MOTM

My roommate recommends:

* Alesis D4.  He found his used for $125.  It's worth that much solely for
the trigger->MIDI conversion, if you are interested in triggering drum
sounds with either drum pads or analog sequencers.  (He built an excellent
set of trigger pads from instructions available on the net, for under
$100; email me and I can find the reference, although in this group, it
may be enough to say that it involves Remo practice pads, coffee can lids,
and disassembled Radio Shack piezo buzzers.)  The D4 contains the same
soundset found in the SR16 stand-alone drum machine ... `serviceable'
might be the best way to describe it.

* E-mu Procussion.  This is the drum module member of the Morpheus/Proteus
series.  Very large, nice sounding sample set, _very_ flexible synthesis
architecture (for a ROMpler I mean).  We both think it sounds better than
any machine with pads on it.  I forget how much he paid for it used.  But
it wasn't cheap, and it's MIDI only.

Not recommended is the Alesis DM5, because he found the trigger inputs
worked much less reliably than the D4's with his pads, and DMPro, because
it costs too much.  Also not recommended is any Roland product from after
1993.  :)

ObMOTM: I would _definitely_ go for a couple VCOs that offered
through-zero FM in exchange for some loss of precision (as long as Paul
could still sleep at night), were such a module to be offered.

peace,
Chris Jeris