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Quality construction, excellent (real drum) samples and great live-use functionality. The intros, fills and beats were played by a real drummer and are more authentic than any drum machine I have ever heard. There is also a large user forum and the company responds quickly to questions and requests for beta firmware updates. No, I don't work for them.
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: New
The hardware seems solid and well made, though the main pedal itself it not very smooth for an expensive unit. I also thought it was poor on Singular's part they didn't include the power supply and the plug-in two button extension pedal to switch from one song to another from a stand up position. That, in my opinion is a capability that should have been part of the original pedal. Pretty useless without it if you plan to use the pedal in performance. The alternative is to drop to the floor after each song and manually switch to the next song using a plastic arrow button. They do provide a prodigious amount of pre-programmed drum sequences categorized by style and those can be switched to use different drum sets. And the display is pretty well thought out and most of it is readable from a standing position. I was disappointed by how much work it took to create song drum sequences that matched any particular song. This was probably my own lack of thinking this through... somehow expected they would have come up with a usable way to quickly find the components needed to come close to what's used in some of the more popular songs. The manager software it does come with allows you to select a provided drum sequence, or move it's parts and a few alternatives around to create a variation. You can get closer by choosing a particular musical style and sampling all the sets included in that style, but getting that to match an actual song is a tedious and time consuming task... a big one if you are using two 15-20 song sets for a performance. It is also possible to take components from different musical styles and assemble them into a new song sequence but there are hundreds of parts... you could well spend an hour or more for each song doing this and unless you have a heck of a memory, you'll spend those hours many times over as you do each song. If you need something other than the drum sets and style building blocks they provide, you need to download a free very basic program that lets you time sequence hits on different drum set pieces into the various drum song parts you want. This is also pretty time consuming, but might be an alternative if you give up on searching all the different sets and styles they provide and decide to build your own from scratch. But be aware this free program is not even close to a DAW... no tweaking, no panning or volume envelopes, no effects... free, but very basic. What you get in the package might be enough if your goal is to create something close enough that you can practice timing and hear a basic style and drum set combo while you play. And it might even work if you're a player/singer/song writer and don't have a drum sequence you're trying to match. It might even be a creative tool used this way. But, if you expect to use this unit for live performances and you're fussy (musicians... fussy ;-) you will need to plan on taking a good chunk of time to assemble your song sets and will probably need to have or buy at least a basic DAW to tweak up the drum set component sounds. To be fair, if I was willing to invest the time and make notes on all the parts I auditioned, I might have been able to search through the huge selection of styles and segments and pull pieces from different sets together, but that's a daunting time commitment. There's no easy way to know what you might want without listening to hundreds of sequences and parts and creating a system to remember them and where they were. Here's a software challenge, Singular. Create a program that will input a song MP3, analyse the drum patterns and spit out a best match parts list based on the styles and sets you provide. I ended up sending my unit back, decided it was too much work for the end result. But, with that analysis software, I'd take another shot. As always, your mileage may vary.Read full review
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: New
I thought it really didn't have much to offer that was any different from the drum machine that is built in to almost every keyboard out there including ones that only cost $99. I thought that the only difference was being able to start and stop it with your feet. I finally decided to buy it and I have to say that the program-ability is the huge difference. This thing can be customized and being able to do that and also trigger it with your feet makes it worth it. I do think that the price it a little high but I'm glad that I got it!
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: New
I never understood why most drum machines need to be so complicated. This is easy to use. All most of us need is a machine to give us different grooves and feels. This does that great, but it also can put fills in very easily, no matter what part of the beat you hit the footswitch - you can't throw it off! It knows how to do a fill to make it sound less "mechanical". Get the optional footswitch too.
Verified purchase: No
Very versatile for either creating and exploring various song ideas or for performing. Built with great quality. Rugged. Easy to work with. And you can even adjust the settings to have a 'drunk' drummer, if you want.
Verified purchase: Yes | Condition: New