How to..Big sound ,small kit?

[Hemi245]

Hey fellow drummers, I have some questions, I hope someone can help me with. I would like to have a small kit with big sound, to travel with that is. What I mean to say is, can I get a roland spx, or octo pad, or yamy pad or hand sonic,..... to do this?... I have a roland td 30 module with stike and other vex's on it, and would like to plug my td 30 into something small and blow the ears of everyone. Ok this is my thought,, Can I plug the td30 into say a spx, and get my vex sound through it. If so I will plug the bass and hihat padal through it and amp the crap out of it. Just save me taking my whole kit with me, trying to go ultra small, thats all.
Any other idea's are most welcome.

[Hemi245]

Sorry if this post sounds a bit crazy,, I am a little toasted after jaming with my little cousins,, it late, going to bed, nite

[hairmetal-81]

I think there have been a few 'portable kits' or 'mini kit threads' in the past.
Just give the search-engine a good sweat!


I will link you to a post of mine that I wrote for R_Z, which shows some of the setup-possibilities you have with a multipad. Take note especially to the nice spd-30-based mini-kit by forum-member Tazed!

http://www.vdrums.com/forum/forum/we...240#post970240



HTH

[Kenster]

Got a solution for ya but you're not gonna be happy...you need a kick butt monitor stack including a sub, or bigger cabinets that can handle the bass without a sub....you could run almost any crappy kit thru an awesome monitor stack and get a BIG sound. Sorry but I don't think there is any really good way to get what you want without spending a little more $$. You've already saved money with a smaller kit you can spend on the monitor system. The key is to get something not too bulky or expensive but gives you lots of boom! There are lots of ideas and WORKING solutions in the PA/Monitor thread as to what cabinets others are using with much success. Nothing underwhelms an audience like an underpowered kit. Too many horror stories of folks spending thousands on a mondo e kit and then going out to play live thru a $200 cabinet....not happening.

K ;-)

[kurth83]

As one of the mini-kit players around here, here is my kit thread:

http://www.vdrums.com/forum/forum/performance/showcase/65955-my-first-attempt-at-a-mini-kit

That kit is almost a year old and I am still playing on it, various attempts to improve it have mostly
met with price/performance failure. :-)

To directly answer your questions, yeah you can MIDI in anything to the TD-30 module and get the TD-30 sound.

The choice of what you use to trigger it is all about your priorities, if you want the best feel,
only the latest TD-30KV-style pads will do for those who like the subltety that PS provides
and the nice feel of a well tensioned mesh head. If you want to go small and are ok playing on rubber,
the 8-pad and Alternate Mode options are super, although the AM stuff is pricey.

For me it was surprising how nicely the dirt-cheap Control Pad played (once I learned to dial it in).
It was so nice I never upgraded, although I played on the AM stuff, and the octapad too.

Personally I like the idea of something cheap that I don't have to worry about it at gigs, someone could run over it with a truck
and I could have a new one the next day with Amazon overnight and not have to care that much.
One trick for rubber is to learn to play lightly (like a jazz player), by turning up the sensitivities,
Pretty much eliminates the fatigue that some players get when playing on rubber.

Somewhere around here I posted a review of the various multipads, and the SPD-30 Octapad was the clear winner
as a triggering device, (SPD-SX was just as good, but only 6 usable pads).
I don't know how they did it but it had no crosstalk cancel I could find during an extended bash session at GC.

Crosstalk cancel is when you hit two pads at the exact same time, and only one of them will sound.
I solved that by having an external snare pad, and frankly it makes it feel just like a real kit but smaller anyway,
and makes it easy for me to transition to a regular kit layout.

The Rolands and the AM's were the only multi-pads that didn't have the crosstalk cancel problem.
I tried the Rolands (SPD-30 and SPD-SX), the Alesis ones (CP, PP and SP), the Yamaha DTX Multi-12,
and the Alternate Mode DrumKAT (same tech as the trapKAT).

[hairmetal-81]

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[Hemi245]

Thx for your reply's guys. I was a little tanked last nite when I posted, so I was not precise.
I just wanted to make the kit as small as possible, but keep my vex strike sounds. So there I was wondering can I hook the td 30 into something smaller and get the same great sound.
I would be happy just to get the same sound , no matter what the feel. Its never going to feel like the pd 125 and cy 15r.
Hay kurth83 your mini kits looks wicked. I cannot see any wiring,,, does the td9 wireing plug straight in the back of the alesis pad or is it just midi out soft through. Prob a dumb question but still new to this digital stuff.

[hairmetal-81]

"Don't Write Drunk!" ....or something similar like this that saying goes.

[kurth83]

In my mini-kit the Control Pad is connected by MIDI to the TD-9.
The pedals are directly connected to the TD-9 (FD-8 and a Krigg mounted on an Iron Cobra RG).
The Sample Pad's audio-out is connected to the TD-9 audio-in (1/4/" to 1/8" stereo cable).

That amounts to a single stereo (or mono) out from the TD-9 to the sound board,
and I depend on them for the monitor (they treat me just like a vocalist with a monitor).

I made a custom snake for the TD-9 so it only has the pedals,
it uses a standard DB-25 connector available at Radio Shack.