Yamaha DTXpress/DTXplorer/DTXtreme

Hey OGD,

Recalling your dissection of the HH65, I've been reading the thread 
at vdrums that Chris Jude started a while back about hi hat 
modification (for me, a little like reading War and Peace in Russian, 
I'm afraid). I'm wondering how many of the Roland problems translate 
into the Yamaha context--that is, the long throw of the pedal vis a 
vis the short range of motion that actually picks up the middle 
ground between open and closed on the sensor. The Yamaha sounds don't 
seem too abundant either, but are they handled the same way as the 
Roland sounds, with each hh sample serially mutated to create a 
simulated range (the COSM system, at least in my understanding), or 
are they all individual samples? (And we still haven't figured out 
whether the HH80 is fully variable or discontinuous like the HH65). 
It would seem that the original Visu-lite hat for Roland users was an 
attempt to eliminate the wasted motion of the FD-7, though it could 
do nothing about the limited sonic geography. It would also be nice 
to stretch out the Yamaha sensor as well, especially since something 
like the Visu-lite theoretically would allow the hh voices to 
activate more quickly and fully. The Roland crowd seems pretty 
cynical about it, but a sampler-based module might be the ticket, 
assuming that the company were to make a controller to take advantage 
of it; the Visu-lite, or other aftermarket controller, certainly 
wouldn't be a good enough excuse to do it. I can't help but think 
that the shortcut in electronic hi hat technology is a little like 
the popularity for lossy compression schemes in audio. 
Notwithstanding the issue of cost, after a point, even though it is 
easier and more convenient, the masking is not completely effective, 
and you do notice the difference in quality.

Ed