hi, just thought i'd start a general thread about electric drum modules since i haven't seen one so far, anyway

i've got a roland td-8 and i'm wondering, how do you download drum sounds onto it and then make the sounds work? i really wanna learn what i can do with the module and my computer, like program funky effects into it (like the type of thing danny carey has put in his electric drums, i think he used old synths' to get the sounds) and yeah, these things have a lot you can do with 'em...pitty roland manuels leave me more confused then...uhh, an extremely confused person

Unfortunately, the alternatives to drum modules tend to be less than straight forward too.  The stuff you are talking about can be done by using the electronic drums with a sampler or directly triggering any MIDI device.  

There are drum modules that allow you to upload your own samples, but a really good temporary one is sorely needed.  Your Roland module doesn't do that, although they allow you to affect/effect the sounds to varying degrees.  That said, I wouldn't be surprised if you see some great progress directly along these lines in January at NAMM.

I have little experience with vdrums, but if your TD8 connects to your pc you should be able to trigger custom sound effects using MIDI (Your ROLAND manual should have a topic on this). You will need a software mutli-tracker (for example Cubase) that allows you to change drum sounds and enables you to control midi inputs. You will need to configure your vdrums to be the MIDI input device in your multi-tracker. However, you may have difficulties disabling the modules sounds and just using it as an input device. If you do have problems there are some multi-trackers which allow you to change the sounds after the recording. Once you have it all configured you can press record whatever you play. Then all you have to do is spend several hours searching for the sounds you want.

GL
Bob