Alesis SR-18 Standalone Drum Machine

Finally!!!!! The drum machine I've been looking for!!! If you want access to a plethora of great drum sounds, and the ability to program either simple or complex drum patterns and stitch them together to make great songs then this is the machine for you.Looking forward to using this in a live situation.What a relief!!!!!!P.S. One using this as a portable machine, it doesn't so much take batteries as EATS them!!!! I think I've barely got 60 minutes out of a full set of new batteries. This is a bit of a pain, but still a great unit. Just trying to map it onto my FL Studio DAW next!

Had one for at least 10 years. Fantastic old school drums. Connected to a BOSS A/B trigger pedal and it's the business. Stop/start and drum rolls! Just tried midi out into Cubase 14 and the possibilities are endless! Thoroughly recommended. Def one for people who don't want disco/trance synth drum machines(which most others seem to be!)

SR16 or SR18, Trying to decide?I’m a guitarist, but I wanted a drum machine, I don’t know why, but I did. I’ve a Beatbuddy Mini 2 which gets mixed reviews, but which I find exceedingly fun pedal to play along to at home, but I wanted something with midi and more programable.I bought both the SR16 and SR18 to compare. Here are my first impressions for anyone trying to decide between the two, I hope it helps.They both have impressive (yet retro) drum sounds, very usable and recordable with a little tweaking. They both have a learning curve, luckily, Alesis have good manuals included in the box. Side by side, the differences are notable.Sizewise, the SR16 is smaller, but not by much, the SR18 seems more ‘professional’ in build quality, though both of these units have a reputation for being very reliable. The keys are bigger, more tactile (and have a nice ‘zx spectrum’ rubber vibe!) I found the SR16 to be a little hit-and-miss when tying to 'tap' at the relative pressures, both are velocity sensitive, but the SR18s are a lot easier to use for input. Also, the spin wheel is better and the layout is less cramped, that little extra real estate is put to good use. It’s not perfect, but the revisions make it easier and more rewarding to use. The unlit display on the SR16 is a huge oversight and should have been corrected even if it meant adding another to the price. I can’t imagine using it on a dim stage... at all. The SR18’s display is limited by modern standards, but is large, well lit and easy to read at a glance.Drum sounds are personal taste, both machines included some good kits. The SR18 adds ‘play along bass’ which can be turned off. For some reason, only the SR18 can run truly portable (6x AA batteries) which seems another cost-cut too far for the SR16. A design choice as strange as omitting a backlight for something so portable.I would have loved to see the keys backlit on both models or at least the more essential ones ‘bordered’ with a glow to aid navigation, it seems a standard these days on other equipment, even at this price point.Your mileage may vary of course, but as soon as I took the SR18 out of the box, I knew the little brother SR16 was going back to meet its maker. It's not a bad machine - at all! But you can see where the extra money went, the SR18 is more suitable if you want to break out of the bedroom and perform live, and I'm sure many solo and duo acts are using it, as you are reading this overview. Which must be a recommendation, of sorts .SR16 / Three StarsSR18 / Four Stars

I seen many reviews complaing about the bass lines that play along with each preset that it couldn't be turned off clearly didn't bother to read the manual .. press and hold mute then press bass and same for percussion . This machine is incredibly flexible easy to programme and has the bonus of being able to program actual bass lines in for full songs . Perfect for what I needed I would give it six stars azing value for money

This drum machine is outstanding value. Inside the ususal Amazon packaging the unit was well presented and well packed. As well as the power adaptor there was a quick start guide a few pages long which explained everything clearly, and was written in perfect English. There was also a 58 page reference manual, all of it again in perfect English, which explained evrything in much more detail, and finally an A4 sheet listing all the patterns, drum kits etc. It was simple to get to grips with and sounds great. I own four drum machines. This one was the least expensive, and even though I only got it yesterday, it's already my favourite. A good buy.

A really useful drum machine for entertaining/busking which I will use often; especially for my home studio.

This drum machine has a great sound and is well made with clear instructions. Lots of good presets drum patterns and plenty of scope to create your own patterns, songs and save them. I'm impressed.

The sounds are good but it's difficult to program user patterns and adjust things. The sounds are very good though and the presets patterns are pretty decent.

Very useful for composing song. I got it for special price at Amazon .

Cette drum machine est très bien!Les sons sont très bons.Il y a pas mal de bon rythmes.La programmation est différente des drums machines actuelles, mais ellefait son travail.Pour moi, c'est un bon achat.

The Alesis SR18 Drum Machine is amazing. I have had many problems with every computer based drum machine program. It's not that they didn't work right, but the fact that they just weren't for me. I am very good with computers, do photography editing, and music editing, etc, all on the few computers I own. As far as doing drums on my computer, It just wasn't clicking. Everyone has to find their path of least resistance, and THEIR best method for doing things, since everybody is different and everyone has their own path of least resistance. Hence, to each, their own. What works best and is the easiest for one person, may be the most complicated for the other. What is most complicated for you, may be the easiest for the other person.Basically what I am saying is this drum machine, once in my hands, really clicked. This was MY path of least resistance. It's good to know I can sit down with this machine, and only this machine, and make full drum tracks. As far as some people saying this is so hard to use, or takes a couple months, for me it took two days. Hence, 6 one way, half dozen the other. The first day I just messed with it, without directions. It was confusing. The second day, I read the directions, and by the end of the second day, I had already made three full length drum tracks, doing everything from customizing my entire drum set and sounds, making a bunch of patterns, and then piecing all those patterns together to make tracks.Ok, so now for what it can do:* I saw one review where they said you cannot change the length of the patterns. This is not true. You CAN indeed change the length of the patterns. You can use whatever tempo you want, 120, 140, whatever, and you can make the patterns 4 beats long, or 8, or 16, etc.* You can customize your own drum setup, so you have have a couple bass, etc. Rule of thumb if you are trying to re-create double bass, is to make two sounds, almost identical, BUT make the second sound a little different tonewise. Because in real life, you can tell the difference between both bass drums. This makes it sound more realistic.* There are a TON of different sound variations for every kind of drum sound you want.* You can tweak each individual sound. For instance, if I find a crash I like, but think to myself that I want it to sound softer, offset it to the right a little, change the pitch to a slightly lower pitch, and also make it ring on longer, ALL of this is possible.* Learning this machine really is not that hard. Can be done within a good weekend.All in all, this machine is amazing. I am a heavy metal guitarist, and I record my own tracks on a Tascam DP-02, and this works great in conjunction with that. This machine works very well with the metal genre, or rock, or any genre at all. It lets me put together full length tracks (from all of my combined patterns I made), does very very well using it in a double bass aspect (you can program the bass to sound like double bass, and as fast as you want), and you end up with very realistic sounding drum tracks! Since I play metal, this is VERY important, since it's hard to find a good drum machine that can go with the metal genre. Last, all I have to do is plug it into my Tascam recorder, and record! Love it! This sounds amazing!The one and ONLY downside to this is the fact that there is NO connection to connect it to your computer. I want to make this clear. There is a way to hook up through your instrument cable connections, but then I'm not sure how this hooks to your computer through a 1/4" cable connection. But all I have to do is record them into my Tascam, then send them to my computer, where I can save them for later.Hope this helps, and sorry about rambling. Any questions, feel free to comment and I will surely answer them for you the best I can, to help out.

One of the best things I ever bought. Sounds great on my multitrack recordings and makes playing by myself a lot more fun when hooking it up to my amp's auxilliary input.Although many of the patterns aren't usable to me (hiphop or salsa crap), I've found that playing to some of the funk or industrial and other patterns has helped my lead guitar skills as it forces me to adapt and play things in ways that are different from what I usually play so it has also become a learning tool to me.After 3 or 4 weeks of using it, I feel I haven't even scratched the surface of its possibilities as I haven't even got into programming beats yet but the addition of a footswitch ( https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B00U2Q8YU0/ref=cm_sw_r_taa_aXODybBFCJ70Y ) allowing me to switch from pattern A to pattern B during a song makes it a lot of fun.

L'Alesis SR 18 è ben nota a tutti per le sue caratteristiche tecniche e per le sue doti esecutive e di portabilità. Lo strumento mi è arrivato con un leggero ritardo rispetto ai tempi previsti di consegna, poiché un disguido non ben definito sull'assegnazione dell'indirizzo di destinazione ha comportato la rispedizione dell'oggetto dopo che la prima transazione non è andata a buon fine. In pratica, partita la seconda spedizione, che ha impiegato pochissimi giorni, in totale ho atteso circa un mese per avere l'oggetto a disposizione.L'imballo è risultato all'altezza del viaggio che ha dovuto coprire, dalla Germania all'Italia e quando l'ho ritirato non presentava tracce di danneggiamento alcuno, segno di una certa cura nel maneggiare le merci da parte del Corriere, che non sempre è così.Messo in funzione, ho potuto apprezzare le effettive doti di flessibilità circa la sua potenza di programmazione.Il suono degli strumenti a percussione ivi registrati è molto realistico, incisivo e presente nei dettagli agli estremi di frequenza: bassi potenti e acuti cristallini. Sebbene non abbia ancora provato la modifica della programmazione della linea di accompagnamento del basso, mi è apparsa estremamente utile l'opzione di poterla escludere dall'esecuzione dei pattern di batteria per avere solo ed esclusivamente il suono della ritmica senza arpeggio. Ottima la possibilità di connessione dell'apparecchio con il mondo esterno, con molte prese disponibili; molto importante la ovvia presenza delle porte MIDI in e out che voglio sfruttare per unire l'SR18 con il registratore multitraccia TASCAM DP 32. Ottime le connessioni con i comandi a pedale. Un piccolo appunto sulla uscita cuffia che non mi ha pienamente convinto, poiché per udire un suono ad un volume adeguatamente sufficiente per effettuare un buon setup dei pattern o semplicemente per suonarci sopra con una chitarra o altro, si deve ruotare la manopola quasi a fine corsa. Pur trattandosi di gusti unicamente personali, suggerisco per questo l'uso di cuffie chiuse, molto isolanti e possibilmente con elevata efficienza sonora. Da evitare gli auricolari da telefonino e similari che potrebbero distorcere ai passaggi più forti di batteria. Insomma, un apparecchio che raccomando senza problemi, ad un prezzo molto conveniente per tutto ciò che è in grado di offrire. E guardate, prima di arrivare a trovare la fine, il suo pozzo di risorse è veramente molto profondo. Buon lavoro a tutti !!