a handfull of samples for an instrument has seemed to be the case.

One thing people have been waiting to see was if Roland would add the ability to import your own samples to a flagship module. They did add that to this one, but it is very limited. Not the kind of thing like 2Box where you can import VST samples with like 100 plus unique instrument velocity hits. The sampling is limited to just a couple layers per instrument,Number of Samples:

Maximum 500 (includes factory preloaded user samples)
Sound Length (total): 24 minutes in mono, 12 minutes in stereo
File formats that can be loaded: WAV (44.1 kHz, 16/24 bits)"

So this is really just for adding a couple layers of sound on top of the instruments.

I do notice an improvement in sound quality on this module though, which to me means they at least started out with some better samples. Listening to the cymbals and toms in particular I hear more clarity, and sustain. The former flagship Roland module contained over a 1000 sounds, so since including user samples the limit now will be 500 it does make me wonder if the internal sounds are a little better quality, or more layers than earlier modules.

I do have to eat my words about not getting one of these modules though ....... since I do build and sell Roland compatible conversion kits besides my 2Box conversions ..... I will be picking up the TD-50 Upgrade pack, so I can check out the TD-50 and the new snare and ride. Plus.... test and set parameters with my own conversions for the new module. Which will give me a chance to do some side by side listening/testing with my 2Box. Don't worry, I won't be abandoning the 2Box camp!     But I may need to unload one of my THREE 2Box modules to recoup some $$$ and make some room ..... LOL It seems the Upgrade TD-50 packs won't ship til January 2017, even with pre-order, so it will be a while.

Oh, and, as a side note, next year with Winter NAMM 2017 promising to produce at least one ... or ... some new eDrum modules I may be forced to repeat this for the Mimic, and possibly a new 2Box model??? That is if I am not bankrupt by then .... LOL ....   J

[welshsteve]

As far as USB connected pads, I really wonder if it is about improved triggering technology, or simply the latest way to put out a unique trigger that Roland can have a patent on that it can aggressively defend..... LOL

They're also not the first to do this, Mandala drum have done it for many years. And apart from the Octagon shape and rubber playing surface perhaps not being the most favourable thing (though wouldn't bother me personally) to play, seems to do it very very well with fantastic positional sensing technology. We ahead of Roland on that, even the 20 year old Ddrum 3 did that very well.

I am not sure of that's the angle of USB, haven't seen anyone explain why that makes it better than analogue connectivity yet other than saying, "it's better"