Yamaha DTXpress/DTXplorer/DTXtreme

Well. Having digested the NAMM fallout, I am left with mixed 
feelings.

Yamaha's e-drum folks clearly couldn't market their way out of a wet 
paper bag. They have good gear, but their European web site still 
has the OLD DTXtreme, and the comparison between the videos on 
Harmony Central for the TD-20 and the DTXpressIII is painful. If I 
was a tech at Yamaha, I would be mightily pissed: their new baby 
getting next to no coverage, leaked out before NAMM and leaving 
Roland to steal the show. You just have to admire Roland, even if 
their gear is ludicrously overpriced. It's a bit like watching IBM 
and Microsoft back in the days when I was an OS/2 programmer.

Nothing from Clavia, and nothing from Pintech that I can see.

I'm left with a suspicion that my upgrade path this year will be 
modest: a DTXPU3 module to sit alongside my DTXPU2 (take advantage 
of the new sounds and get some more inputs), a handful of the round 
cymbal pads to replace the PCYs, perhaps the hi-hat pad (as long as 
I can cable mount it - I agree with the rumblings about pad son hi-
hat stands missing the point a bit), and at least one mesh pad 
(snare).

I don't yet see enough that's compelling enough about the 
DTXtremeIIS module to make me spring the extra cash, and the Roland 
TD-20 module and kit looks wonderful but the price is so high I 
would need specialist breathing equipment and a heated suit to get 
up there. My existing RS65 rack has been supplemented by a couple of 
extra tubes and clamps and is fine (if not pretty), so no need to 
spring for the (admittedly nice) new racks, and even if the new TPs 
are softer rubber that doesn't really make me want to run down to 
the store for them.

I'm completely conflicted about the Roland gear too. I mean, 
technologically it's stunning. What they've done with the hi-hat, 
with the modelling, with the interval tuning, are all superb. The 
hardware is stunning too - cabled racks, roadworthy clamps, and so 
on. Yet all that processing power and huge tweakability to get 
closer and closer to a facsimile of an acoustic kit seems almost 
futile. If it's silent acoustics you want, surely a converted 
acoustic kit and a sampling module like the ddrum4 is the 
overwhelmingly obvious choice? Chris Jude's converted Sonors on 
edrumming.com are plain, old-fashioned stunning, and hooked up to a 
ddrum4se and TD-10 (or 20) will sound awesome.

Hmm.

Stewart

--- In DTXpress@yahoogroups.com, "moosetication" <moosetication@y...> 
wrote:

Good morning/UK afternoon, Stewart,

> Yamaha's e-drum folks clearly couldn't market their way out of a 
wet 
> paper bag. They have good gear, but their European web site still 
> has the OLD DTXtreme, and the comparison between the videos on 
> Harmony Central for the TD-20 and the DTXpressIII is painful. If I 
> was a tech at Yamaha, I would be mightily pissed: their new baby 
> getting next to no coverage, leaked out before NAMM and leaving 
> Roland to steal the show. You just have to admire Roland, even if 
> their gear is ludicrously overpriced. It's a bit like watching IBM 
> and Microsoft back in the days when I was an OS/2 programmer.

It's clear that e-drums don't have the same importance for Yamaha 
that they do for Roland; whether resignation, litigation, or 
ineptness is responsible is the $ million question.  But I don't 
think that a giant like Yamaha, which certainly knows how to promote 
when it has a mind to, is suffering from any unforeseen consequences. 
The DTXpress has done well, and will continue to do so while Roland 
reaps the rewards of owning the market in general. The DTXtremeIIS 
will take some of the lower high end, but even though Yamaha seems to 
have done as well as it can with rubber, not having a woven-head 
option will hurt, and Yamaha seems to know it. I honestly think that 
something else is waiting in the wings, but legal problems, and maybe 
other considerations, are stalling it. But I'm definitely intrigued 
about the XtremeIIS. If I can find one, I'll go play it. The 
DTXpressIIISP is my cup of tea as well; I like what I heard on the 
video. I may buy the module as well sometime.

> Nothing from Clavia, and nothing from Pintech that I can see.

Clavia, I'm afraid, is a dwarf among giants. It simply cannot afford 
to keep up, or even bother to try to keep up, with the big boys, and 
synth products are its priority. If what I've heard is true, dddrum 
has had something new on the drawing board for years, but the usual 
product-release timetable for this company doesn't apply. As far as 
Clavia is concerned, it's NAMM SHMAM THANK YOU MA'AM. 
 
> I'm completely conflicted about the Roland gear too. I mean, 
> technologically it's stunning. What they've done with the hi-hat, 
> with the modelling, with the interval tuning, are all superb. The 
> hardware is stunning too - cabled racks, roadworthy clamps, and so 
> on. Yet all that processing power and huge tweakability to get 
> closer and closer to a facsimile of an acoustic kit seems almost 
> futile. If it's silent acoustics you want, surely a converted 
> acoustic kit and a sampling module like the ddrum4 is the 
> overwhelmingly obvious choice? Chris Jude's converted Sonors on 
> edrumming.com are plain, old-fashioned stunning, and hooked up to a 
> ddrum4se and TD-10 (or 20) will sound awesome.

Elegant as the TD-20 kit is, I don't see the point of shelling out 
$5,000 for it either, but thousands of people will. Converted kits 
are an option, but a labor-intensive and not necessarily less 
expensive one. I've thought of converting my old Walberg & Auge, but 
I don't have Chris' time. Those who want meshes but not at Roland 
prices will happily take up Pintech and Hart on their options, though 
Roland's new "spider" triggering will be hard to match. The TD-20 
module certainly seems like an advance. As OGD says, its sampling 
capacity may largely determine how satisfied higher-end consumers 
will be with it, but its sounds and subtleties are hard to deny. I 
must say, however, that at least some of what it accomplishes were 
anticipated in the ddrum, and on principles that are far simpler to 
deploy than Roland's. 

In the end, my feelings are mixed, too (they always are, for a 
variety of reasons). The balance of power definitely has not shifted, 
but Yamaha's offerings occupy a distinct and valuable place in the 
market. It will be interesting to work with them and to see how they 
fare.

Ed

> Ed wrote:
> In the end, my feelings are mixed, too (they always are, for a 
> variety of reasons). The balance of power definitely has not 
shifted, 
> but Yamaha's offerings occupy a distinct and valuable place in the 
> market. It will be interesting to work with them and to see how 
they 
> fare.
> 

Actual, my feelings are pretty positive from what I have seen.

My initial reaction to the TD-20K video was "Holy cow!!", but after 
reflection, when I see the latest Lamborgini, it is also "Holy 
cow!!.". Unfornucately, there really is no comparsion. The Lamborgini 
is expensive, but it is finished and polish in every aspect. You get 
what you pay for. You simply cannot say that for the TD-20K, it is 
expensive, it has lots of new bells and whistles, but it is still not 
finished. You simply cannot make that comment about the Lamborgini. 
The TD-20K is missing on board sampling capable of holding 2gb of 
data that can be off loaded to 4 gb CF cards, it doesn't have a 
firewire/USB 2.0 connector. The fact is for $500 I can get a full 
computer system with case/motherboard/ram/hard drive. They could do 
the same and put it in the base of the housing and provide full 
computer support right out of the box. With a built-in computer with 
USB you could plug and play any device to the module. And to say this 
would make it too expensive is crazy. Whether they sell it for $5000 
or $5500, somebody that can afford $5000 can also afford to spend 
$5500 to get the ultimate system. Maybe some bean counter at Roland 
didn't want to play the numbers game with this stupid MSRP garbage, 
that would have pushed the fantasy land pricing from $6500 to over 
$7000. 
And to say, "but we did leave an expansion slot, so you can add this 
later???", yea for another $500, so why didn't they just add it in 
now?? 

The TD-3 is priced at $100 less than the DTxpress III. There is no 
way it can compete with the Dtxpress III. Maybe if it had a street 
price of $600 it would have a market for parents buying something for 
their teenager.I believe that Yamaha missed out on some real sales 
oppurtunity by not releasing the Dtxpress III globally back in 
November for the xmas rush.

The real potential winner here that I see is the Dtxtreme IIs. My 
only disappointment is that there are no video's of it being demo'd 
yet. 

I guess, for me it comes down to, the Manufacturers still don't get 
it. The end users are the people buying their products and not the 
stores. And with most people now having online access, most people 
will spend 90% of time online and 10% in the store getting 
information about drum products.

Within less than an hour of the posting on the website in Japan in 
October about the upcoming release of the DTxpress III/IIIsp, it was 
posted here, on vdrums, on edrummings and no telling how many other 
websites. So literary, within a few hours/days thousands of E-drum 
people all across the globe knew about it. I don't know of a single 
store that could do that, at that price. 

But the standard business model is "let's wait for Summer NAMM, let's 
wait for Winter NAMM, let't wait for Summer NAMM, etc. etc.

My question is who goes to NAMM??? Not the majority of the people 
that buy this stuff, only the few people that sell this stuff. And 
profits are not made from what a store can buy, but from what you and 
I actually buy. We are the ones that make or break the banks of these 
companies. And certainly the advice we give here has more impact on 
what people buy than what someone at a local Guitar Center says.
   
These companies need to embrace the virtual world of the internet and 
address the real impact it has on what people buy and don't buy. I 
would love to see the day when NAMM is a virtual NAMM that is a 
website that "we" the actual buying public can visit and not just be 
the domain the store owners/vendors.

If it were not for the internet and these forums, how many people do 
you think would even know about KOBY drums??

OGD