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Average rating:
3.9 out of 5
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I like my SR-16 very much, but would like it much, much more if Alesis put on it four important features : tempo-change, metronome-out, earphones output and expansion slots. I triggered it from my sequencer as a standalone module only. The sounds are great, some thunderous kicks and snares, and a good colection of hi-hats, crashes and cymballs. I consider it ok for my new-age style.
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I have had mine for three years. There may be better out there, but the Sr-16 is STILL the hottest seller, after 13 years in production with virtually no upgrades. Know what I like about it? The kickin' bass drum and very tight patterns. I put it through a pair of the passive Mackies and it just rocks the house, inside or out! Yes, there are several totally useless patterns on it, but I have found a useful pattern for virtually every one of my songs. And yes, there is too much reverb on some of the patterns, but again, it is so simple to use right out of the box, I'm not going to quibble about this issue. I have programmed nothing on it from day one, and don't even midi it. I would strongly suggest the start-stop floorswitch, and it is much more interesting to do the A/B/fill changes by pedal also. This is a steal on eBay now, so if you want something you can use right out of the box, I recommed it.
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The sr-16 has one feature that blows comparably priced units away. Midi out. Many of the similarly priced units do not have midi out, only in. So you can't use them to sequence and trigger a sampler. If you have a stand alone sampler and no sequencing or triggering capabilities, this could be a cheap way to address your needs. d
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The SR-16 is garbage and I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy. I couldn't figure out how to program it to save my life. The drum sounds are stale, and most of them have bad reverb effects on them, which you can't remove or edit out. The presets are frankly only marginally better than the Yamaha DD-5 that I use as a metronome when I practice. I finally gave up on trying to program it and tried to use it by tapping on the pads, but the pads are stiff. Of course it doesn't help that the pads are "velocity-sensitive" as well, so when you hit the pads hard enough to make them work, the resultant sound is too loud to use. This is a piece of garbage. If you still want one, go to Ebay and see how many people are trying to unload these things. And then DON'T BUY ONE. I personally would rather use a Baldwin Tempo-Matic than deal with this thing ever again.
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Just like all Alesis drum machines - if you like loads of boring, uninspiring and pretty realistic rock drums then this is the one for you. Electronic and experimental musicians go elsewhere. (Checkout the extremely bad Techno 1-3 preset patterns for a good laugh !! What the hell were the programmer thinking about ?!)
The most sold drum machine ever. Released more than 10 years ago. (And can you believe it - Alesis still makes them.)
I bought it by mail order in the early 90's mainly due to economical resons. (Cheaper than the Boss DR-660.) I remember I was quite dissapointed when I heard the drum sounds.
Compared with todays drum machines (and samplers) it's totally dated. Still used though. Frequently heard in various commercials.
233x 16 bit samples. Most of them sound clean and are noise free. Several drums are sampled with effects, low quality reverbs. Ok user interface and sequencer. Real and step time programmable with quantizing. 16 voices polophony. Sound stacking capabilities via midi.
Main cons are, Common, Recognizable samples, Very few electronic drums, Bad and few hats, Bad, hard pressure drum pads, Limited editing possibilities, No headphones connector.
Main pros are, Can be found very cheap in the used markets, Separate audio outputs, Easy to use.
Summary, The SR-16 is suitable for "half decent home studio rock demo" purposes only. It has some acceptable and useful BDs and SDs. But its main problem is the ancient set of ROM samples. I would personally strongely recommend any Boss DR-xxx instead.
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