Now THAT is a bass drum port...

It looks no uglier than a pillow, blanket, towel or mattress that I see stuffed into drums all the time, and proudly displayed. In fact, I think this horn head looks better than any of those things stuffed in a drum.

I agree with this... It sort of makes me wish I had a 22" bass drum and some cash so I could just buy this to check it out merely for the gimmick.

As much as I'd like to think it's this incredible idea, I'd imagine it's really not much more than that...
 
Why bother? Just leave the res head off surely?

I like how they said they're working on ports for tom res heads.

this is going to go down in history as a bad idea...
 
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I got mine in the post today and made a comparison video! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d4EVlf5iD_I

Interesting, almost like it rolled off some of the high end. I like that you used the Sennheiser vocal mic (e845)...shows you can get a good sound with a $100 mic.

Would be really cool to hear this with an Audix D6, AKG D112, Shure Beta52, and Sennheiser e602 to see how the 'pre-EQd' bass mics would handle it.
 
Personally I liked the sound of the other head better, the other one sounded more full compared to the drum port which sounded a bit thin to me.
 
That thing is hideous. I use Kick Port and have excellent results.
 
Eww. That could be the most disgusting looking drum product ever. I would never subject the audience to a 22" anus looking thing all night. Who OK'd that design?

HAHAHA!

I think some of the theory of this object is that it increases the resonant surface area of the drum (even though it decreases the internal air mass inside the drum). The horn shape and the ridges are like having a larger resonant head.
 
I've got it.

Get one of those 7" deep bass drum cover things (Like a mini bass drum or a subwoofer) and take the res of your bass, put that infront of it, tape it and stick the anus on the drum cover.

No decreasing the internal bass drum air space and it acts like an amp :)
 
That thing looks hideous; the opposite of classy. Though I suppose it's the sound that matters.
 
From DRUMPORTS website:

We are also currently designing and manufacturing the range of drumports for tomtom's to further enhance the sound of your kit - watch this space or join us on facebook for updates.

... "Bloody ace man!"
 
the one head, Premier, sounds like a fluffily beater and the DrumPort one sounds like a hard plastic beater. Hence the difference.
 
When I listened to both videos, I thought the Drumport 'resonant ass' sounded noticeably worse to my ear. All the punch from the low end was gone and instead it just sounded boxy. And overall it sounded unnatural, like a below average electronic kick. I was curious to see exactly how it was different in a more objective way, so for anyone else who may care, I sliced up the audio from their YouTube video (the last four hits of each drum for all three mic positions) and popped that into iZotope...

First of all, check out the waveforms:
ndwz6v.jpg


This audio, recorded from the mics, has been compressed with something like a rack compressor or in the program used to record the file, because all the hits peak right at 0 dB. You can also plainly see that the Drumport hits were significantly more compressed than the reference hits. I don't think someone can logically argue the Drumport head could physically have such a big influence over the compression of a waveform, so that leaves two possibilities:
1) they used different compressor settings to intentionally try to make their head sound subjectively louder and seem naturally punchier with a longer sustain
2) the same compression settings were used for both but the guy was actually hitting the Drumport drum harder, knowing the compressor would make them have equal peak volume but would have much less effect on the lower-threshold reference hits

Now for the EQs (averaged over all twelve hits from above):
25yzwc4.jpg


The fact that the Drumport is about 5 dB louder comparatively across the entire spectrum despite having the same peak volume gives further evidence of the compression inequality. Keeping in mind that different compression means that the two raw EQ shapes will be affected differently (especially if dynamic range compression was used), you can see that the Drumport head appears the give a big boost around 150-175 Hz. This is not where I really like to emphasize the bass drum's low end in the mix, and in fact I tend to make a modest cut centered around 200 Hz to get rid of boxiness, which I had previously noted about the Drumport, and boost somewhere from 75-125 Hz for thump. There's also a big difference in the 4-8 kHz range, which might explain why people have noted such a large discrepancy in the beater attack because this range is boosted in the mix if a slappier, 'thwackier' kick sound is desired. This could just be a consequence of it being more heavily compressed, but I think it's more likely that this is a genuine effect of the unique head design.

So in summary, I think this head gives some noticeable differences, one in the range that emphasizes aggressive beater attack (some like this, some don't) and another in not a particularly pleasant sounding region of the bass spectrum, save for maybe 16/18" tight jazz kicks. But I think they have been intentionally misleading with the samples they posted to make it sound like their head makes a bigger difference than it really does. Meh, I hope someone got something out of this but if not, I enjoyed thinking about it at least. B)
 
Anyone else noticed the lack of negative comments on the anus video?
 
Not to mention he doesn't show the reverse angle where you can actually see the beater hits or the mic positioning >_>

Snare drums and bass drums are probably the two things in recording that you have to be the most careful about over-compressing. That probably makes it sound worse than whatever the heck that crazy design is reflecting from the sound wave.

Despite my wholly negative earlier post, I will say that I see two big positives about it. First, anything that encourages people to stop stuffing their kick with a small motel's worth of bedding is doing good. And second, the design allows for a great mic position for recording--centered in the radial and lengthwise center of the kick, pointing at the beater(s).
 
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