Crimson II SE Mesh Kit : Great kit for the price but bad built-in sounds

3 years ago

This kit has a great price-quality ratio. For this price, you will struggle to find a kit with all mesh heads with such large sizes.

The 12" Snare and 14" ride are great and make the kit feel very realistic and the general build quality seems great so far. Only complaint about the physical kit is the hi hat pedal which is functional but definitely doesn't feel like a real hi hat pedal.

Where the kit leaves a lot to be desired is the built-in sounds, which are simply not good. There are 57 kits, only a handful of which mimick acoustic sets and I haven't found a single one that sounds good. Even after adjusting the settings, the volumes, sounds and feel just feel wrong. Coming from years of playing on acoustic drums, the built-in sounds are very difficult to play with.

However, I hooked the kit up to logic Pro using a USB midi cable and used the drum sounds from Logic's drum designer. It took a bit of tweaking but with that done, the sounds are much much better than the built-in ones and the kit itself feels a lot closer to a real acoustic drumset. I'm now having a great time with the kit.

TL;DR Great hardware, sturdy build, good price - quality ratio but try to use external sounds if possible.

Image Alesis Crimson II SE Mesh Kit

Technical Data

  • Manufactured by Alesis
  • Released in 2020
  • Average price : $938
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