Yamaha DD55AD Touch-Sensitive Digital Drums with AC Adapter

 A fantastic compact drum kit, ready to be amped up!
I received this product from Amazon a few days ago. I've already put it through it's paces and it holds up pretty well. One reviewer was commenting on amplifying the sound. I ran a standard 1/4 cord from the DD55 headphone jack, into an Alesis Quadreverb (I guess any pre-amp would work), and then plugged the Quardreverb into my Peavey Amplifier. BAM! Rock and Roll! Drums as loud as you can stand it. The sound quality is hard to judge coming through the small speakers embedded in the DD55. Even using a decent pair of headphones the sound quality improves dramatically. Through the Amplifier; forget about it. It sounds better than A LOT of drums I hear in concert.

If I could make one adjustment, I would add more than one customizable set. There are over 200 great sounds in the DD55, so the number of unique kits you could create is vast. Yamaha does supply their premade kits. They are okay, but for instance, they have fantastic retro electronic drum sounds, but none of their premade kits use them. I don't want to "waste" my only custom set on a kit that I would use for just a novelty song.

Overall it's a great purchase. I bought it just so I could take it to band practice, instead of lugging around my full size kit. You drummers out there know what I'm talking about. And now that I can amplify it, it does the job I need. No fuss, no muss. Finally, this is the best price I've seen; $40 less than Sam Ash or Musician's Friend.

Eric Rollence

 A lot of fun!
I bought this as a gift for my 12 year old son. I think I've had as much fun with it as he has! Neither of us are "drummers" and I'm guessing that a serious drummer would probably have little use for this. BUT...it's definitely more than a "toy" and it's a heck of a lot of fun for the rest of us!

 Good simulation
A pretty good simulation of a drum kit. The drum samples are high quality and sound very close to the real thing. Also includes assorted percussion samples, such as castanets, cowbells, and even turntable scratches. Overall, I recommend this to anybody wanting an authentic drum instrument, as opposed to a drum toy.

 Good tools - great for MIDI input...
I bought this today on a whim after playing around with it for about 15 minutes at BJs... I have been looking for a digital kit to mess around with as I have no space or quiet in my apartment to practice.

General feel - I have to agree with the acoustic drummers out there - the hi-hat is very difficult to control. It also seems to be limited in the number of voices that can be played on a sound at once - this may be a limitation of the machine itself, it may not affect a drum module being sent MIDI info. In an ttempt to eliminate MIDI 'noise' the machine dampens notes which are too quiet, but also apparently too close together. So that if you do not play with a firm hand when you tap the hat, the second bounce of the stick can kill the sound altogether (i.e. it won't continue playing the original note) In other words, depending on how rough you play, you may get some stutters occassionally - the alternative it drop-outs, as a few users noted - the pads are small, which is actually good. It means that in terms of practice, I have to pay a lot more attention to where I am hitting.

What sold me on the item was the patch selection interface and controls. The sounds are typical sounds for a GS device - I think my sound canvas has about the same quality of sounds in its drum voice. The MIDI compatability is par - no aftertouch, but then again, these are drums. You can load a midi composition of your own to practice to, which is GREAT. If that aspect were beefed up, I could really get into this thing. I also found it was great to have a metronome available that was out of the recording loop - that is, if you are passing the MIDI onto another module for recording.

Oh yeah, this would be a great starter kit and/or kids toy, although I think it would not be too good for young kids.

Pros: Good sounds, good MIDI, good practice options.
Cons: Stutters or dropped notes, quiet high hat in the default position with the default sound.

 GREAT! Plug into an amp or pa and stand back!
Almost everything about the dd55 is good. I wish they made these 30 years ago and I know I would be a better drummer. Any one who plays drums should have this machine, even if you own a huge set of acoustics. If your kid plays, you MUST have this machine, as he can learn more quickly, experience more diverse sounds, play with accompaniment, and play at a low volume level, which translates into more potential practice time, with less setup and hassle. Let's face it: acoustic drums are loud and obnoxious to most non drummers except when played along with other instruments. The dd55 snare sounds are great, the tom sounds are great, the kick sounds are great, hi hat great, ride and bell and other sounds are very good. Crash cymbals are weak, and too few. I would say with a few minor upgrades, this system could potentially become the "drums" of the future. I am in my 40's and played in bands years ago and know the "pain" of a huge set: set up, tuning, miking, sound check, tear down, hauling, cleaning, maintenance, and inconsistency of sound! (I always felt drummers should get bounus pay for all that!) My opinion for improvement: (1) better crash cymbal sounds. This is the only weakness I have found as the crash sounds are not rich and full, but rather sound short and a little "dirty".(2)at least 2 more "small" pads on the right side for bell and ride cymbal sounds. As it is now, if you want a 5 piece kit, you are limited to only 2 cymbal sounds other than hi hat. That means one crash, one ride, so what about a bell (cup), and a second crash, and even a cowbell, etc? To keep the unit small Yamaha could even make the cymbal pads a bit smaller if necessary. SUMMARY: I LOVE IT AND THINK THIS IS THE BEGINNING OF GREAT THINGS IN MODERN DRUMMING AND WILL MAKE DRUMMING A MORE ENJOYABLE EXPERIENCE FOR FUTURE PERCUSSIONISTS!

 I love this thing!!
Cool drums. I got it so i could use it fo my home studio. Its the perfect thing i would have gotten. Thats what you have to base it on. What you need. Dont get it if you want a set to play live at shows, but dont get it if you want to give you 3 year old kids. If you want drums but your mom wont tolerate the noise, good solution. Best drum set for [good price].

 Lots of fun, but could be better. 3 1/2 stars is closer.
The DD-55AD digital drum kit has both advantages and disadvantages. I have to admit it's a lot of fun with reasonably authentic drum sounds, but with some exceptions. It's great that it's so portable, so you can just grab and go anywhere you like for a jam session.
Things that could be done to improve the kit:
1. The 2 ride cymbal settings that are provided sound pretty pathetic. The hi-hat open/close "shick-click" sound is not easy to make sound right.
2. Yamaha needs to make more accessories available that are compatible with this set.
3. The hand drum setting needs some work.
4. I would like to see some of the drum kit pre-sets to be more specific. For example, have a setting for a 1960's Ludwig kit, or 1970's Slingerland.
5. Although it's really neat that it comes with the two pseudo pedals for the hi-hat and bass, it would be great if you could also purchase more realistic pedals similar to the ones in the top of the line Yamaha electronic drum kits.
Although the information is not in the manual, and it's well hidden on Yamaha's site, I have the following info from them: For a more realistic drum pedal feel, a Yamaha KP60, KP80, KP80S or KP120 Electronic Kick Tower Pad may be used in place of Pedal 1, and a Yamaha HH80 Electronic Hi Hat Tower may be used in place of Pedal 2. These alternative foot pedals add the look, feel and durability of real drum pedals.
IMPORTANT: The newer Yamaha HH60 and HH80A Electronic Hi-Hat Towers will NOT work with the DD55.
6. I haven't quite figured out how to hook it up to an external amplifier, and am not sure that it is possible. If it is, I suspect you would need some sort of pre-amp. The manual is not clear on this at all.
7. On the plus side, I intend to use this with an additional real snare drum, plus genuine cymbals with stands. This will give you a pretty great sounding kit that is still extremely portable. Now if I could just get those pedals ....

 Mixed Results
My 2 cents... First, the sampled sounds are really quite good. If a closet drummer out there is looking for fun way to explore the drumming experience, then I would rate it 4 stars. However, as an acoustic drummer, several aspects of this kit really frustrated me:

1) The Hi-hat sound is TOO soft. The sound of the stick hitting the rubber pad is as loud as the closed HH sound. It destroys the aesthetic. Of course, this is solved by running the system through an amp, but that defeats the notion of low volume jamming.

2) The triggers aren't that "touch-sensitive". I believe the claim is 6 levels of volume sensitivity. In practice, I could reliably produce maybe 2 with sticks. I had slightly more control playing with fingers. However, the bigger issue is reliably generating any sound at all when striking the rubber pad. Even if it catches 19/20 strikes, it doesn't take very many misses to drive you crazy. Thus, playing live with this as your entire kit is all but impossible.

3) As mentioned in another review, the foot triggers are tough to control with finesse.

In my opinion, the very best use for this is as a rhythm teacher and advanced practice metronome. It comes packed with preset rhythm styles and associated synth music. One can vary the tempo for each style and drop/add the music and each voice of the rhythm groove separately. I like to listen to the machine with headphones while playing real drums to learn new styles and to practice rock-solid timing and syncopation. For this use, I give it 5 stars.

 o.k.
This thing is sweet but the sound is to quiet. I play my real drumset and think I will go deaf But this is just...