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I am currently filling whatever musical need our worship team might have from week to week. Often that would mean I'm on drums. We are currently running mobile church, and the space we rent really doesn't support the use of a full kit. Even an electronic drum kit would be too much given setup complexity and setup/tear down time. At the same time I would like something more powerful and flexible than a cajon and a few percussion elements. I decided to give this a try along with the kick trigger. which I use with my own kick pedal. I would say within an hour of connecting everything I was creating my own custom kit - and all without ever opening up the manual. This includes tweaking the multitude of settings that are available to get the pads to respond very much like an actual kit. Also love the out of the box cajon kit, which I will also be using. The sounds are great, the interface is easy, the unit is well built and confidence inspiring. What is truly astonishing however is all of this combined with the amazing playing surface. I am amazed at how nuanced your playing can be on this. Its just so enjoyable to play and is as close to an acoustic instrument responsiveness wise as I have ever experienced. The bonus here is the free bag, which is of top notch quality and worth well over 50 bucks on its own. And it does fit the unit when the stand adapter is attached. This was important to me as I did also purchase the Roland stand.

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Many of us have been handslapping and fingerdrumming on tables and other surfaces since childhood. I'm no different. I wanted to apply that technique to an electronic drum instrument. I wanted to evolve beyond the MPC pads I was used to. Enter the Handsonic HPD-20...This is the most expensive device of its type when compared to selections offered by other manufacturers. It excels as its own instrument. By that, I mean that the preloaded sounds and effects are top-notch. Unbox, plug in, and power on, and you'll be trying out 100 different drum kits within minutes. And I guarantee you will have fun. Don't be afraid to slap and pound on this thing. It was made for it. Whether you're into banging with your fists or delicate fingerdrumming, you can adjust the sensitivity, threshold, and curve of the pads to match your style. The settings don't have to be set globally. You can make each kit have a different response profile. You can program the device in such a way that it mimics an organic instrument, including pad muting, layered velocity-dependent sounds, external rim reactivity, and more. You can load your own .WAV files to create custom kits. And while it naturally translates percussion sounds, you are not limited to that. I would encourage you to load up vocals, instrument samples, synths, stems, and anything and everything else to see what this thing is capable of. There is nothing else on the market that delivers the wide range of expressiveness and potential for creativity that this device offers. If you want to play ANYTHING with your hands/fingers/palms/knuckles/elbows/chin/forehead/feet/miscellaneous appendage, this is the device you want.In spite of the shortcomings I personally found, I have zero regrets in purchasing this.Where I found this product lacking:- Another reviewer said that this came with a nice carrying bag. I believe this is sold separately. Mine came boxed with the instrument and its manual, and that's it.- Computer interface: This thing has a USB connection for connection to a computer. But there is no software for this thing, other than basic ASIO driver configuration. It creates record and playback devices on your computer which I have found are next to useless. For sound output, you'll want an amp, or connect to inputs on an audio interface. Also, you might expect that you could load custom samples to the Handsonic through this USB connection, but you cannot. Nor is there any line-in option on the device for recording custom samples. In fact, the only way to load custom sounds is by placing them, unfoldered, on the root of a thumb drive, and connecting that thumb drive directly to the Handsonic. - Usage with a DAW: That's what I bought the thing for in the first place, but it hasn't worked well for that purpose. It has MIDI In/Out, but I haven't had success in getting the MIDI clocks synced in either direction. The USB connection also transmits MIDI information, so it can be used as a controller, which is good. The MIDI channel and values are highly configurable on the device, which is doubleplusgood. But the Roll button doesn't function to output MIDI gate the way you'd expect it would. So no Rolls, just single gate triggers from the pads. The Handsonic shines because of its capability to be expressive and responsive, but these capabilities don't carry over as a MIDI controller, in which, relatively, it only functions in very basic fashion.- The display on the Handsonic is chonky monochrome LCD, and you navigate through the menu functions with a minimal number of buttons. Other devices at half the price have a color display with higher resolution and cleaner menu layout, for a more comfortable UX. Bottom line: This thing is outstanding in itself as a percussive instrument and as a standalone device. Expand it with other Roland pads and pedals. Play it live, or record from its outputs, and don't try to use it to control other devices.

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The HPD-20 is PERFECT! The instrument is so EASY to edit. The sounds are GREAT! This is a FUN alternative to a full size drum kit. The Pay as you play helped ALOT. Thanks ALOT! THANKS so much!

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