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good control pad for drummer

Posted: Mon Apr 26, 2010 4:07 am
by lip2lip
hey guys,

i've been searching with some difficulty for a good USB control pad to trigger ableton scenes, loops, etc. however, as a drummer, i'm seeking a controller with large pads. for reference, i was interested in this alesis pad: http://www.alesis.com/controlpad (however, i believe these are being discontinued, and i've had no luck on ebay).

any ideas guys? perhaps something from roland? i'd love something that functioned like my akai mpd 32, but just larger.


thanks all,
john

Re: good control pad for drummer

Posted: Mon Apr 26, 2010 8:52 am
by swishniak
no usb, but midi - http://www.thomann.de/de/roland_spd-s_sampling_pad.htm

or just pick up some cheap pads and a trigger to midi (usb) interface. would be around 200 bucks all in.

Re: good control pad for drummer

Posted: Mon Apr 26, 2010 8:54 pm
by lip2lip
thanks, man.

i may go the midi route, but i wanted to first see if i could do USB to keep things congruent. midi through my profire 610 interface could suffice, but i hope there'd be no latency.

thanks again,
john

Re: good control pad for drummer

Posted: Mon Apr 26, 2010 9:44 pm
by iwasborn
i just got a control pad to augment an acoustic kit and it's working out fine so far, though i'm not far enough along to say it's faultless...

Re: good control pad for drummer

Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 9:26 pm
by lip2lip
which control pad you working with?

Re: good control pad for drummer

Posted: Tue Apr 27, 2010 9:50 pm
by SubFunk
lip2lip wrote:but i hope there'd be no latency.
there is ALWAYS latency, point is to bring it down, if you are a real tight drummer you should be fine with anything under 6ms.

i use a PadKontrol for finger drumming, and there if i want to play real tight need to use the midi delay compensation within ableton, works.
another 'workaround' when i record drummers or guitarists is to delay compensate the monitor or click track.

Re: good control pad for drummer

Posted: Wed Apr 28, 2010 6:29 am
by ajargy
check out the octapad
cheap simple effective
http://www.skidmore.edu/academics/music ... tapad2.jpg

Re: good control pad for drummer

Posted: Wed Apr 28, 2010 8:01 am
by UKRuss
The Alesis pad is great becasue it's cheap, I use it and it is good enough. however it does miss notes from time to time and also I note I lose a hi-hat note if it strikes exactly the same time as the snare. This is all fine for getting loops down in a studio environment, but I would hate to relay on it for live use.

The octapad really does look good, but it's pricy!