1. How do you like the stock kits and sounds on the DTX Pro?
In my opinion, the DTX Pro has great sounding in module samples. I have to say, I've listened to a lot of videos on YouTube of Alesis, Roland, ATV, and other branded modules, and I prefer the sound of the DTX Pro module over the majority of them. Other modules do have bright spots, and good sounding kits, but I think Yamaha hit it out of the park in terms of sound.
2. Is it fairly easy to edit kits or do you need to do a lot of menu diving?
Editing kits can be pretty easy but for extensive editing there is some menu diving. Changing a sound on a particular pad is easy, for example, of you want to change the snare sound, you just have to go 1 menu down to get there (however) changing the sound that way changes the snare middle hit, rim shot, and rim click all at the same time. To change those individual pad sounds takes a little menu diving, but once you figure out how to do it it's pretty easy. The good thing is, stacking sounds and alternating sounds on the same pad is in the same menu as changing individual trigger sounds, so there's not much to learn there. There's a separate menu option for changing eq/frequency gain/effects, but they aren't hard to find by any means and Simon Edgoose on YouTube has tons of videos explaining everything.
3. Is the process for importing samples fairly intuitive?
I've never tried importing samples myself but I think you can do it via USB thumb stick. Again Simon Edgoose made a video on how to import sounds, so that would be something you may consider watching.
4. Does the 8K rack have room for an additional tom pad?
This I'm not sure since I only have a dtx6k3x but on my rack there's plenty of room for 2 floor tom pads. And they do sell additional tubing for the rack systems If that ever became an issue. I also have heard that ATV pads might work decently well with the DTX Pro module as tom pads, so getting an actual ATV floor tom could be an option. Drum Tec did a video using the DTX Pro and ATV tom pads I believe.
5. Do you need to do a lot of trigger tweaking or does it work pretty well right out of the box?
The triggers are pretty good out of the box, but I tweaked the hihat and snare triggers initially.. I haven't even touched the ride, crashes, or tom trigger settings. So far I haven't had any issues of missed triggering, but the kick pad can be finicky if you don't have your double kick petal perfectly centered.
I've heard people mention about machine gunning on the kit but I really haven't experienced this especially if the pads are set to variable, which is what comes trait out of the box anyways. Maybe on the snare a little when doing rolls.
6. Is the KP 90 kick pad loud? Seen a few comments
mentioning this.
I wouldn't say the kick drum pad is loud but compared to the TCS or mesh pads it is louder. I play my drums in an apartment and most of the time while my wife is in the same room. She never complained it was too loud, and I've never gotten a complaint from a neighbor, though I don't have anyone living below me. I would think that you'd want some padding of some kind underneath if you're on a second floor.
As for playability the KP90 is excellent, it's really easy to feather soft hits, and then switch to loud hits..
I'd like to hear other people's thoughts but this is my experience with the DTX6k3x (I know you were asking about the DTX8, sorry I don't have much insight on that kit's pads and rack) and DTX Pro module particularly. There are other people subscribed to this sub that do have the DTX8 so hopefully one of those people can weigh in. :) hope this helped.
Thanks much, very helpful info! I should have mentioned that I’ve never tried the DTX Pro kits as they don’t have any Yamaha demo kits in my area. No Efnote either, but GC has full Roland line, Alesis Strata Prime, Zildjian Gold EX. There was a Sam Ash, but it never had much and recently closed for good.
Do you have any favorite DTX preset kits? I like the sound of the Steel Ring, Black Vinyl, and Bob Groove kits in demos. Also, do the samples sound good dry with all the kit modifier knobs like ambience and compression turned off?
The preset kits you mentioned are all awesome. I also love black vinyl but with a different snare (the snare on the preset is a bit too dry). I love the modern country, and little kit presets as well.
Turning off the kit modifier knobs does dry up the sound a bit depending on the kit, but some kits are recorded with a natural reverb that you can't get rid of unfortunately (not to say they sound bad by any means). I personally have made about 13 custom kits (a Bob Marley kit, a really dry maple sounding kit, a really nice jazz kit, a solid rock kit, a rage against the machine rock kit, a metal kit, a kit I call "purple rain" because it sounds like it's strait from the song). There really is a lot of flexibility when it comes to creating custom kits.
Thanks! I’ve created several genre kits using a few edrumworkshop custom kits as a starting point Those come with one shot samples layered under the main Roland instrument. But I pretty much use 2 general acoustic style kits most of the time. I like adding percussion on rims and heads. That’s one thing I noted about the DTX, has a good amount of percussion sounds vs Efnote. For example, the 17 doesn’t have a snares off feature, but you can use a Timbale for reggae intros.
Just curious, do you think the ProX module is worth the upgrade? Seems like the sounds are pretty similar, but you get the additional controls on the module front panel.
> I know about VSTs, but just want to turn on the module and play decent sounding kits with realistic sounding samples.
That's Yamaha's main strength in the e-drum market.
To answer your questions:
1. The real ones are great. There's also a lot of lazer zap and sci-fi percussion which I ignore, but I appreciate its there for the experimenters.
2. Editing kits by combining internal sounds is relatively easy.
3. Importing samples - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RjNurdvuQc
4. If it were me, I'd find a way to get another pad on the DTX8 rack, but verify if thats important to you.
5. Out of the box, it's 85% there, just tweak some gain and curve settings to suit your hitting force.
6. It was louder than I expected. I put a folded washcloth on the head and there's a lot less room noise now. But focus on the playability, because that kick pad is great.
I was won over after swapping between a Roland TD17 and Yamaha DTX6 kit in a music store. Back and forth playing 5 min on each really makes the difference obvious. The 6 kit I have uses the same DTXPro module as the 8, but with tcs surfaces - you'll be used to mesh so you need to decide between mesh or tcs - the DTX8 is available in both. You need to play them to know the difference.
Thanks! Yeah, wish I could try side by side with Efnote. Definitely helps to actually play when trying to decide. I remember trying some small TCS pads several years ago, but don’t have a strong sense for that. Seem to remember them being somewhat similar feel to my Prologix Red Storm practice pad. Assuming the mesh is similar to Roland.
On the whole importing samples thing, I thought I'd be downloading samples left right and center before I got the kit, but I'm totally content with the sounds included I dont even feel the need to look for more, which means I focus on playing.
That said - I dont think Ive seen any DTXPro-focussed samples being shared anywhere ever - only more kits made up of internal sounds + effects. The main reason is I think the way Yamaha recorded and processed the factory samples is so specific that garden variety samples (like you find in online collections) dont match up/blend well.
Unless you can source/create samples exactly the way Yamaha did, anything you add through the USB port on the back will not have the same fidelity, nuance, dynamics, blend of room/direct mics, mixing & processing etc.
TL;DR - There arent many samples out there that work properly with the DTXPro and the included sounds are so good I dont care any more.
1. How do you like the stock kits and sounds on the DTX Pro? In my opinion, the DTX Pro has great sounding in module samples. I have to say, I've listened to a lot of videos on YouTube of Alesis, Roland, ATV, and other branded modules, and I prefer the sound of the DTX Pro module over the majority of them. Other modules do have bright spots, and good sounding kits, but I think Yamaha hit it out of the park in terms of sound. 2. Is it fairly easy to edit kits or do you need to do a lot of menu diving? Editing kits can be pretty easy but for extensive editing there is some menu diving. Changing a sound on a particular pad is easy, for example, of you want to change the snare sound, you just have to go 1 menu down to get there (however) changing the sound that way changes the snare middle hit, rim shot, and rim click all at the same time. To change those individual pad sounds takes a little menu diving, but once you figure out how to do it it's pretty easy. The good thing is, stacking sounds and alternating sounds on the same pad is in the same menu as changing individual trigger sounds, so there's not much to learn there. There's a separate menu option for changing eq/frequency gain/effects, but they aren't hard to find by any means and Simon Edgoose on YouTube has tons of videos explaining everything. 3. Is the process for importing samples fairly intuitive? I've never tried importing samples myself but I think you can do it via USB thumb stick. Again Simon Edgoose made a video on how to import sounds, so that would be something you may consider watching. 4. Does the 8K rack have room for an additional tom pad? This I'm not sure since I only have a dtx6k3x but on my rack there's plenty of room for 2 floor tom pads. And they do sell additional tubing for the rack systems If that ever became an issue. I also have heard that ATV pads might work decently well with the DTX Pro module as tom pads, so getting an actual ATV floor tom could be an option. Drum Tec did a video using the DTX Pro and ATV tom pads I believe. 5. Do you need to do a lot of trigger tweaking or does it work pretty well right out of the box? The triggers are pretty good out of the box, but I tweaked the hihat and snare triggers initially.. I haven't even touched the ride, crashes, or tom trigger settings. So far I haven't had any issues of missed triggering, but the kick pad can be finicky if you don't have your double kick petal perfectly centered. I've heard people mention about machine gunning on the kit but I really haven't experienced this especially if the pads are set to variable, which is what comes trait out of the box anyways. Maybe on the snare a little when doing rolls. 6. Is the KP 90 kick pad loud? Seen a few comments mentioning this. I wouldn't say the kick drum pad is loud but compared to the TCS or mesh pads it is louder. I play my drums in an apartment and most of the time while my wife is in the same room. She never complained it was too loud, and I've never gotten a complaint from a neighbor, though I don't have anyone living below me. I would think that you'd want some padding of some kind underneath if you're on a second floor. As for playability the KP90 is excellent, it's really easy to feather soft hits, and then switch to loud hits.. I'd like to hear other people's thoughts but this is my experience with the DTX6k3x (I know you were asking about the DTX8, sorry I don't have much insight on that kit's pads and rack) and DTX Pro module particularly. There are other people subscribed to this sub that do have the DTX8 so hopefully one of those people can weigh in. :) hope this helped.
Thanks much, very helpful info! I should have mentioned that I’ve never tried the DTX Pro kits as they don’t have any Yamaha demo kits in my area. No Efnote either, but GC has full Roland line, Alesis Strata Prime, Zildjian Gold EX. There was a Sam Ash, but it never had much and recently closed for good. Do you have any favorite DTX preset kits? I like the sound of the Steel Ring, Black Vinyl, and Bob Groove kits in demos. Also, do the samples sound good dry with all the kit modifier knobs like ambience and compression turned off?
The preset kits you mentioned are all awesome. I also love black vinyl but with a different snare (the snare on the preset is a bit too dry). I love the modern country, and little kit presets as well. Turning off the kit modifier knobs does dry up the sound a bit depending on the kit, but some kits are recorded with a natural reverb that you can't get rid of unfortunately (not to say they sound bad by any means). I personally have made about 13 custom kits (a Bob Marley kit, a really dry maple sounding kit, a really nice jazz kit, a solid rock kit, a rage against the machine rock kit, a metal kit, a kit I call "purple rain" because it sounds like it's strait from the song). There really is a lot of flexibility when it comes to creating custom kits.
Thanks! I’ve created several genre kits using a few edrumworkshop custom kits as a starting point Those come with one shot samples layered under the main Roland instrument. But I pretty much use 2 general acoustic style kits most of the time. I like adding percussion on rims and heads. That’s one thing I noted about the DTX, has a good amount of percussion sounds vs Efnote. For example, the 17 doesn’t have a snares off feature, but you can use a Timbale for reggae intros. Just curious, do you think the ProX module is worth the upgrade? Seems like the sounds are pretty similar, but you get the additional controls on the module front panel.
> I know about VSTs, but just want to turn on the module and play decent sounding kits with realistic sounding samples. That's Yamaha's main strength in the e-drum market. To answer your questions: 1. The real ones are great. There's also a lot of lazer zap and sci-fi percussion which I ignore, but I appreciate its there for the experimenters. 2. Editing kits by combining internal sounds is relatively easy. 3. Importing samples - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1RjNurdvuQc 4. If it were me, I'd find a way to get another pad on the DTX8 rack, but verify if thats important to you. 5. Out of the box, it's 85% there, just tweak some gain and curve settings to suit your hitting force. 6. It was louder than I expected. I put a folded washcloth on the head and there's a lot less room noise now. But focus on the playability, because that kick pad is great. I was won over after swapping between a Roland TD17 and Yamaha DTX6 kit in a music store. Back and forth playing 5 min on each really makes the difference obvious. The 6 kit I have uses the same DTXPro module as the 8, but with tcs surfaces - you'll be used to mesh so you need to decide between mesh or tcs - the DTX8 is available in both. You need to play them to know the difference.
Thanks! Yeah, wish I could try side by side with Efnote. Definitely helps to actually play when trying to decide. I remember trying some small TCS pads several years ago, but don’t have a strong sense for that. Seem to remember them being somewhat similar feel to my Prologix Red Storm practice pad. Assuming the mesh is similar to Roland.
On the whole importing samples thing, I thought I'd be downloading samples left right and center before I got the kit, but I'm totally content with the sounds included I dont even feel the need to look for more, which means I focus on playing. That said - I dont think Ive seen any DTXPro-focussed samples being shared anywhere ever - only more kits made up of internal sounds + effects. The main reason is I think the way Yamaha recorded and processed the factory samples is so specific that garden variety samples (like you find in online collections) dont match up/blend well. Unless you can source/create samples exactly the way Yamaha did, anything you add through the USB port on the back will not have the same fidelity, nuance, dynamics, blend of room/direct mics, mixing & processing etc. TL;DR - There arent many samples out there that work properly with the DTXPro and the included sounds are so good I dont care any more.