Decatoms any good?

BFD3 General Discussion
1

Are the Decatoms any good? Are they close to Octobans? The examples for the Decatoms on the site are lame.

2

Check the Benoni Studio BFD Decatom Expansion Pack - Demo
The Decatom Expansion is 10 ddrum Deccabons
Sizes 6-8-10-12-14-16-18-20-22-24…
Styles/Tunings - Cantonese,Caprice,Dance and Verb…
Aeqlian…Diminished…Pentatonic

2 Likes
3

Thanks Chaser, I’ll give them a go

4

I got the Decatoms years ago. Like you I thought they would be like Octobers, but sadly they’re not. They are indeed lame. Even with a ton of processing I can’t get them to sound decent.

There is a set of Octobans in the Superior 3 “Berlin” pack (pricey) and a much cheaper but just as good set in NI’s 80s Drummer, which is included in the last few versions of Komplete. Both also include Roto-toms too.

5

I had never dug that far into the NI drums in Komplete really. Just took a look and the Octobans do sound good, although the lowest three have a pretty noticeable metallic resonance from the stands or something. You can tell they were recorded in a hurry, because if they were taking their time at all, somebody would have gotten out the gaffer tape and taped the stands. I wouldn’t use the bottom three, which lessens the sets utility. The Octobans seem to only be available in the Chrome kit. I didn’t see the Rototoms in either the Black or the Chrome kit. Those would be cool to have. Where am I missing them?

Update: Found the rototoms. They’re in the 70’s Tight Kit.

6

My mistake - the Rototoms are in the 70s kit.

I’ve never really used any of the NI kits either, but actually some of them are better than I remembered. Not as good as BFD though, quite processed so easy for a quick fix, but I prefer separating the kit out & treating them myself in the traditional way.
I found out about the NI octobans via a thread somewhere when searching for them.

The BFD Decatoms are just too flabby & don’t have that tight snappy, punchy sound of Octobans.

1 Like
7

A little searching around on some drum forums, and it looks like that’s the actual drums and not any of BFD’s doing. There seems to be a strong consensus that the original Tama’s are the preferred drum over the Decabons and also Roto Toms.

1 Like