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Ddrum 4SE
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Published on 10/31/08 at 16:00
I am very pleased with the features of this latest Clavia Ddrum kit. Even though Clavia has done a great job updating the pads with mesh heads and making the sounds available for download, the brain is starting to show it's age. The next generation of Ddrum brain should include a faster I/O xfer via Firewire or USB2.0 instead of MIDI for data dumps. It takes literally an hour to load a complete custom kit from their (very expansive) library of proprietary sounds. Speaking of, while they're at it, I'd like to see them up the internal memory to say 128MB or higher and open up the compression architecture so we can record our own velocity sensitive samples. RAM/ROM parts are so cheap and this open initiative would almost guarantee a Ddrum5 (?) in every studio or on every stage around the world!! They should also beef up that little PC dump utility and provide a Mac version so the little macer's will quit bitchin on ddrums.com!

Price paid: $2199 USD

Sound quality is excellent compared offerings from other manufacturers. makes the TD10, DM5Pro and DTX series sound like toys. Some of the older sample libraries exhibit some &quot;hiss&quot;, but I believe that's due to the compression. The newer signature kits do not express this as much and as always, you can tweak the decay to trim that off the end of the sample. No, there is no COSM or pretty little character LCD display, but you will get good REAL drum sounds and plenty of 'em.

Couldn't be easier to use. The inclusion of sensivity knobs instead of convoluted &quot;scroll n tap&quot; menus is a welcome feature. Believe it or not, the ability to tweak sensitivity on the fly is what makes this the next best thing to accoustic. The manual is very simple andeasy to understand and I suggest you use it!

The quality is top notch. No rinky dink hardware, no flimsy pads, no crappy cables, the brain feels like it would take a nose-dive at 12 feet and still play a gi if needed. This is a very solid kit. Again, quality is in the sound as well, and Clavia did not fall short in that department as well.

I have been very pleased with this kit. Over 1400 FREE drum samples at my disposal that sound more real than the competition at a fraction of the cost - WHAT'S NOT TO LOVE?!?! If the next Ddrum brain lives up to the 4SE and makes a few &quot;modern additions&quot; as mentioned above, it will be a Vdrums killer. No matter what, I'll most likely be a Ddrum customer for life!

Originally posted on FutureProducers.com
Posted by: Unknown ( 6-, 2003)