[Harp-L] Cheap/good software alert

[Richard Hunter <turtlehill@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

For those list members who are into recording using computer-based
systems, I want to alert you to a very good deal on a software drum
machine on musiciansfriend.com.

Musician's Friend is offering FxPansion's DR-008 drum machine (v1.10)
via reseller GForce at a cost of $49.00.  For that you get three
versions of the drumbox -- standalone, DXi, and VST -- plus dozens of
very useful drum kits for various styles of music, plus MIDI files that
contain grooves to go with the drum kits.  (Note that this software only
plays drum sounds in response to MIDI -- it doesn't create drum grooves
on its own.) The software also reads Battery and LM-4 drum kit files,
two of the most popular formats in computer music.  (kvr-vst.com offers
about a dozen decent kits in these formats for free.)

You can also register the purchase with FxPansion, at which point you
can get your hands (via download) on the latest release (v1.20) of the
software, PLUS another 200 drum kits or so.  The extra kits are very
large (hundred of megabytes) -- you'll need a high-bandwidth connection
to download them.

This is a very low cost deal for a pro-quality drumbox for computer
recording.  I've had the software in my hands now for two weeks, and
have installed it on two of my Windows XP-based SONAR systems.  I've
only used the DXi version so far.  The DXi works as advertised by the
manufacturer, and the drum kits sound very, very good, with a tremendous
range of styles (including ethnic and jazz kits, modern styles like
hiphop and industrial, and a range of acoustic kits).  They are
certainly of the same high quality as the Large and Small Ambient
acoustic kit soundfonts I bought for $24.95 each from Sonic Implants,
and the price-performance ratio is MUCH much higher.  I mean, 300
great-sounding kits for the same price I paid for two?  The plugin uses
about 1% of CPU running under SONAR on my 2.4 gHz Dell 8350, which is
less than most of the software synthesizers in my toolkit.  
   
This is an example of how you can get very good deals by buying one to
two generations behind the latest and greatest in electronics.  Again,
if you're already using a Windows-based recording system (like Cubase or
SONAR) and want a large collection of good drumkits with a simple,
functional software player, it's worth considering.  Note AGAIN that you
will need to make, buy, or otherwise acquire MIDI drum files to use this
player; it doesn't make drum grooves by itself.  (Note also that drum
machines that do make their own grooves, like Steinberg's Groove Agent, 
sell for $250 and up, and you can get very good MIDI drum files for low
cost or free in lots of places on the Internet.)

Disclaimer: I have no financial interest in the success or failure of
this product or the companies that sell it.

Mandatory harmonica comment: I have heard rumors to the effect that some
harmonica players make recordings that include drums.