Alesis Nitro - Electric Drum Kit with Quiet Mesh Pads, USB MIDI, Kick Pedal and Rubber Kick Drum, 40 Kits, 385 Sounds, Drum Lessons

Back in the day, people used to say that something fun was "the most fun you can have with your clothes on". It was a bit of a naff saying but it did the rounds for a long time. Well, drumming might just be that fully-dressed frolic that works for me! I laugh out aloud whether I'm getting something right or hilariously wrong, and its invigorating and rewarding at the same time. This kit covers just about all that I want to achieve. I was getting it to replace the old Octapad II that I still have. That was getting a bit unreliable and I just wanted to trigger drum sounds elsewhere, but to my surprise, actually playing and learning new tricks has proven to be pretty engaging and exciting. It's hard to assemble, and heavy too once it starts coming together (well, it has to be). The instructions are okay, but not overwhelming. We really need another picture for a little Ikea-man lying on the floor throwing a tantrum when putting one of these together. It's kinda exciting to see it taking shape, though. The instructions are a bit fuzzy on things like orientation of parts - is this crossbar the right way up, or upside down? Getting the kit assembled is partly instruction and partly inspiration. Once it is set up, the fun begins. The module (brain) controls everything except your playing, and has a bunch of demo tune for playing along to, with drum parts that can be switched on or off as required. You can also choose other kits (sounds) to play or concoct your own kit from the various sampled sounds, mixing bass drum with snare from another kit, and cymbals from yet another one, and so on. There are practice functions to improve your timing and accuracy in other regards as well, and switching on the metronome while playing along to a demo tune will also invoke the function that watches your timing. You can even play music from your phone or some other device and drum along to that. I record music and have made drumless versions of my own music to play along to. It might also be possible to find such tunes online, by bigger rockstars than me! You can also play drums into a DAW (USB-midi) and assign the hits to different drum sounds, meaning that you can add your own playing to any demo tracks you are recording and also change the sounds as you go. It's a beginner kit in many ways. The drums are all single-zone but for the snare, which has two. This means that the sounds are less changeable by techniques such as where you strike the drum, although they are obviously velocity-sensitive and you get a lot of nuance that way. You have to move up to another kit to get that feature. You can add another tomtom and another cymbal to this kit using the two spare inputs on the brain module. I've not become an expert with this one yet, but who knows, one day I might do a whole-bar fill that goes around the kit and miss that final drum and cymbal. It's comprehensive enough for a long time musician getting into drumming, there's a lot to learn. Build quality is "sturdy". It needs to be! It's heavy as a large boulder but things like the bass drum pedal, while fantastic and just like a proper one, are so light that they will creep across the floor as you play the bass drum, eventually ending up out of reach! So you really need to look at getting a backstop for wandering pedals. The hi-hat pedal doesnt have the same wanderlust. It's not so bad. Playing acoustically is hilarious, just a collection of weird bumps and binks and bops as you hit the pieces, so headphones or an external amp are the way to go. I've used a guitar combo to good effect, although you really have to do some serious equalising of the sound to get something acceptable. Headphones is great too, and with other people in the house perhaps it's the only polite option. Playig upstairs on a wooden floor would be antisocial either way, so use a good drum mat or something to deaden the bumps if you are in that situation. As a 60-something just getting started, this is great fun, and with great fun comes great progress. I'm now confident that I could amaze someone with my drumming (unless they were also a drummer) and was at that level after about 2 months of playing an hour or so each day. I've come to a plateau in my progress and now need to look into specific things, most importantly trying to get my right foot (bass drum) to stop following my right hand (hi-hat cymbal) when I change the rhythm on one or the other. This "rewiring" of the brain is a common obstable that is only overcome with practice, and this kit provides more than enough fun to keep me going while I figure that de-coupling skill out. It's not for everybody. If you're easily discouraged then it really doesn't matter how great a drumkit is, you probably wouldn't stick with it anyway, but if you're even moderately ambitious and open about having to learn and improve, this is a real blast. I doubt I'll ever regret buying this kit and using it to "upskill" myself in music. There's also nothing quite as satisfying as now having demo tracks on which I really did play every last instrument myself! No drum machines, no pre-recorded tracks slipped in, just my own work. Enjoy!

Great quality entry e-drum kit. As someone that has played drums for many years I would say this is a great priced entry level kit. The kit can also be expanded on if you want a more advanced kit as you get better at the instrument. All mesh heads are responsive and have a real drum feel, which would be good enough is practicing for exams or pieces. There is a lot better drum sound quality if you are able to plug into a DAW such as GarageBand, then you can alter the sound you want. Also very handy if you’re looking to record but I have noticed some lag when doing this. All in all I would recommend this kit until you’re ready to take a step up.

I've returned to drumming after a break of several years. I'm no pro, but I'm not a novice either (about a scratchy grade 5 I'd guess). The good points:- Amazing value for money! My last kit was a £2k Yamaha DTX affair and whilst the built quality isn't in the same league, the feel is possibly better on this kit. The mesh heads work great, giving it a pretty convincing 'real' feel. It doesn't take up a huge amount of space The not so good:- The frame a little on the short side for a 6-foot drummer. With my stool at the right height for working the pedals I find there's not enough adjustment to get the snare up to a comfortable height. A driveway monoblock under each leg solves the problem (until I can think of something better) but doesn't look so hot. If the frame legs had been just another 2-3 inches longer it would have been perfect. The module isn't that intuitive and the instructions are pretty brief. Having said that, I think that's a common trait with all manufacturers modules, although Yamaha manuals tend to be huge. Some of the pre-set kits are badly balanced. By that I mean that (for example) the sound of the closed hi-hat can drown out the sound triggered by the snare. You can balance it out yourself, so not a biggie, but please bear in mind my previous gripe. I found that non of the pre-set kits were particularly good. They all seem to have 1 or 2 elements that don't quite match the rest of that particular kit. A bit of re-assigning sorts that out as there's plenty of choice but, again, that takes reading manuals and working things out when all you really want to do is build it and play it. The lead for the snare is way too short, so there's no chance of it neatly following the frame and has to dangle instead. All in all though it really is a fabulous kit which I'd 100% recommend. I've had the kit for a month now and all these niggles I've got are just that - niggles. At this price point you will not get better.

I love this kit! It takes a while to get setup properly, with all the cables in all the right places, and - if you're like me, the wiring nice and tidy, and there are a lot of wires! It works seamlessly on it's own, best to get a cheapo headphone amplifier if you plan to use it outside of the PC. I have it hooked up via MIDI to my PC and it maps to Rock Band and Guitar Hero without any problem, (look it up on t'internet). I also have it mapped into GarageBand on iOS via MIDI. While there are 3 toms as standard, with only 1 input, all are dual input capable if you do a bit of rewiring of the cable harness - which effectively gives you an additional 3 inputs that you can rig to anything you like - extra cymbals, a cowbell etc.... even claps - there are hundreds of sounds built in that you can map to any input. It's a hugely versatile kit, got me into drumming, there is plenty of free software out there like Clone Hero and Pardiddle - it even works with some Oculus Quest games and work with it out of the box, just plug in the MIDI cable, map the drums and you are away to everything from Eye of the Tiger to We Will Rock You and Iron Maiden! It's so addictive being able to drum along with your favourite songs, I lose hours on it, it has mesh pads that are pretty quiet unless you are in the same room! But the only real noise you'll make to annoy the neighbours, (if you have headphones on) is you screaming along to AC/DC! Highly recommended for any music fan - I also play Bass, Guitar and a bit of keyboards, and this is my favourite bit of kit :-) A good workout too - when did you last see a fat drummer? T

Just received this and started having fun practicing right away. In a nutshell great value for money, if you just need to practice in between studio sessions. Thanks and credit to to user Jaz, whose detailed review helped me chose this kit. The delivery was fast and assembly was pretty easy. Material felt a bit flimsy but sturdy enough once all screw are tightened. If you are used to acoustic kits, this one will take some adjusting at first. The snare drums is awkwardly positioned and very small. 1 times out of three I'm hitting the rim. The low and high time are a good size but the floor tom is also awkwardly positioned and too small. The hit hat needs to be tightened as another user noted - it tends to move away otherwise. The kick pad is of decent quality and easy to use. The hi-hat however is a big low point with very little realism to the real thing so you would need to keep that in mind when learning. Sound is loud enough - beware to not go too loud lest you destroy your ears. Easy to find how to use external source sound to practice. All in all for the budget I am pretty happy so far. It's of a better quality than anticipated though I would like a better snare drums on this one .

First electronic kit for me after many years of not playing due to acoustic kit being too loud in the house. I have taken to the mesh heads very well (still fiddling with the tension on the snare but you can do a decent drum roll on it). The rim shot on the snare is also brilliant and gives you a great realistic variety of snare sounds while playing. I bought an extra non branded crash cymbal quite cheap that looks and plays the same as the supplied Alesis ones that works well and has it's own sound on all the kits in the module. The range of kits on the module is adequate and you can customise each one and store to your own bank number. Slightly disappointing range of percussion sounds but realistically when would I use them other than for my own entertainment (remember everyone used to go straight to the helicopter sound on a synth keyboard). Hi- hat pedal a little bit flimsy and quite hard to get to the "slightly open" hi-hat range on the pedal, but there is always the option to replace this with a proper hi-hat module with stand and pedal (and presumably you can re-use the pad for another crash). Kick pedal quality is good enough, but you can use your own anyway. Don't forget the drum stool - this version doesn't come with one, and use your own sticks (nylon tips work well). So far, so good - would highly recommend.

Bought from Amazon Warehouse as 'like new' with the 30% off and when it arrived it was brand new and unopened which was great news!! After a bit of a struggle to get it assembled - the instructions are next to useless - everything was going well.. Unfortunately the terminal which came with mine was faulty. When i first connected headphones it was extremely quiet and then the static/crackling/white noise started. if i unplugged the headphones slightly it was so much louder, which was great but i still got the crackling and static, but strangely only seemed to start after around 5/10 mins but then it was unplayable.. really frustrating as the kit is actually pretty good!. As Amazon did not have a 'like new' replacement they credited me £50 back to try and resolve myself. I got in contact with Alesis support in UK (waiting times on the phone can be upto 20 mins) who i must say were great but i did have recommend a few thing to them rather them advising me but not a problem. I did as much testing as possible and asked if they could send me a replacement Power Supply, which they did for free with next day delivery but unfortunately this didn't fix the issue so i've just purchased a replacement terminal as it was faulty. Trade price was £135 but they managed to sell for £100 - so paid £50 more - but all in all a good price for the full kit and now i get the 12m warranty on the terminal which is a bonus as i may need it! I also paid for melodics app and its really good.. well worth the investment (although costly) and you can get 20% off with 'HIPHOP-20' - however with the first terminal it just kept losing connection to PC so again was unplayable. With this new one everything is great and played for an hour or so tonight with no issues! (If i hadn't spent so much time on testing everything and buying replacement cables and then having to pay an extra £50 for new terminal i would have given 5 stars but there you go)

Ok, quality