Roland SPD-SX PRO Sampling Percussion Pad  From Roland

The SPD-SX PRO comes loaded with 1,550 high-quality sounds and 200 kits (43 erasable preset kits and 157 user kits). And in the heat of battle, the SPD-SX PRO’s processing power lets you swap to a new kit without cutting off the sound of the existing kit—so as the audio decays at the end of the last sound that you played, you’ve already changed kits ready for the next track in the set. Need even more options? Dive into Roland Cloud sample libraries and explore the ever-expanding selection of sounds.

When the lights go down, the PRO lights up. Customizable pad-dividing LED and trigger lights let you see all nine pads on dark stages—goodbye gaffer tape! Assign any vertical or horizontal light to one of ten preset colors or create and name your own. Group together kicks, snares, backing tracks, and clicks with their own assigned color. And set the horizontal pad lights to be on constantly, light only when a pad is struck, or flash dynamically with its assigned WAV.

Playing in the dark just got easier. The SPD-SX PRO features a large 4.3-inch color screen with backlit function buttons, tabs, and a jog-dial for lightning-fast sound selection. The display shows essential real-time information such as A & B sample layers, WAV sample names, sample playback progress, and more.

It’s easy to create custom sound layers when you assign two sounds to a pad. You can assign a sound as the MAIN layer within the pad menu and then select another sample to layer with your original sample—resulting in MAIN and SUB sounds on the same pad. Then alternate between MAIN and SUB layers. You even have separate volume, pitch, transient attack, and release control for each sound, so you get the perfect blend of layers.

With nearly unlimited sounds under your sticks, you need to stay organized. Using the dedicated SPD-SX PRO App from Roland Cloud, you can easily import audio, and edit sound or playback parameters via USB on your computer. Drag and drop samples, create kits, adjust settings, and name as you go. The same USB connection allows you to send 8-channel audio and MIDI to the computer for recording with a DAW.

With expanded trigger inputs, there are even more playing possibilities at your fingertips…or feet. You can play with up to nineteen surfaces when you max out all pads, external triggers, and footswitch inputs. Connect a hi-hat controller, like the Roland VH-10 V-Hi-Hat, and play with open and closed pedal expression or add snare and kick pads to create a mini drum set. Alternatively, you can connect an expression pedal for real-time effects control as you play.