How do you find that perfect cymbal sound?

[Forces]

So I am a home-recording hobbyist and during my quest to get everything sounding tip top (with what I have to work with) I have been noticing that while I listen to some of my favorite bands, I keep wishing I could get my cymbals to sound so clean and less manufactured-sounding. I am using a Simmons SD7K brain and recording straight into a 8-track 16bit digital recorder.

Does anyone select their crashes/chinas/ rides/ hi-hats...etc,etc samples by EQ,
or
just what you hear that sounds good to you, with no regaurd to what the rest of the instruments are EQ'd too?

A lot of what I play is metal and post rock driven, so I spend a lot of time treating the crash like a hi-hat or ride, but when I play like that it sounds so canned. I am trying to save up for a TD-12, but I don't know if even that will solve my problem.

Ideas? Suggestions? Are cymbals just one of those things that e-drums have just not conquered yet?

[grog]

I have found that the latest VST kits, like BFD and EZDrummer (I use the latter with the DFHS add on) are light years ahead of the modules in terms of their crash sounds.

I do very little EQing of the drums unless something stands out in the mix that needs dampening.

www.myspace.com/projectronics

[SSK]

All I tend to do is roll the treble/highs off most of my cymbals. Not so much for crash and splash ones, but some rides and especially crash/ride type ones, gives a bit more of a professional 'washy' sound than a big brash sound that stands out too much.

[weldman]

as good as Roland modules work (and this goes mostly for any drum module), I have found that they just dont sound nearly as good as the VST plugins out there now such as EZDrummer or Session Drummer 2.

Im planning on getting SD2.0 soon but for now Session Drummer works very well. I've never heard the TD12 or 20 in person however I used a 10 and 6V and both only sounded fair to my ear and after getting into recording I found out that the VSTs sounded much better.

Run a MIDI cable out the module and into the input port of your interface of choice. Setup the settings so you can get all of your pads onto each MIDI channel which in turn will let you convert each channel to an audio track giving you more mixing options.