Clavia DDrum 4

I have an older kit with the cast precision pads that can sense pressure and position. Using version 1.32. I have the 1.4 upgrade, but haven't seen a need to install it. Presets sound great and it is easy to navigate. No need to even look at the manual to get up and running. Editing is simple as there isn't alot you can do. I took another reviewers adivce here and deleted all the factory sounds and loaded in some Mega-drum sounds from Clavia. Well, I tired to. See the customer support section.

I don't know the polyphony, but I can't get it to choke. No effects are built in, but since when do you really need effects on drums? A great sounding room is all you need, and if you download the ambient Mega drum kits, they sound AMAZING. I am giving it a medium score on features because it is a very basic unit and could use a USB port for updating sounds, and MORE memory please. Or a compact flash card slot so you can load them in quickly. I only got in three kits, but you can tweak them a bit so it sounds like you have more.
A neat feature is that if you trigger it from midi, each note plays a different velocity level of a drum. i.e. the snare can be mapped from C3 to C4 for all the different tones. Makes getting dynamics easier.

The best there is! They are so expressive and the tones are unlimited. Just download the sound you are after. Mix and match. DW kick, tama snare etc. There are 1000 levels of dynamics instead of just 3 or 4. Way more expressiveness. You can close your eyes and they feel like real drums, and sound like real drums. Machine gun effect rears it's head VERY rarely I find. This unit slaughters any other edrum out there. I now know why so many pros use them.

Can't see any issues with this. If the brain failed n a gig you are screwed though. I am waiting for ddrum5 to come out and I will grab that brain right away.

I had an issue with loading in new samples. Since this unit uses midi dump to load samples, it is painfully slow and archaic. They really should update it to USB at the least. Everytime I tried to load in a new sample, I would get an error message. Every now and then a sound would load, but usually it was screwed up. I tried the basic things like swapping cords etc, but to no avail. I contacted TJ at Armadillo in the US (They are the distributor for NA), and he was amazing. He suggested a few things and ackowledged me when I told him I am very competant with computers. (I build custom PC's and MACs for music use only). I have found most tech support people assume you are an idiot even if you tell them you know what is going on. TJ assumed nothing and treated me with respect. That night I tried his suggestions, and sadly, they didn't work. I did solve it however, once he assured me that it was most likely my USB midi interface. The problem turned out to be that no other USB deivce could be plugged in anywhere, AND I had to change the midi interface to another port. Weird, but now it works perfectly. Here's the kicker. I work for a company that is a dealer for Clavia, which I never had to bring up. I didn't think it was neccessary as TJ was prefessional from the beginning. I always like to see how my customers will get treated. Good job Armadillo and TJ.

I love these things. I have wanted a drum set in my studio for years, but the noise was always a problem. Buying a ddrum kit eliminates this, and a million mics, and the need for an amazing room. I would replace them in a second!

I wish they would expand the memory and update the sample loading. Also, they need more sounds that are position sensitive. That's a memory thing though. Tonal volume driven changes are more neccessary and there isn't enough memory for positional changes, unless you are happy with one kit.

I compared this with everything else out there. The V-drums are okay, but VERY expensive. I find with any Roland product, you have to ditch the presets and get tweaking. The Yamaha kits can sound really good too, but only when certain players use it for some reason. Alesis are WAY behind the times and need to seriously update their DM Pro and synth line.

These are the best edrums out there, hands down. You can record with them no problem, unless you want to get into really positional stuff, but no edrum does that at this point really.

Can't wait for ddrum 5!

I bought the ddrum4 SE 1.5x Mesh Head set and one extra cymbal pad.

The kit itself was extremely easy to get set up and tweaked the way I like it. Editing from the brain is a simple and straight forward affair and the manual is clean, easy to understand. The hardware was super simple to put together, the playability was easy to adjust, the hardware was actually fun to put together and all was pretty much bliss. One little problem I ran into right from the start: since my set came with like 10 Switchcraft cables that all seemingly looked identical, it took me a little bit to figure out which cable was supposed to be used for the hi hat. Being a mostly acoustic drummer and not a keyboard player, I had no idea that the cable with the double banded 1/4" tip was the stereo cable until someone on ddrums.com forum enlightened me. They should have marked the bag or something for us wiring idiots.

But really the above is fluff. The REAL reason I'm giving a disappointed 6/10 is because the ddrum4 dump tool that's provided (ddrum4tool.exe) does not work well in sending sounds to the brain from certain machine configurations (Windows XP, Onboard sound cards, etc..) and Mac users are tough out of luck all together. I was going through the manual and deleted all sounds on the brain like the manual suggested in order to download the new sounds and I started getting an "Err" message when trying to send sounds. After much searching on the Internet, I eventually found that the tool just doesn't like Windows XP. In the week it took me to figure that out, I had a $2500 5pc. paper weight in my basement. Kudos to Clavia for even providing a tool at all, but they should work on it as computer operating systems update and upgrade. Not everyone wishes to be stuck with a 6 year old OS!!

Again, this set is feature rich. The hardware stands are sturdy enough for lightweight gigging and the memory locks are a nice touch for tear down and set up. I ended up using a dedicated snare stand instead of the included basket contraption and I felt the cymbal arms fell short in the way of flexibility so I replaced the arms with DW booms, but other than that no complaints.

The brain has all of the features I want and none of the features I don't want in a drum interface. The sensitivity knobs are awesome as some days, I play harder or sloppier than others and it's nice to have an instant way to adjust for those changes in playing on the fly instead of scrolling through confusing menus like ddrum's mainstream competitors.

The Headphone, A1/A2, B1/B2/B3/B4 output options are fair, however, you only have 10 inputs. This basically limits me to a five piece kit with four cymbals. Honestly, that's enough for most everyday usage, but if you want to add a pad for a splash and an extra floor tom or make use of those nifty octobans (joking), you better have another brain handy!

Most of the sounds available for download are stunningly real sounding and feeling. If you have sustaining tom sounds, they boom forever and don't cut each other out if you start playing fast patterns (ala TD10 or DTX). No "machine gun" effect here at all. Some of the factory bass drums have a trace "hiss" sound before the gate or sound very short and electronic, but there are a few awesome bass sounds for download from www.clavia.se that really thump. A few of the factory cymbal samples suffer from sustain issues too, but again, clavia saved it's best sounds for their web site in my opinion, so don't just stick with the factory sounds! Explore...

I also wish Clavia would update the brain as well to include a USB or Firewire interface. Despite popular opinion, PCI, SCSI and MIDI are dying standards. More onboard memory or a memory expansion option would be nice as well and would push it into a league all it's own with engineers, pro musicians and live sound men. If you wipe all the factory sounds off the brain (which I suggest you do if you have no need for octobans, glockenspiels or timpani sounds), you can expect to download one, maybe two, good drumsets into the brain. That kind of flexibility is awesome, but the price of ROM/RAM components these days should warrant an upgrade to the memory capacity guys, seriously.

Again, as said above, they need to pay more attention to the necessary software tool and continue to develop it, or at least maintain it and make it compatible with new computer OS'es and the ever-growing sound card pool. Again, the flexibity was the only reason I bought this kit and to be cut short of it's potential by some little proprietary PC utility is extremely NOT cool.

Honestly, after downloading all of the sounds to my PC that are available for the ddrum4, I think they included the wrong sounds from the factory! The preset sounds are just OK. More realistic than even the best offerings from Roland, Yamaha or Alesis, but still just OK. Out of the box, I would have liked to see more of the "Mega Signature" sounds from the clavia web site than all the crazy percussion sounds that I don't need anyway. But if you don't run into any download issues into the brain, it's smooth sailing. And there are literally a boatload of great sounds available from Clavia.

Sensitivity is far supperior and easier to setup than on The Alesis DM5Pro, Yamaha DTX or Roland TD10. Do yourself a favor though and put the snare pad on it's own dedicated snare stand if you have the option. The extra isolation will come in handy if you want to tweak a little extra sensitivity without double triggering.

Again, you won't find any phaser fx, 20 different reverbs or different room environments, but you will find top notch samples which works great for me.

Pending what I said above about the reliability or compatibility of the software dump utility, I feel this is an extremely solid kit. Would I take it to a gig without a backup? Ask me again in five years! If it hasn't died by then, then it probably won't! Until then, my drum tech carries backups of just about everything. My guitar player doesn't show up with a few backup guitars and a backup amp!

Ewwww. I tried emailing Clavia's support 4 times about the problem with that dump utility. Two weeks later and still no response or "Undelivered mailer deamon" errors... Not good if you ask me.

Also, what's this crap about having to BUY a firmware upgrade? They sure are liberal with the free samples, but lord forbid you want to upgrade the software revision on the brain if you need to.

I'll give Clavia the benifit of the doubt, but hopefully I never have to deal with the warranty/RMA process...

I know it sounds like I'm harsh on this kit or Clavia. But don't get me wrong. This is the next best thing to good acoustic drums. I would definitely buy this set again, but now I know the caveats, and so do you.

I have been playing for 17 years and gigging and recording all types of music semi-professionally for the last 8 years.

My acoustic collection ranges from old Ludwig Vistalites, a 5pc 80's Gretsch Kit, a DW Collector's Series kit, Sonor Jungle Kit. Snares include 6x14 N&C SS, 5x13 DW Edge, 6.5x14 Ayotte Wood Hoop, 5.5x14 Gretsch, 5.5 Ludwig Hammered Bronze, and 8x14 Tama Artstar. Cymbals include various Paiste Signature and Sound formulas, Zildjian A/ZCustoms/K. Hardware is mostly DW and Gibraltar with Tama Iron Cobra pedals. I own the Alesis D4 and DM5Pro currently, but have owned the Roland SP20 and TD7 as well as the Yamaha DTX.

Love - The pads, the hardware, the brain, the sounds, the ease of use, the sensitivity
Hate - That blasted sample dump utility!! Not real hip on the snare basket and cymbal pad holders. Not too crazy about the fact I was basically ignored by Clavia's support team for a legitimate problem.

Editing is very easy. The ddrum4 is a "down to earth" module. If you just like to play drums and not scrolling through all kinds of cheezy menus for tweaking, then the ddrum4 is for you.

There are no effects and there is no sequencer inside the ddrum4. But since most modules have lame effects and a limited sequencer: it's better to buy your own (professional) stuff...
Expansion can be done by downloading all the sounds from the http://www.ddrum.com site. The ddrum4 module is from late 1996 but Clavia still updates it with new sounds. Name one company who does this!
The only drawback is the limited memory. All sounds are compressed 3 or 4 times. Nevertheless it would be great to have some (32 mb) memory expansion.

In a few words: the best you can buy!
Dynamics are very good, sensitivity is perfect.

Solid metal housing, no noises at all !!!
Very reliable

Great. Clavia is a small company with onlt 15 people. And they listen to their customers.

I would certainly buy it again. This is the best e-drum you can buy

Has very few editing parameters and it is very simple to navigate around the ones it has.
The sounds before loading mega kits are great and even more impresive
when loaded. The manual is simple but tells you all you need to know.
This may seem a little different than other edrum modules to use but when use to the way it works
it is by far the simplest.

No bells and wistles but it's main feature is it plays and sounds like real drums.
What more could you ask for. The vdrums without effects sound very synthetic. You could
never accuse the ddrum4 of this. Polyphony is not an issue at all as
you never here not stealing which I used to get on my Aleses D4. Would be
nice if the unit had more memory as if mega kits are loaded you need to delete a lot of other sounds
but it is well worth it. Being able to load kits from the net is a big
plus. I love the way you can use a real hi-hat pedal but I find the way
the samples play a bit eratic. This is the only bit that reminds you
you are playing an edrum. I have tried the vdrums and don't think the hi-hats
play any better. I have got used to them now and can manage to contol them a bit better

This kit is the best. I have tried the other edrum kits and agree with other reviews
this is just the most realalistic edrum there is. This is the kit for
you if you want to record or play an edrum kit but for it to sound like
a real kit.

Built like a brick but not had it long enough to make a desision

Had a few problems with sub standard hardware. Mainly the wing nuts. One broke
so the shop I bought it from replaced it but others are still dodgy
and I am still waiting for full replacement

I just love playing it. I marvel at how I can play without hardly
realising it is an edrum kit

The Clavia DDrum 4 interface is not quite as asthetically pleasing as the Roland V-Drum brain, but it is fairly easy to operate once you get the hang of it and read the manual, which is very small and easy to comprehend. Downloading new kits off of the Clavia website is fairly simple as well, as long as you have sequencnig software like Logic Audio or Cubase, etc. Editing on this baby is not easy but not too tough either. There is major detail that you can go into in order to get the sounds that you want.

The snare alone has 16 trigger zones. Beats the hell out of the Roland which costs $1000 more. You have room for two more pads for expandability, and new kits are always being released for download on the Clavia website. The one thing that this kit lacks is an onboard sequencer, but the samples are so authentic, anyone who is going to use it is going to use it for professional gigs or studio time, not for toying around with (like the V-Drums). No built in FX, but who needs it! These are drums!

I have played every synth kit on the market and this one blows every one of them away. The V-Drums don't even touch them, the Alesis kit is laughable, the Yamaha's are well built but sound worse than the V-Drums. The only one that comes moderately close is the Space Muffins kit, but it is very expensive and is coupled with an acoustic kit. The samples are taken from actual kits and you can combine them. IE. Tama snare, Gretch kick, DW toms, Zildjian ride, Paiste Hi-hats, etc.

I have had the kit for a year and a half now, and have had no problems. I have mounted it on a Dixon full rack instead of the rack it comes with (which is a cheap piece of crap unfortunately). The shells are cast iron with a foam pad in them and they use real drum skins, so the only thing I have replaced is the skins.

I have dealt with Clavia's distributors in the US, Armadillo Enterprises and have nothing but good things to say about them. I recieved an upgrade chip from them so that they could use mesh heads, and their service was prompt and efficient.

If anyone is serious about buying a digital drum kit for live or studio use, this is the kit. It destroys the Roland, Yamaha and Alesis kit for quality of sounds and ease of use. It also cost me considerably less than the V-Drums which sell for $5495(basic V-pro) and $7495(Studio V-pro) in Canada. The Yamaha kit is over $5000, and I wouldn't touch the alesis kit with a ten foot cattle prod. This is not a kit for amatuers or for guys looking for a "toy". This is as pro as it gets.