[mcguyver]

Wow where do begin? Drum machines are pure [bleep][bleep][bleep][bleep]. Lifeless machines with no variance and beyond calculated. Do you play emotionless music? Well then maybe drum machines are for you. Drum replacement software, another industry joke. I have heard some of the [bleep][bleep][bleep][bleep]tiest sounding drums in my life on those programs, the cymbals if they have any sound like garbage, and no matter how they try to gimmick the product, see natives Beatles Drums, 'recorded on a ringo Ludwig 4 piece in the same studio 2, with the same micing techniques used by beatles engineers!!!'. Give me a break.

I have heard $500 drums sound as good as $1000 drums. I've heard sets that were under 2000, mostly expensive due to finishes if you are savvy to drum pricing, that sound as good as the most expensive ayotte, OCDP, DW, pearls masterworks, all of them. It's about knowing how to tune drums, having experience with a wide range of heads. How many heads can you choose from on those electronic drum kits? 1 ply 2 ply, clear or coated? Because there's only 4 different drum heads out there...

Now that we have covered drums, not even cymbals, let's talk about mics. Microphones bring out the characteristics of instruments based on their frequency response curves. So you'd rather trade plug and play, out of the box, beyond limited when it comes to tweaking compared to real acoustic drums with a choice of microphone rather than a pre-recorded tone. No thanks. That's why we are engineers. I'm also a drummer and have been much longer than I have been an engineer. [bleep][bleep][bleep][bleep] electronic drums, ya heard?

If I was forced to use electronic drums, say for living arrangements or such, I would never use electonic cymbals. They all sound like garbage and play worse than that. So you're still left with micing real cymbals no matter what.

Unless your drummer really cares absolutely doesn't care about his tone. This is like asking a guitar player if they'd rather have an amazing amp, or play with amp modeling on stage to have so many options. Real players want to have THEIR tone. Not flip flop every which way. Even for bands that use amps they wouldn't on tour, the sounds aren so far out of reach a live rendition sounds bad, and they're also not depending on the amps sound to carry the tune. That's the musics job.