Cheap Drum Machine Followup

[Douglas Baldwin <coyotelk@optonline.net>]

Quick followup on this post:

> > Yesterday I bought the Alesis/Ion drum pad-drum
> > machine set at Costco for
> > $200. I've heard that the pad-to-MIDI interface is
> > glitchy, but I figure I'm
> > getting the drum machine for $150, plus some pads
> > and a glitchy interface
> > for $50.

...so I set up the system, and within a few hours I decided to return it.
* The dynamic response is poor. On both the drum pads and the machine's
pads, there are only 3-4 levels of volume.
* The machine has only MIDI out - no MIDI in or MIDI thru.
* The range of pitch tuning for the drums is very small.
I didn't experience any serious pad glitching, as some have reported, but I
was so underwhelmed that I hardly played it enough to know.

I'm putting the $200 towards the Boss DR-880.

Douglas Baldwin, coyote-at-large
www.thecoyote.org
coyotelk@optonline.net

"Life! Life!
Clouds and clowns!
You don't have to come down!"
- Sly and the Family Stone