Which drum software for me?

[K2000]

Hello, I have some basic questions about EZDrummer and Superior Drummer. I’m a new Logic user. I was previously using Garage Band and was frustrated by the crude controls. (I am a professional motion graphics/animator so Garage Band was way too primitive as an interface.) I was very surprised to see that Logic gives you the same limited “Jam Pack” drum patterns as Garage Band. I need more/better drum patterns that I can use to compose music with… “heavy prog” or retro hard rock with some odd time signatures occasionally, to mix things up. Please help me by recommending a product.

—> I was looking at EZ Drummer but I’m not sure if it is compatible with my new Mac (Intel Xeon). Your website seems contradictory. On the main EZ Drummer page, it says it works with Intel chips. But then there is this: http://www.toontrack.com/helpdesk/issue_view_portal.asp?ID=39

Note that there is currently no support for 64 bit operating systems

Does that mean I can use EZDrummer but it doesn’t take full advantage of my hardware? I use several Adobe graphics apps which do not run in 64 bits yet. I ordered EZDrummer from Musicians Friend, then called them back to cancel the order until I figured out what would work.

It also looks to me like Superior Drummer might be 64 bit compatible now? I don’t see the same warning on the “Bugs” page for Superior Drummer.

I’m not a real drummer or engineer, so maybe Superior Drummer is overkill for me. Given the choice of 8 snare drums to choose from, it might just be wasted on me. I will be interested in basic tweaking of the overall drum sounds, but not in choosing different mics for the drums and other in-depth tweaking. I would want the basic ability to tweak my EZD tracks so they don’t sound instantly recognizable, but I’ve got a feeling that EZDrummer gives you enough customization choices that you can move your sounds ‘out of the box’ because I haven’t seen any complaints about this. Between EZD and Logic there should be ample chances to modify the drums and put my own spin on them (?)

My main concern is having LOTS of patterns to work with, and being able to mix odd time signatures with those patterns, and not getting totally bogged down in the drum programming. Are the ‘Odd Time’ patterns relatively useful combined with other expansion kits like DFH? Or would I be best off editing my basic patterns to change the time signatures? Since I’m new to Logic, I haven’t even gotten that far.

I wouldn’t know what to do with a blast beat. I’m more from the Black Sabbath old school. EZDrummer is on sale with one free expansion pack, so that is obviously getting my attention. I want to spend my money wisely, even if it means paying more for Superior Drummer.

Help! I’m not smart!

Sorry for this long rambling post. Confused people ask confused questions. All help is appreciated.

Topic

[John]

Hi,

if you aren’t running your OS and apps fully 64-bit in Snow Leopard, then yes you can run EZdrummer. I do it on my Mac:s with Logic, DP, Cubase and Pro Tools.
To me it sounds like you should try to find the EZdrummer expansion(s) -EZX- that fits your needs the most and then add MIDI packs, like the Monster MIDI packs or Songwriter’s.
You can still tweak some, should you wish to. There is the EZdrummer mixer and you can separate the microphones into separate Inputs in Logic for further tweaking.

Superior isn’t 64-bit on Mac either, the Mac platform hasn’t been mature enough yet, since there is only the host developed by Apple that has gone 64-bit so far.
64-bit plugins are being developed on Mac as well, it’s just that it takes more time, for obvious reasons.

Please feel free to ask more, should you have any further questions.

Best Regards,
John

John Rammelt - Toontrack
Technical Advisor

[K2000]

I’m running Snow Leopard (10.6.3) but my Adobe software (Photoshop, Illustrator, After Effects) is not 64 bits. I think Adobe is finally releasing 64 bit versions just recently… I don’t have any of them yet.

So to be clear, I can install EZDrummer, I don’t need to do anything special…? I poked around a bit on the forum and saw some posts about bridging (?) somehow which I guess is no longer applicable. Cool!

BTW, I really liked the sounds of the New York Studios expansion – those really sounded fantastic. My friend recommended DFH, which seems a little more modern-sounding than what I like, but once everything else is added, it will probably work well. It will be a start, anyway.

Thanks for your help!

[K2000]

By the way, this is what Musicians’ Friend support just emailed me, in response to my query:

Thank you for your recent inquiry.

These are the system requirements concerning Macs for the Toontrack EZ Drummer: Mac- OS X 10.3.9 or *higher*, G4 1 GHz with 512MB RAM

The Toontrack EZ Drummer and Free EZX Expansion could be supported on your Mac pro 4 because it has the option to run as a 32-bit although the Superior drummer will run on a 64-bit with no problem. The superior drummer and EZ Drummer beta lite will be able to be used with a 64-bit operating system.

So they don’t have it exactly right, but at least they didn’t discourage me from buying the sale item (EZD).

[wailinsmash]

greetings… i’ve a difficult time, navigating this site for basic info, so here goes…

i’ve an ’02 mac g4 (450mhz & 640 ram) / ’02 cubase 5)… pls inform :

A) is my system too-outdated, for ez-drummer?

B) how to access these forums, for support…. i’m not a dumbell, just ignorant….

thx

[Mark Williams]

Hi wailinsmash,
Welome to the forums. This is a pretty helpful bunch around here, so this is a great place to start researching and asking any questions you may have. It might be helpful to do some searches, as well, since obviously many folks will have wondered some of the same things you probably are right now. Having said that, don’t be afraid to ask for help here.

In terms of your system specs, this is what I’m seeing on the EZDrummer product page: “Mac OS 10.4.11 or higher, G5 or Intel processor with 512 MB RAM.” So my initial guess is that no, your system won’t work. At least in theory. Who knows if it would work in practice? I have an older G4 of about the same vintage as yours, but I haven’t fired it up in over a year now, and haven’t used it for real audio work in quite a long time. It is definitely long in the tooth, as they say. I would probably consider a newer machine. Even a used first-generation Intel iMac would shock you with how much more power it has compared to your G4. Of course, I recognize there may be other reasons for you continuing to use the system you have.

So, short answer: “no, it won’t work.”
long answer: “who knows? Maybe it will, though it would probably be quite slow.”

Hope this is in some way helpful.

MBP 2.4 GHz | 4GB RAM | OSX 10.6.8 Logic Pro 9.1.5 | Metric Halo LIO-8/4P | Apogee ONE SD 2.3.0 | EZP 1.1.0 | Drumtracker 1.0.2

[Mark Williams]

ORIGINAL: K2000

I’m running Snow Leopard (10.6.3) but my Adobe software (Photoshop, Illustrator, After Effects) is not 64 bits. I think Adobe is finally releasing 64 bit versions just recently… I don’t have any of them yet.

So to be clear, I can install EZDrummer, I don’t need to do anything special…? I poked around a bit on the forum and saw some posts about bridging (?) somehow which I guess is no longer applicable. Cool!

BTW, I really liked the sounds of the New York Studios expansion – those really sounded fantastic. My friend recommended DFH, which seems a little more modern-sounding than what I like, but once everything else is added, it will probably work well. It will be a start, anyway.

Thanks for your help!

So here’s the real deal (forget about Musician’s Friend–they’re not particularly knowledgeable over there about these kinds of things):
There is currently a 64-bit beta of Superior Drummer (henceforth, SD2) for PCs, but nothing for Macs yet on that front. Same with EZDrummer (henceforth, EZD).

Assuming you have the most recent version of Logic Pro, it defaults to opening in 32-bit mode. You can easily get it to open in 64-bit mode instead, if you need to go that route, but until your plugs are 64-bit, it’s probably not the best move for you. It can be done, but I’d advise sticking to 32-bit mode until your plugs are fully ported over. (If you used other large sample libraries that were ported to 64-bit already, then I’d say yeah, go for it.)

So then, yes, you can install EZD just fine, no problems whatsoever. Same with SD2.

Now, in terms of your original post, here are my thoughts. First, it’s not that surprising that Logic Pro doesn’t come with many more options than the Jam Packs for percussion loops. It would be a little bit like including a bunch of pre-made company logos with Adobe Illustrator. Sure, you could adjust the vectors a bit, change the colors, etc, but really, Illustrator is a professional application that sort of assumes you know what you’re doing. Same with Logic Pro. (I hope this is a good comparison–heck, maybe Illustrator does come with that kind of thing! I use Vector Designer instead.) Plus, there are so many third-party add ons you can buy for exactly this kind of thing.

Next, in dealing with your major question, I would tend to recommend EZD for you. EZD still allows you to tweak a bit, and as John mentioned, you can always send the sounds out individually to Logic, and then you can do whatever the heck you want with them there. Since you say, “I’m not a real drummer or engineer, so maybe Superior Drummer is overkill for me. Given the choice of 8 snare drums to choose from, it might just be wasted on me”, I’d advise you to go with EZD. You can always pick up the Crossgrade one day if you’ve really gotten into it and hit the ceiling of what EZD can provide.

The next question would really be which expansion pack to get for your style of music. There’s certainly the ‘Drumkit From Hell’ pack, but you might also want to check out the Vintage Rock EZX. It might go in the direction of the stuff you’re into–Sabbath and the like. I don’t really work on that genre of music, so I’m not the best resource for that. The New York Studios expansion you refer to is actually an SDX, so it will only work with SD2, not with EZD.

I would also echo John’s thought that you should pick up a couple of the Monster MIDI packs. There’s one that involves odd time signatures, if I recall. If you’re using odd time signatures, it will pay in spades for you to get Logic’s bars and beats to match what you’re trying to do with the time signature. It’s dead-simple to do it, and very quick, and it’ll help line everything up for you with the song structure.

I want to mostly say to you that this is an exciting journey you’re on. The Toontrack products are excellent. I can say that without bias, as I don’t work for the company. They are making some really, really wonderful products right now, and this is a community that is very open to helping one another, so don’t be afraid to ask questions.

Cheers, and best of luck to you.

Mark

MBP 2.4 GHz | 4GB RAM | OSX 10.6.8 Logic Pro 9.1.5 | Metric Halo LIO-8/4P | Apogee ONE SD 2.3.0 | EZP 1.1.0 | Drumtracker 1.0.2

[trebor99]

I called Toontrack and they said they would have a Mac 64-bit update for Superior Drummer around the end of the year.. yet they did the Windows 64-bit update months ago.. this doesn’t make sense to me.. Snow Leopard has been out for several months.. Logic Pro 9 and the 64-bit update has been out for several months.. all Spectrasonics instruments are 64-bit.. and just about everyone I know uses a Mac for their studio.. I’ll keep hoping that they will speed up this update.. it will make a WORLD of difference once SD goes 64 for Macs!!

Mac OS 10.6.3 - Logic Pro 9.1.1 - 2x3.0 GHz Intel Quad Mac Pro - 5GB RAM - Superior Drummer 2.2.1 - Stylus RMX - Omnisphere - Trilian - Rocktron Prophecy II - Warmoth Guitars

[Author]

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