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Still with us? Okay, let’s get into it. With the exceptional high quality we’ve come to expect from Nord, the 3P displays a vast array of sonic capabilities. It has 200 sounds and a large variety of modulators, oscillators, reverbs, filters and various other FX on-board. You can use these to alter specific aspects of each sound and save them as your own in one of the 400 available banks. There is also a sequencer app for iOS, called Nord Beat, which will make beat-makers and producers feel at home. While this may not be on the level of the Roland V-Drum module, having two velocity layers per pad allows you to play more dynamically with your sounds. If you’re confused by what this means, allow me to explain.
The Alesis SamplePad is a compact four-pad instrument with 25 sounds built in plus the ability to add any sample to it. Any sound of your choice can be assigned to the four velocity-sensitive pads via way of a standard SD Card - this is perfect addition to you kit or studio setup.The Yamaha DTX Multi-12 does not offer anywhere near that much space, but it supports finger and hand drumming, with mutable pads, meaning it feels much more realistic to play. Then you’ve got the Nord Drum 3P - also filed under ‘multipad’ - which is a drum synthesizer. If you're not sure whether to upgrade your SPD-SX, or whether you spend the extra on the SPD-SX Pro, our comparison piece will help answer all your key questions. This would be particularly problematic if you’re planning to launch long samples (e.g. pads with long chord progressions, bass lines, etc). Cross-talk could unexpectedly start or stop these samples at the wrong time.
A percussion pad will not allow you to import samples, however it will be loaded with - as the name suggests - a multitude of drum and percussion sounds, along with tools to colour and manipulate them. If a sample pad is an electronic Swiss Army Knife, think of a percussion pad as a thousand drum kits in a box.Here atMusicRadar, we are experts in our field, with many years of playing, creating and product testing between us. We live and breathe everything music gear related, and we draw on this knowledge and experience of using products in live, recording and rehearsal scenarios when selecting the products for our guides. The SamplePad 4's built in library contains the most commonly requested percussion and drum sounds available, but you can also load your own samples via the front SD card reader.
Say you’ve identified a particular ambient bird sound from your bedroom window that really adds to the feel of one of your songs. You would record it and program into the pad so that you can then trigger it live, without having to move from the kit. Perhaps you also want a choral part to play over the bridge of a particular song? Queue it up on pad two and, when the bridge rolls round, you can summon those angels with a strike of the assigned pad.Cross-talk: This was one of my biggest concerns with using the SamplePad Pro. A well-known issue with this model is that hitting one pad may trigger another. The Alesis Sample Pad Pro comes pre-loaded with over 200 individual drum and percussion sounds that are versatile and realistic sounding. These sounds are definitely a good platform to get started with into the world of hybrid drumming. Is that an issue? If you’re using this for more basic playing and drum beats, you might be fine. If you’re expecting this to respond like a snare drum for very fast playing (or an electronic mesh pad) then you might be let down.
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