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Roland HD-1 Electronic Drumset

Date: September 28, 2007 @ 11:26 PM

I needed to check the accessories at my local music shop this week, and after reading all the hype on the web about Roland's new HD-1 Drum Kit, I thought I'd have a go at the demo set that was there.

Not good.

This is a very hot item this season, but it's dinky. Being over 6' tall, I felt more like I was playing a kid's kit than a cutting edge rig. The angles on the footpedals is not adjustable, and the rig can only go so high, and spread out so much, before you reach the limit.

Also, the headphone output seemed to be quite a bit on the soft side, and as far as I could tell, there was no set of 1/4 in. stereo outputs for serious patching into a mixer.

The photos that are circulating around the web for this item make it look really beautiful, but in the flesh, it's kind of blocky-looking... nothing at all like the elegant piece of furniture that the photos make it appear to be.

Probably more disappointing, though, is the fact that Roland has clearly branded this as a small studio sized version of their V-Drum technology, which seems to be a half-truth. The pads do seem to use some of the V-Drum technology to provide a decent response, but the sound generation method, according to my research, is pure sample playback... not physical modeling like the high end V-Drums.

Normally, I wouldn't be this hard on a product, but in this case I discovered that Roland's next step up, the TD-3SW, is only $200 more, and has much more of a full sized layout and a better brain.

So, for those who might have been thinking that V-Technology is now available to the masses at an extremely low cost, I would suggest not getting too excited.

Oh well... there's always next year...

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