What difference does 20 years make? Comparing ddrum4se with Roland VAD503
I had the opportunity to spend last weekend with a Roland VAD-503 kit (with TD-27 sound module, CY-14C-T hats, CY-18DR ride, PD140-DS snare)... a kit 20 years newer and about $2K more expensive than my Clavia ddrum4se kit that I use at home. I've been thinking about upgrading my kit now that my kids are both using it to learn/practice, so part of me was hoping that the tech would have advanced to the point that the Roland was like sitting down at an acoustic kit, while my wallet was dreading the same thing.
Overall, I was far from blown away. The Roland was better in many ways, but sure didn't seem 20 years and $2K better.
Drum pads/triggering: no difference in latency (and to be fair, I didn't expect any, since the 2-4 ms latency is one of ddrum's strengths), and the larger snare (14" instead of 12") and floor tom (14" instead of 10") were nice but not life-changing, and there wasn't much difference in feel between the mesh heads on either kit. Edge: Roland
Cymbal pads/triggering: the Roland cymbals felt much better, and the multi-zone support made it easier to trigger the sound I was looking for, for the most part. I really had to hammer the crash to get it to open up, but I expect that could be adjusted in the settings that I didn't have time to dig into. I'm not the most technical player, but found that the sound correspondence to my pedal movement feels better on my ddrum kit than the Roland. Edge: Roland
Dynamics: I didn't find the Roland kit to be as responsive to subtle dynamics as the ddrum. Ghost notes on the snare were similar, but the toms on my ddrum are more expressive (I was using the 13" and 16" maple sounds on the Roland kit, if I recall). I can play quietly on the ddrum floor tom and it sounds quiet... noticeably less attack, like you'd hear with a real drum. The Roland sounded like a harder hit with the volume turned down... it didn't have the tonal character of a lighter touch. This may also be something that could be adjusted for in the settings, but as it was, I was disappointed. Edge: ddrum
Sounds/Brain: the Roland has about a bazillion times as much memory and processing power as the Clavia, so no surprise that it has far more sounds available and a much more advanced ability to modify those sounds. I bought the ddrum because I wanted something that sounded like real drums and then do my processing in a mixer. That's where it gets tricky... I have 6 outputs from the ddrum, so can easily route kick on one channel, snare on another, stereo toms on two and stereo cymbals on the remaining two. I know Roland has other brains with more outputs, but it was a pain trying to get everyone's individual monitor mixes and a FOH mix from only a stereo pair and 2 more direct outs. Not sure exactly how they had everything routed, but as far as monitors went, kick and snare were on one channel and everything else was on another, so very limited flexibility when playing live without using a digital interface. I preferred the snare and cymbal sounds on the Roland, but liked the toms on the ddrum more and was able to get a kick I was happy with on either one. I'd call this one a tie except for two factors: the Roland has more lifelike snare behaviour (not sure if it's due to the positional sensing in the pad or better samples or both) and every once in a while my ddrum will run out of processing power and cut off a cymbal because it just can't keep up with the limited memory. Edge: Roland
Mechanics/setup: I'm a bit torn on this one... the Roland shells do look better on stage, but for my purposes having something that takes up more space and is tougher to transport isn't a win. The ddrum tom mounts will sometimes loosen up over time, and I didn't get the feeling that would happen on the Roland, so for me it was a tie. If you care more about portability the ddrum would be much better; if you care about looking like a real kit then of course it would be the Roland. I don't move mine much and don't care if it looks like a drumset or not, so it's a question of whether the smaller footprint of the ddrums compensates for the toms potentially loosening/swivelling on their stand, so it's really a wash in the end. Edge: tie
I think the biggest disappointment for me was the lack of nuance in the toms but much more so in the cymbals. I was hoping that we'd be at the point now where things like a swell that I use often on acoustic cymbals would be natural to translate to the advanced Roland cymbal pads. The cymbal experience was better on the Roland than the ddrum, but nowhere near what I had hoped it would be. I'm not sure if using the edrums just to trigger and then running a VST on a laptop would change that, but it was disheartening.
Conclusion: I won't be in a rush to sell my ddrum4se and get a Roland (at least this one). I would like to have better-feeling cymbal pads, but since I'm not gigging or recording professionally I'm not sure that the high cost of getting the Roland USB cymbals (and snare) and corresponding brain would be the right move... it's a definite improvement, but still wasn't really satisfying, for a lot of extra money. The quest continues...
