Alesis Drums Surge Mesh Kit - Electric Drum Set with Mesh Pads, 385 Electronic / Acoustic Drum Kit Sounds and 60 Play Along Tracks

Product Information

To start recording, press Start/Stop, or hit any pad. The Record LED will light solid. (To cancel recording instead, press Record again.) You can reassign pads and create kits on the fly. There are 40 ready-to-go drum kits right out of the box.

The responsiveness from the Surge Mesh is wonderful and even will allow you to use a double bass pedal. To play and be scored, press Start/Stop,After a count-in 9 (EXM will appear on the display) the beat, rhythm, or pattern will play once without the drum part. Play the drum part as accurately as possible. In the end, you will receive a score (SCO) based your accuracy. To improve your score, practice the beat, rhythm, or pattern without being scored (see above) and try again!

All three cymbal pads are 10-inch pads with rubber trigger zones all facing the drummer. The pads look the same, but function a little different for each cymbal. Alesis offer 40 free drum lessons with this kitfrom Melodics their software partner. Once connected, the software recognises the drum kit and will show the players performance and progress in real time. Many styles are covered and it makes learning fun. Now that being said, it is rather difficult to replicate everything you can do on an acoustic drum kit, so I’m still happy with what you get with the Alesis Surge Mesh. Why do the more expensive Roland electronic drums sound so much better, you may ask? The Surge Mesh Kit is a complete 8-piece electronic drum kit that includes everything a drummer needs to play like a pro. Not only do the mesh heads deliver unmatched response and playability, the compact size means the Surge Mesh Kit goes where larger kits can’t. This article answers popular questions about the features and functionality of the Alesis Surge Mesh kit.

Using drum VST plugins, you can get different software like Addictive Drums 2, EZ Drummer, Steven Slate Drums, or GetGood Drums. Module user guide – the built in user guide is ok, see our note below about more detailed, unofficial user guides Now don’t get me wrong. I do like a lot of products that Alesis makes, but I have never been too big on their electronic drum kits. They have always seemed very cheap to me, but I believe they are beginning to turn themselves around. For beginners, the module features a training mode for learning and even will give you a score upon finishing. It’s super helpful for getting your timing to be spot on. More expensive electronic drum kits from Roland, for example, feature mesh heads that feel much better than traditional rubber pads.The hi-hat pad is a single zone pad and works along with the included foot pedal. This isn’t the most dynamic sounding hi-hat pad to play, but it gets the job done for a budget kit. The foot pedal is a little springy but it is also smooth and functions just fine. There aren’t a lot of subtleties in the hi-hat positions on with this pad and pedal. You pretty much just get open, closed and half-open sounds. Depending on what type of drummer you are this may or may not be an issue. The dual-zone pads bring an extra element to performance and enable drummers to assign additional percussion and effects If you already own the Surge Mesh, or a similar kit, it’s very easy to expand the sounds of your drums. The Surge Drum Module equips the kit with a powerful brain that brings your playing to life. Play one of 40 drum kits (24 presets and 16 user kits) that feature 385 individual sounds that can be custom-assigned to any pad trigger or cymbal.

Connectors: (1) 25-pin cable input (9-trigger cable snake) (1) 1/8” (3.5 mm) stereo output (headphones) (1) 1/8” (3.5 mm) stereo input (auxiliary) (2) 1/4” (6.35 mm) trigger inputs (Tom 4 & Crash 2) (2) 1/4” (6.35 mm) outputs (main left & right) (1) 5-pin MIDI input (1) 5-pin MIDI output (1) USB Type-B port To practice without being scored, press Play/Practice( PRAwill appear on the display) After a count-in, the beat, rhythm, or pattern will repeat so you can practice it. The Alesis Surge Mesh Kit features 40 total kits. There are 24 preset kits and 16 user kits available. There are some more detailed settings available for the individual voices and drum sounds. You can edit the volume, panning and pitch of each sound on the drum kit. You can also adjust the amount of reverb individually for each drum sound. So, for example if you want a good amount of reverb on the snare but not on the toms, you can do that. You can also adjust the MIDI number for each pad, which is helpful if you are connecting to a computer and need to edit MIDI numbers to match up with drumming software.

Warranty and Support

Despite the Alesis Surge Mesh having incredible velocity recognition for playing quiet and loud dynamics, they dropped the ball in one area: the samples.

The Surge drum module allows you to edit some overall kit characteristic as well as individual sounds. This allows you to do a little bit of sound editing and craft the sound of the kits to your liking. SUMMARY: If you have access to a PC/Mac and BFD, GarageBand, Logic Pro, EZDrummer, or some other drumming software, then the Alesis Surge can be a very good kit. If you are on a tight budget and need serviceable sounds right out of the box, then you are going to be better served by the Simmons Titan 50. This means, that you’re getting a different sample of the same drum when you tap the drum near the rim versus hitting it hard in the center. I believe the Alesis kit uses the exact same sample across all dynamic ranges; it just changes the volume rather than the actual sample.I think it’s hard for people to grasp this concept, but this is exactly why this kit sounds like a machine gun to me. BUT, this isn’t a deal-breaker. It has come to my attention that I was originally a little bit too harsh on the Surge Mesh. Having realized what great value lies in this kit, I have updated the review. Alesis is a fantastic company that makes everything from keytars, to MIDI controllers, to electronic drum sets, at an affordable cost. Overall this is a solid budget e-drumkit for beginners + you get a solid VST that is plug and play - already programmed for this alesis kit.