Adding on to Roland TD-30 kit

Buddy9832

Member
All,

I am new to the electronic drum world. I've been playing acoustic kits for about 15 years but now my job requires me to hop from place to place, apartment to apartment and an acoustic kit is no longer ideal. I've been keeping my eye on purchasing the Roland TD-30 drum kit since it has come out. I'd really like to find a kit that allows for plenty of room to add on and is as close to an acoustic drum set as possible. One thing that I have noticed recently however is that there doesn't seem to be much room in the sound module to add on more cymbals or drums. Does anyone know a solution to this?

Ideally I'd like to have a total of 4 or 5 toms and 6 additional cymbals not including the ride and hi-hat any suggestions?

Brett
 
All,

I am new to the electronic drum world. I've been playing acoustic kits for about 15 years but now my job requires me to hop from place to place, apartment to apartment and an acoustic kit is no longer ideal. I've been keeping my eye on purchasing the Roland TD-30 drum kit since it has come out. I'd really like to find a kit that allows for plenty of room to add on and is as close to an acoustic drum set as possible. One thing that I have noticed recently however is that there doesn't seem to be much room in the sound module to add on more cymbals or drums. Does anyone know a solution to this?

Ideally I'd like to have a total of 4 or 5 toms and 6 additional cymbals not including the ride and hi-hat any suggestions?

Brett

Hi Brett,

Nope - you'll be maxed out and short of target. Without getting into DIY workarounds, the TD30 offers 4 extra inputs over the 'stock' kit pads. To go beyond that, there are two methods:

- TMI - Trigger->to->MIDI Interface, the most common of which will be an old Roland TMC6. This will give you an additional 6 trigger processing inputs, it then connects to the module via MIDI to fire the sounds. The upside of this is that it's a pretty inexpensive unit = the downside is that it will require programming a) to set the trigger performance you want - although you'll have to do this with the main module anyway - and; b) to set the correct MIDI map for the sounds you want, kit by kit. None of this is rocket science, but it isn't plug-and-play either.

- Get a 2nd module. As simple as it sounds. upside is that it doubles your inputs and if you know how to work one, you know how to work two! Downside is, of course, the price... Most 'monster' ekits you see that replicate a large acoustic kit use double (or triple) modules.
 
Hi Brett,

Nope - you'll be maxed out and short of target. Without getting into DIY workarounds, the TD30 offers 4 extra inputs over the 'stock' kit pads. To go beyond that, there are two methods:

- TMI - Trigger->to->MIDI Interface, the most common of which will be an old Roland TMC6. This will give you an additional 6 trigger processing inputs, it then connects to the module via MIDI to fire the sounds. The upside of this is that it's a pretty inexpensive unit = the downside is that it will require programming a) to set the trigger performance you want - although you'll have to do this with the main module anyway - and; b) to set the correct MIDI map for the sounds you want, kit by kit. None of this is rocket science, but it isn't plug-and-play either.

- Get a 2nd module. As simple as it sounds. upside is that it doubles your inputs and if you know how to work one, you know how to work two! Downside is, of course, the price... Most 'monster' ekits you see that replicate a large acoustic kit use double (or triple) modules.


Thanks for the help.

I was talking to someone the other day about this and he also suggested getting a 2nd module. How would you be able to merge the two sounds together? I guess a better way of putting it is if I wanted to use headphones while playing drums how would I be able to get them to both to merge? Is there a splitter of some sorts that I would be able to get?

As far as using a TMI would I be losing any the features that this kit has to offer? That is one of the things that I really love about this kit. I wouldn't want to lose the ability to sense the small nuances of drumming such as ghost notes, rim shots, accents, etc.
 
Ideally I'd like to have a total of 4 or 5 toms and 6 additional cymbals not including the ride and hi-hat any suggestions?

The TD-30 has Bass, Snare, 4 Toms, Hi-Hat, Ride, 2 Crashes & 4 Aux. (Tom, Cymbal or whatever). From your list it looks like the fifth tom is all you loose. Not worth the investment in my book, but hey it's only money.
 
Before you go spending thousands on a second module, you could try these to increase your no. of outputs.
http://www.drumsplitters.com/


Thanks for the showing me the splitters. It definitely seems to be the most economical way of approaching things, but I'd hate to lose any functionality/realism. Is this really one of the only means without shelling out thousands for another module?
 
Here is my TD-30KV kit with a bunch of extras:

10354201743_97e479ab6e_o.jpg

I have all that running off of a TD-30 and TD-9 module. The only things not hooked up to the TD-30 are the (4) PD-85's (auxilery toms) and the splash cymbal by the hi-hat. I am currently using 2 splitters to make this setup work and they work pretty well. Not 100% perfect, but probably 90%.

Edit: Dont forget that all the drums and cymbals are dual zone, so you can have 2 different sounds on them. If you don't play the rims of your toms, you can set them up to be whatever sound you want. It doesnt feel as realistic hitting a tom rim to get a splash sound, but they work great for cowbells and tambourines.
 
This is my first time checking out the electronic drums section of the forum. Tommy D - I am AMAZED at your photo. I've barely looked at higher range e drums before (have a starter kit myself - a TD-11k) and I had no idea e drums could be like that! Wow.

The TD-30 certainly is something. Even though it's way out of my range, my curiosity is piqued. Headed over to youtube now to locate demo vids.
 
This is my first time checking out the electronic drums section of the forum. Tommy D - I am AMAZED at your photo. I've barely looked at higher range e drums before (have a starter kit myself - a TD-11k) and I had no idea e drums could be like that! Wow.

The TD-30 certainly is something. Even though it's way out of my range, my curiosity is piqued. Headed over to youtube now to locate demo vids.

Thanks leanneislearningtodrum. You can see some of my TD-30 videos on YouTube. The link is in my signature.
 
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