The Roland TD20 expansion card

[TAKnipe]

Okay, I havent said a word about this yet. I have been reading what others are saying but havent seen many common threads through the threads. People are ofcouse upset with the extremely high price. I keep wondering why no sampling feature??? And only minimal layering, I am a little baffled by its existence.

I guess you need to hear it first before you can decide whether its worth the wait or the price tag.

[OverLord]

To me, its a mixed blessing. I wanted sampling and I would have loved layering.
Improved PS, hi-hat responce and a slew of new sounds is nice. Being able to use a bigger CF card and have 99 backups is great.

The card is better than having to buy a new module. I have put one on order, lets see if it is as good as they say.

[kevincool87]

Improved PS? Where does it say that? The only thing I heard in terms of nuance was the randomizer in the clip rmc posted. Something similar to what VSTi's do to prevent machine gunning. I couldn't hear properly because of the background noise.. but something about envelopes?

I just use Vex kits and don't really put in much effort learning the module(after trying to learn DTX IIs), but from what I saw on the clip, you get 300+ new sounds, couple of more ambience options that might come in handy, total resonance of the entire kit.. basically an upgrade on the existing functions. That and this mysterious randomizer thing that needs to be more elaborated on like Yamaha's nuance system that has now been revealed to as XA system. Unless one finds all these upgrades useful and finds a use for them that's great, but for others like me who see them as a mere upgrade that might or not be beneficial since I'll actually have to think of a way to utilize them or the changes barely are significant, it's not much of a big deal to justify it's price tag. I was hoping a big bang and with the way it's priced, it should have. Bweh.

edit: Found what Michael meant.. here (http://www.roland.com/products/en/_support/faq.cfm?iCncd=4814&FAQ=EN08-22636&dsp=1&ln=en&prd=TDW20). Basically improved PS and Interval control... nice, but interval control is still limited to snare, cymbals and ride. And no PS on toms either. Nevertheless the toms in the clip sounded nice.... nice rings when Johnny did rolls on the toms.

I'll be sticking with my TD-20 until time comes where I might not care so much by how little the $500 upgrade brings me. Maybe a pay increase or something. like a 25% increase. :D

[fignewton]

They are charging $500 for the upgrade? :o
Man you guys with multiple Modules are in trouble.

I am ready for the the TD30 that way the TD20's will drop in price, so i can justify picking one up.

[OverLord]

RMC is charging $449. But yeah, essentially $500 bucks.

[dschrammie]

Silly Ryan, posting over in the Product Reviews where only mods can reply! ::)

Anyway, as far as his "Must Have or Hype" question is concerned, I guess I would ask what are you really getting for your $500 (or $449)? Compare it to the TDW-1 for the the TD-10. As I'm aware the TDW-1 had two productions, right? Wasn't it the 2nd that gave the "V-Cymbal Control"? The impression that I've gotten from people is that this issue of the TDW-1 was a major upgrade to the TD-10 (would you guys agree?), and therefore was worth the $. Based on the description we've gotten from Roland (and J Rabb's demo @ NAMM), is this really providing a major upgrade?
It would seem to me that the "major" portions of the upgrade are:
- smoother sound control on the hi-hat
- enhanced V-Editing
- and an improved user interface for quick and flexible drum customization

Granted, I don't know what "enhanced V-editing" will consist of...and I don't know how difficult the original user interface is, nor just how "improved" this one is. But those are the things that would be important to me. I don't know just how "important" the additional 300 sounds would be, or the ambience effects, etc. Sure, those are cool features and may be important to some people...but is it worth the $500? That just seems like an awfully large chunk of change to dish out for a small number of upgrades.

Another question I'd have is regarding the "smoother sound control on the hi-hat"...is this something that will only benefit users of the VH-11/12 hats? Or does it improve performance for users of the FD-8 as well?

I don't know. There just doesn't seem to be anything about it that blows me away and would make me think I've got to have it. Maybe if I were recording with it a LOT and those new ambience effects were essential to my recordings...I guess. I don't know nearly enough about how the inner circuits work, but I'd think that some of the "advanced" functions that Tom's talking about would be difficult to do with just a little card...though I agree that sampling would be huge.
It sounds like it does have some nice upgrades...I just don't know about that pricetag....but I'm a major cheapskate, so that's part of it as well. ::)

[OverLord]

When you consider you are getting 300 more samples, that's a big improvement right there. How much would the equivelent BFD expansion packs cost? (Actually that would be hard to calculate but at $249 a pack it wouldn't take long to spend the same)

I don't begrudge the cost, there are just features I would have rather paid for. Like LightPipe output and sampling.

[fignewton]

Silly Ryan, posting over in the Product Reviews where only mods can reply! ::

AhHa!
That is why i couldnt post on that topic.