Customer Reviews

Xbox 360 Rock Band Portable Drum Kit

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(12)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

I got this drum because it's cheap and I thought maybe at least something about it would be fun to mess around with. I have an ion, but my pedal is too loud and I also wanted to get something I could take with me on the go to a friends' house. Well this thing worked as well as the other reviewers have said. The pedal in this kit is better and makes less impact noise than any pedal on the market, and if you can stick the pads down in one place, they seem to work perfectly as well. The only downside is that you pretty much have to use this with the included sticks, because the pads are too hard. The sticks in the box are rubber to compensate. Using wooden sticks on these is too loud to stand.

Another added perk of this kit is that the controller can be plugged in standalone and used like an NES controller for arcade games, as long as the games don't use the shoulder buttons. Also, people who are interested in modding projects can use the little controller part as the "brain" for a custom drum kit. People have used this to turn their nice electronic kits into RB kits!

Let me reiterate again that the pedal on this is better than the stock ion pedal in terms of noise and equal in function. Get a 1/4" to 1/8" converter and use it with your ion.

In every way, this product is worth your money if you're looking for any of the above features.

ADDITION: I am adding this to the review as a caution: the sticks that this comes with seem to be susceptible to breaking at the middle where they screw together. Now, I know that all drum sticks break eventually, but just be prepared to try to locate some rubber-head sticks as backups because you really can't play this too well with a wooden head.

UPDATE 6/29/09: The pedal for this is still working great, and I still use it with my expensive Ion drum kit. I play on expert now better than ever, and this pedal is very accurate and much easier to double tap to get those super-rapid beats. The official pedal I bought recently doesn't respond well at all to quick rapid pushes like this does. I even got a second portable kit just so I could have a spare, and the second one works just as well.

Overall, the quality of this product is top notch. I'll start with the bad and work into the good.

BAD----By itself, the drumkit has to be placed on a flat surface like a table or desk. For those who are used to the standard Rock Band Drumkits, the pads are angled towards the player rather than flat. I guess it's a matter of personal preference but I see this as a negative feature.

BAD----The kick pedal is in the shape of a box rather than the shape of a foot. It is very awkward to use and if you're used to the standard kick pedal, this is a bad alternative.

GOOD----The drum pads themselves are highly sensitive. Never in the past 6 months of using this product have I missed any notes due to the pads not being able to register a hit whether they are soft hits or hard hits. The pads are very reliable for fast parts i.e. Everlong on expert.

GOOD----The drums pads are very durable. For the price of this product, the durability and resiliency of the pads is excellent. I've been using them for 6 months now and not a single pad has malfunctioned.

GOOD----The sticks that come with the package are durable and allow for more fluid play with the drum pads. They are made of plastic and weigh about the same as the standard wooden sticks. These sticks also have rubberized head which allow the player to feel a bounce off of the pad. For me, this allows me to transition from one pad to another more effectively than with wooden sticks. These sticks also have a rubber grip around where you would normally grip a drum stick. This helps prevent the stick from leaving your hand.

OWNER SUGGESTION----Please watch this video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-i4mfxoDUg this video will teach you how to fully take advantage of your portable drum kit. This enables you to use them with your existing Rock Band Drum Kit.

Another note: The pads connect to a central rectangular panel which has the standard console buttons on it. This is where you plug each individual pad, kick pedal, and has the USB plug that plugs into your console. The only problems I've encountered are with voice communication. There is an outlet where you can plug in a microphone and I frequently run into problems with communicating with other players. Maybe it was my headset, but it works fine with my regular controller.

In sum, this is an excellent product and for its price, it is very much worth buying for its ease and quality of use to its durability.

We bought these for our son to play on his uncle's Xbox Rock Band game (we already own the Wii set with the full size drums). Our thought was that they would sit on the Wii drums, but they won't they will slide off. When we set them on a wooden bench to play, they work perfectly but the yellow one slides for my son (I guess the way he hits it). They do come with a thin rubber ring around the bottom edge to prevent moving, but I wish they had come with maybe a full non skid bottom to keep them in place better. Still, they work great and were totally worth it for an easy to use set of drums if you need an affordable Rock Band setup!!

The pads of this kit are very good. They register strikes perfectly. I bought them to use in a DIY kit instead of wiring up peizos and buying a midi converter, and I am very pleased so far.

Many people buy these to replace a bad/broken kit. Just apply some velcro to the back of these pads and stick them right onto your existing bad kit, and go to town.

They would be alright for schlepping your gear to a friends house or for travel, but I would not want to try and position them to play as sold.

The pedal is pretty craptastic, but will do in a pinch. The sticks are terrible. The weight is slightly off, and they will come apart or break under moderate stress. All of these problems probably result from them being 2 piece sticks, which is a bad idea to begin with.

The tips are great, though. Buy a pair of sticks that you like, with narrow tips, and stick the rubber tips from these onto them. They are still a little louder than the plastic ones, but feel good, won't fall apart and the rubber gives nice action on these pads.

These drums are actually a lot better than you would think, especially for the price. I had already been through 2 Rock Band replacement sets before I decided to try these out. After cracking the pads yet again on my third set from some intense drumming, I gave these a try. Like some other reviewers have pointed out, this set works best if you simply place the pads on top of your older RB set using velcro or some other adhesive as these have no frame. Also, you can decide to use your old Rock Band pedal with this set or the one that comes with it, whichever you prefer (I opted to use my existing steel-plate reinforced RB pedal and ditch this weird looking one).

I've had these pads for about a year now and they continue to work flawlessly, despite me beating them to death mercilessly. The drum sticks included only lasted a few hours for me before they snapped in half, so you may want to consider using something more durable in that regard.

Prior to these pads, I was never able to get 100% on any drum song (no matter the difficulty) b/c of mishits on my old set. Now I get them quite often. These pads are incredible.

Basically the set itself is great. The pads are responsive. I don't consider myself a great drummer, but I like to tear it up on expert and these drum pads deliver. Rolls on the snare or any other pad are very clean, somewhat of a relief as my RB1 drumset doesn't deliver as much. The pedal is also a wonder. I feel a lot more comfortable with this pedal than with the stock on RB1 or RB2. So the gear is good. The one flaw which a lot of people have mentioned is NO FRAME!!!!! Set-up is a drag, finding a comfortable way to play, but once you do it is awsome. The proof is in the numbers, my score on All Nightmare Long in GH: Metallica went up 200k with these drums. All in all it is worth it, just need a little patience and now you can tear it up on the road

Yes, this is an easily portable drum set that works very well, but they've made one aspect of the drums easier to deal with that in turn raises a whole slew of issues. Drums have to be set up in a somewhat specific way to be played easily so unless you have a table that's long enough to place all the pads on tall enough to comfortably play the pads on and light enough to easily move into position then you're going to have a hard time playing with these. My optimal set up involve a coffee table a CD rack and two boxes. I'f you're playing on easy or medium the comfort issue will trouble you less. If you're looking for Expert FC runs (or know what that means) you're going to have to work a little to make these work for you.

Getting them place aside, the pads themselves works very well. People have had issues with the $90 drums and right now, at less than half the price these pads are taking everything I throw at them (bearing in mind that I've only played on hard and haven't tried the more insane songs). Messing around and playing as fast as I could these pads picked up every hit. If you're looking for a budget way to play Rock Band (or Guitar Hero) drums and are willing to deal with the obvious flaws in not having a base to set the pads up on then these may be right for you.

Let me start off by saying that I was very pleased with these. They are quieter than the original drums, the sticks are great, and not once while I was using them did they miss a note. Until they broke.

Similar to another review, my red pad stopped working after a week. I returned the set and bought a replacement from a different seller. Three weeks later, dead red pad. Either I am extremely unlucky or these are very poorly made. Don't waste your time and money.

The "gamepad" included in this package is really good. It's got a really good feeling D-Pad and buttons. The cord is about 8 foot long and it's about the size of a standard NES pad (with two extra buttons, obviously). It also works on the PC. For me, this was worth the price of admission alone; the drum pads are just extras. The only problem is there are no shoulder buttons, so keep that in mind.

$10? Really? Incredible! I needed a replacement for my RB2 Drum set and I did not want to buy the whole band just to get them. As I find out, the RB2 stand alone drum sets have been discontinued, which forces you to buy a Beatles or RB2 Special edition to get the Drums. I refused to pay over $100 for just drums so I decided to give this unexpensive alternative a try. I also found that the original price for these was $60! I figured they are cheap because they have not sold well and not because thay are cheaply built. I was RIGHT! The thing I LOVE about these drums is the EXTRA bounce you get when you play them. They help you hit those drumroles with ease.
The stick are made of a heavy plastic but the tips are covered with rubber which helps mute noise and gives the bounce. I velcro the drums on top of my old RB2 drums and it works great. You will need some "crazy glue" to adhere the velcro on the rubber of the RB2 drums since they have a silicon coating that prevents a strong bond.

I also love the foot petal. It's accurate and now I can position it where my leg feels most comfortable. Even if you don't need a new set right now, get them before they are gone! Have them as a spare, but once you try them you will wonder, why didn't Harmonix build their drums this way?!