So, I tested the FGDP-30 real quick and pad wise it seems more or less the same. Also the built in sounds seem to be the same.
I also compared the FGDP-50 to my Machine Micro and Maschine mk3 (big one).
I used them as a midi controller to control Addictive drums and with the Mikro I found it hard to pick which one I liked best. With the big Maschine as I mentioned before the “Moeller technique” stuff went indeed a little better. Very soft, subtle things seem to be lacking from the FGDP-50 but it was sort of on par with the Mikro mk3 which surprised me.
I also came up with a layout on the FGDP-50 that uses the right most pad on the extra row. If you use that as a cymbal, you can get the rest of. the layout very close to the traditional QFG layout. With an extra ride pad on the left!
I also like to have the ride a little higher up plus I also want the side stick under my ring fingers just because I’m used to it (and I made a lot of cool drum performances that do use this).
I have just re-watched your video on setup and with this device you could really make it much easier for people to get started on finger drumming. If you export your layout as “One Trigger” as a .bin file, I guess it should be easy to load on a stick and load your setup on the device.
Btw. does your kick pad have the same sensitivity as the other pads? Do your units give you accidental double triggers from time to time? With my unit, i can also “move” all the pads vertically up and down a little bit (there’s some wiggle room vertically, but not horizontally). The pads do not seem completely fixed to their place internally. Maybe that’s a problem with my unit?
Btw. I just tried the built-in audio interface with the Yamaha ASIO driver and I was able to get decent enough latency (with 44.1khz and 96 samples). It seems to run stable with low latency on both my PC and my Laptop.
That’s really nice, because now I don’t need an external audio interface and can just start Addictive Drums 2 Standalone (or similar) on my laptop and start playing, either via Headphones or the internal speaker.
There’s an option to disable the inbuilt sounds, it’s a bit hard to find: Menu → Utility → LocalControl → Off
Thanks (Fannon, Robert) for sharing your expirience with the FGDP! I still have many questions, but I think the answers will not affect on my decision. The key points were highlighted.
I own Launchpad X. Then I start to play difficult and pretty fast composition I get confused in this small RGB identical squares). Even after months of practice. I was thinking is it better to have different shape pads of FGDP… Or may be try 16 big pads controller… Quest for gear)
For now I rearrange my Launchpad layout (which was based on QFG recommendations, Thanks!) to match my future FGDP layout. And then, after I switch to FGDP I can answer to myself: is it more convenient then Launchpad.
Hi! My name is Thomas, and I am new to finger drumming. In fact, a video about the FGDP devices got me interested, and after some research I found QFG and some days later I ordered the FGDP-50. Recently my unit arrived, and here are my first impressions.
It works under Linux out of the box. Midi in and Midi out work fine. I noticed, that the FGDP sends clock events all the time, I do not need this feature at the moment, but I did not find an option to turn this off.
I can set the FGDP-50 as my Audio-Interface (using Jack). Audio Input and Output work. But there is a problem: If I play some tracks during recording from the FGDP, the audio output to the FGDP is echoed back as input (with very low volume, but still audible). This is not a problem for me, since I can use my main interface for jack, and add the FGDP as another audio source if i want to record audio.
First I thought that the kick pad is less sensitive than other pads, but I don’t think this any longer. I tried to measure the sensitivity using weights but could not get a clear result. I now believe that the reason for my first impression was that the default kick-sounds are low in volume (the small speaker may be a reason). If I use the FGDP as a controller, I get louder kick sounds from my Monitors, and I don’t have the impression of less sensitivity.
At the moment I just explore the FGDP (lots of strange sounds ), and start with the first beginner grooves.
In summary, I can say that I have a lot of fun with the FGDP. I am already curious how my finger drumming journey continues.
Hey welcome! I just wanted to quickly touch on this and say I agree. I’ve been playing with the dubstep sounds and the beatbox stuff. Also the percussion kits are a lot of fun. And the Japanese kit has this weird sound where some Japanese man says “wayooooo”. These devices have this fun aspect that a children’s toy keyboard has. Just weird fun things to play with, while also being a pretty decent controller over all.
I can see myself “spicing up” a song I’m working on in the future by going through the weird onboard sounds on this device and adding some sauce that way.
Thanks for checking this! Nice idea using weights to verify, have to try that as well.
Yes, the kick velocity settings of some default kits are really weird. It’s like Velocity 1 = 1% of Volume. This is not how acoustic instruments respond at all. There’s only a limited volume difference, but instead velocity also increases the high-end / brightness of the sound.
For the kick pad on the stock kits, I set the velocity curve to “Offset 3” or something like that.
Hi guys, hi Robert! I’m completely new to finger drumming. Do you think this instrument is good for learning? From your descriptions, only the arrangement of pads worries me. Robert, isn’t this an obstacle to your courses? I really care about the independence of the instrument, I thought about the SP-404 but the pads there are probably too small. What do you think? Thanks for your help
Yes if you’re completely new and you want to easily copy what I’m doing on video for example you will run into problems because some moves will be different. Especially with fills on the toms.
This is not a huge deal once you’re familiar with finger drumming. I could easily switch to the FGDP devices and get some good sounding drums out of them but I can imagine that while you still need a lot of hand holding it might become a bit of an obstacle in the beginning.
As soon as. you can come up with your own drum parts a little bit the FGDP devices will serve you well. Keep in mind I have diagrams that are basically like sheet music. You can read which sounds to play instead of which pads to hit (that’s would be the top down view only, which can be turned off).
So there’s a lot of compatibility but for an absolute beginner it will be an extra hurdle in terms of learning QFG material.
That said, for a beginner there’s also one less hurdle which is drumming standalone with built in sounds
I personally didn’t have issues making the mental switch from the QFG 4x4 layout to the FGDP Layout. Mentally, they are already very close and my impression is that the playing style that is teached here fits very well for it.
But I did start with traditional pads, so I cannot really tell you how it would have been if I started from scratch with FGDP.
One thing where I think that it is definately an advantage: You can just play the FGDP anytime and anywhere, no hurdles to set something up, first. I think this helps when getting started, to just get used to playing an instrument and if it’s just a few minutes here and there when there’s some gap in your time.
Hi there,
Old-new user here (practiced 1 year with Rob 3 years ago, back to it since a few weeks).
I got a FGDP-30 couple of weeks ago.
I second what was said above, especially about the pads: the A/D gain is set by default on 45/127 I think, which is far to be the most sensitive setting. A bit surprising Yamaha went for such a low default value.
Anyway!
I found that a setup between 60 and 80 often gives me the best balance.
It’s still not a perfect feeling (even my MPD218 feel more comfortable / sensitive, somehow), but it’s still very playable. Enough for a student I believe. If you get to groove with a FGDP man, you probably nailed it and will be really easy on “better” pads.
the 30 is really a bliss for the students we are. I would actually recommend it over the 50 for pure practice. It goes straight to the point and PUSHES TO PRACTICE. No extra pads, no “diversion” with samples etc.
I see the 30 as the practice buddy (totally un-adapted to live play because of the voice menu) and the 50 as the live performance tool.
It’s a game changer in terms of approach, still.
It’s always nearby, only 1 button to push to be ready to play. Cigarette break on the balcony? It’s on my knees and I can practice 5mn. With my cigarette consumption it’s close to 1hour per day already xD
And at the end of the day I do a “real” more focused 0.5-1h practice session hehe.
I mean… it’s awesome.
It’s gonna follow me everywhere: in business trips when I’m alone in the hotel, on vacations, week ends etc.
The battery holds pretty well (I would say close to 10h?) so far too and charges real fast (1h-ish full charge here), the integrated metronome and speaker are just so convenient too ! We don’t give a damn about bass response, there are a lot of kicks in the machine that bang this little speaker nicely and is more than enough to get a good feeling of what you’re practicing.
I use it all the time except late night of course.
And finally, the layout is really nice.
Fully compatible with Rob’s “3-finger technic” (as Yamaha calls it) but can also be re-mapped at will to fine tune the placement if we want to use different technic like full hands independence. I’m just working on the placement of the sounds (almost final now) to tailor it to my needs and the “fingers technics” to get used to these placements but it goes pretty fast as a lot of combinations are pretty natural.
I also switch some times to my MPD218+AD2 combo to get different feelings and not be stuck with only the FGDP as 4x4 pad controller remain the most common layout. But I’m under the impression that Yamaha layout is really well thought and way more intuitive / easy to practice in the end…
That said, the menu system of the 30 is really old fashioned and kind of tedious but now that I fine-tuned 1 kit to my needs (sounds, responses, choke groups etc) I have a decent set. I could probably do more kits way faster now that I’m more used to this menu but well… the 50 is probably way more comfortable on that side.
Thank you for your help. I decided to buy FGDP. I’m still not sure about the layout but what you write convinced me. The main argument in my decision was that during trips without connecting to the computer I would be able to practice, and that the layout of the pads is not critical. I hope that the purchase will come soon. When I start the course, it will turn out whether I decided to do it right:) Thanks again!
My pleasure
Buy it at a store where you can return it within a month eventually. Should be enough to assess if it fits your needs
The layout really not a problem, rather an advantage as I see it. This is why I re-switch to 4x4 controller regularly make sure my finger technics are working on both.
Note: I’m using mixed finger drumming method. Essentially hands independance and sometimes Rob’s alternating hands. So I had to make some adjustments of FGDP layout and pay special attention to the way I play each instrument so that they remain “compatible”.
But if you do alternating hands only, the default layout of FGDP is perfect.
Hi Rob
I’m new here , just joined , was looking at the manuals for this thing and it seems there is very little on midi implementation just one rather obscure document. Looks like it’s pads are fixed regarding what notes it plays, which kinda sucks with no reference to midi channels, velocities etc. Hope your review might clear all this up as I am interested in it . It looks promising , the pads seem very sensitive etc.Just bought the xjam as per your recommendation and it is excellent , how midi controllers should be done .
I do not think that the MIDI messages are fixed. See this page of the manual: FGDP-50 User Guide under “MIDI related settings”.
But the user guide is not easy to understand (at least for me).
You can indeed change the midi notes. At least on the FGDP-50. On the 30 it might also be possible but since it lacks a screen I do feel like you’re in for a rough ride trying to modify that thing too much.
There does not seem to be software with which you can quickly configure the devices if you connect them to your computer. That would be a great next step.
), and start with the first beginner grooves.