Roland HD1 drumkit

Reviews | Roland HD-1 drumkit
100
R
oland V-Drums have been
around for a while now and
have made their mark as one
of the most popular
electronic drum solutions. But they’ve
been something of a luxury for the
home studio. Roland’s new offering is
their cheapest V-Drum-style kit ever,
aptly tagged V-Drums Lite. Opening the
huge box reveals a simple set-up with
only a few nuts and bolts to tighten
before you’re ready to rock.
Well, that’s if you have drumsticks
and something to sit on, as there’s no
drum stool or sticks. Although this kit is
great value, I’m sure most people would
have paid a few quid more to have a
‘complete’ set, but Roland have the
extras available as a separate add-on
pack for an additional cost. In pictures,
the kit isn’t done justice – it’s really well
built and the bizarre looking ‘pedals-
built-in-to-the-frame’ actually work
brilliantly. The amount of space this kit
takes up is amazingly small – I had
mine set up in my small studio and it
took up practically the same space as
an extra studio chair.
As a neighbour-friendly bonus, this
is probably the world’s quietest electric
drumkit, so whacking around for an
hour won’t sound like a box of wooden
spoons being emptied on to the dining
room table. The pads are responsive
and bounce fairly realistically, and the
luxury of the quality V-Drum mesh snare
is brilliant and is the set’s winning
feature.
The brain of the kit is a small
affair with six buttons that operate tidily
with the push of a drumstick. The built-
in sounds aren’t anything to shout about
– they’re obviously aimed at beginners,
with ten varying kits from straight
acoustic to 808-style and beatbox
sounds. But Roland have tucked a MIDI
output on the side so you can also jack
into another drum box and trigger
alternative sounds.
This kit comes into its own when it’s
triggering a tidy set of sounds. It isn’t
long before you get used to having it
around for programming MIDI and it
becomes a useful alternative trigger for
samples and all sorts of weird and
wonderful sounds.
But as a strict drumkit there are a
few gripes, the fi rst one being the hi-hat
pedal control. The pedals themselves
feel great and the cymbal-style pad is
also fi ne, it’s just the sensitivity between
open and closed hats that can get
annoying. Sometimes minor pedal
movements trigger larger than expected
reactions. But with some careful MIDI
tweaking in an electronic kit-orientated
drum ROMpler such as BFD, this can
be improved slightly. It makes control
between open and closed actions more
usable. The other minor annoyance is
easily forgivable. The compromise for
such a compact kit is that adjustments
are limited and the pads are small, so
accuracy can be a problem until you get
used to rolling your way around the kit.
Overall this kit is brilliant value for
money – having the real mesh snare
makes it one of the best value kits on
the market and really should be
checked out if you’re looking at starting
drumming or wanting a compact studio
kit. It has to be said that having a real
kit for triggering MIDI drums has made
making music not only more exciting
and fun, but also much more intuitive
and fl exible than trying to bash out
beats using a controller keyboard.
WHAT IS IT?
Entry-level electronic
drumkit
CONTACT
Who: Roland UK
Tel: [phone]
Web: roland.co.uk
HIGHLIGHTS
1 Compact set-up
2 Flexible with MIDI out
3 Great value
SPECS
Drum Confi guration
Kick pedal, snare, hi-hat,
hi-hat pedal, tom x 3,
crash, ride
Drumkits
Ten different kits
Controls
Drumkit button x 5,
Variation button,
Metronome button, Volume
knob, Tempo knob
Connectors
Output jack (stereo
miniature phone type),
headphone jack (stereo
miniature phone type), mix
in jack (stereo miniature
phone type), MIDI Out
connector (5-pin DIN type),
trigger cable connector
(DB-25 type), output jack
can be connected with
headphones.
Power Supply
DC 9V
Roland HD-1
drumkit
| £499
Could it be time to stop bashing the keys for rhythm
tracks?
Chris Barker paradiddles his way to paradise
VERDICT
BUILD
VALUE
EASE OF USE
VERSATILITY
RESULTS
This is a great way to start
drumming, and a superb studio tool
that won’t upset the neighbours.
FMU193.rev_roland 100 11/9/07 17:57:49