Millenium MPS-850 E-Drum Set

The Millenium MPS-850 is a beautiful compromise for people who really want a Roland TD17 but just don't have the money. Millenium might not be the biggest brand, this drum set surely speaks for itself. I've had it for a year now and will tell you about my experience.

- Kit -
The kit itself is simply gorgeous. I love how it does not look flashy but is still stylish. Furthermore, the responsiveness of the kit is good (not perfect, but what can you expect for this money). Mesh is a must and thankfully this kit is fully mesh. Lastly, I found the standing Hi-hat to be a must. I play regularly on acoustic kits and this helps for transition in between kits.

There are a few cons regarding the responsiveness:
- The cymbals are somewhat clumsy in their trigger curves. It takes experience and knowing the kit to maintain a smooth volume during a cymbal roll. I recommend downloading the manual and checking out the curves you can adjust for this matter.
- The hi-hat is not the best-built there is. First of all, my hi-hat control on/off switch broke off about five weeks in. Secondly, the hi-hat sometimes forgets you're playing closed which is somewhat annoying.
- The spring of my kick drum started squeaking a bit after two months of playing. This can be resolved by oiling it.
- Once in a while, hitting the hi-hat, drum and snare at the same time triggers the play-button for the play-along songs. I'll be in the middle of a drum solo and suddenly a backing track comes in. This is the most annoying feature but can be resolved by turning the volume to 0.

- Durability -
I play in a setting where I need to be able to set up my kit in as short a time as possible. I've taken the whole kit apart and put it together about 15 times now, and I can safely say that the kit does not show any sign of wear and tear. What's more, I can now manage to do this in less than 15 minutes which to me is remarkable. Some easy cable management allows you to be very quick. Tip: buy the gig bag with it.

- MIDI trigger -
I play with Addictive Drums 2 and Steven slate. Both works just fine with this drum and I have no trouble whatsoever.

- Drum sounds -
I find the drum sounds themselves to be quite bad, frankly. That's not to say I would find them better in a Roland TD 17 (I generally hate built-in kits I know I'm weird), but still. It helps that you can pitch and adjust all sounds to your liking but especially the more alternative genres sound incredibly unrealistic.
You can download samples onto your module but don't expect good results as the module can only hold about 15 samples. This means you can never sample your whole kit.

Nevertheless, the sound is good enough for practice and I'm enjoying the kit so far. Also: no wear & tear whatsoever.

- Conclusion -
Buy it.

I purchased the MPS-850 for home practice - I normally play an acoustic drum kit. My only previous e-kit experience was with a converted acoustic kit (mesh heads, triggers, VST, laptop etc). The performance of the MPS-850 is proving far superior. I'll go through the various components one by one.

MODULE
The kit is ready to play the instant you switch it on. This is a huge advantage for me, compared to dealing with laptop, VST, external soundcard etc. Another plus: I can't detect any latency, which makes the playing experience feel very natural. Many of the in-built acoustic type kits sound OK. With the help of the supplied manual I created my own 'User Kit' which I'm very happy with. There are several settings you can tweak to deliver an excellent response from all the individual pieces. I've made good use of the module's USB input, playing along to MP3s. You can also record to USB to listen back to your new grooves. I sometimes run the module's output to a Porter & Davies BC2. That works fantastically well! There are additional features I haven't tried yet e.g. MIDI in/out, Aux In etc. It's a well featured unit, easy to navigate.

BASS DRUM & BASS DRUM PEDAL
The supplied pedal looks like a low budget item, but works surprisingly well. Not quite as fast as my Tama Speedking but I find it perfectly usable for practice. The kick pad is mounted to a sturdy frame, separate to the rest of the rack.

HI-HAT
The MPS-850 is supplied with a 'proper' hi-hat stand. On my acoustic kit I have the hi-hats set quite high and was pleased to find the stand has sufficient height to duplicate my normal hi-hat position. I've seen a few reviews saying the MPS-850 hi-hat can't handle a disco-style open and close pattern. I've found the hi-hat responds quite well but I've had to adapt my foot action slightly to get closer to a realistic sounding feel. So the hi-hat open/close feel's not perfect but it's much better than I was expecting based on other feedback I've read. The chick and splash sounds are very good. A nice sounding 'chick' is easy and very intuitive but a splash requires an extremely rapid down and up foot movement - much faster than required with a regular hi-hat, otherwise you only get 'chick'. It's not a big deal but I'll agree with some others that there's scope for improvement to the hi-hat's open/close response and chick action.

SNARE
As with all the pads, stick response and feel from the mesh head is excellent. Initially I wasn't entirely happy with the sound of ghost notes and faster double stroke snare rolls - they sounded a little too machine-gun. After changing the snare's velocity curve in the module's settings I've now got a more natural sounding drum that handles double-stroke and other rudiment style rolls in a more realistic way.

TOMS
They worked just fine straight out of the box. At first I found the 8 inch pads were too small - I was often hitting the rim - but after adjusting the position and getting used to playing pads that are much smaller than my acoustic kit's toms, my accuracy has improved greatly! I didn't have the same problem with the 2 x 10 inch pads.

CRASH CYMBALS
Both crashes have separate bow and edge sounds. No bell sound. But they're also chokable, which is a great bonus. Once you've worked out exactly how to grab the edge in the right way, choke works perfectly every time.

RIDE CYMBAL
It's a 3 zone ride - bow edge and bell. I've seen a few comments about the bell sound being unreliable, so I was prepared for this to be an issue. What I've found is the bell function will work consistently, but only if it's struck within a very small area i.e. you have to look very carefully at the spot you're striking, which can be difficult at faster tempos. If you were recording with the kit and needed 100% perfect bell response, that could be tricky. Ideally the bell area would be larger, but for practice purposes I don't find it a major problem.

RACK & MOUNTS etc
I've never been a fan of racks, or e-kits for that matter - that's why my first venture into e-drumming was an acoustic to electric conversion - because a conventional drum kit will always look better IMO. So setting aside the fact all racks look like scaffolding, the most important thing is whether the MPS-850 rack is sturdy and reliable. I've had my kit for approx 6 weeks and it's been played for an average of an hour almost every day. So far the rack has been 100% reliable. Nothing has come loose or fallen off. It was easy to assemble, following the diagrams in the supplied manual.

SUMMARY
No doubt about it, the MPS-850 is outstanding value for money. To package such a well featured module along with bass drum (and BD pedal), snare, 4 x toms, 2 x crashes, 3-zone ride, hi-hat and hi-hat stand at this price is hugely impressive. The two supplied manuals are nicely done. One is for rack assembly and the other is a very detailed instruction book for the pads, cymbals and all module settings. I received two copies of each - one in German and one in English. Clear, concise and well written - not a hint of Chinglish!

CUSTOMER SERVICE
After a couple of weeks, one of my 10" drum pads (floor tom) developed a fault. The drum would only respond if the mesh head was struck in a very specific area, close to one of the mesh cones that sits between the head and sensor. When I contacted Thomann and described the fault, they asked me to send a video so they could get a better idea of what the problem was. I sent them a short video the following morning. Later the same day they contacted me to let me know a replacement pad was being sent free of charge. Yes, a slight inconvenience having to wait for a replacement but very reassuring to know Thomann were keen to resolve it as quickly as possible. 10/10

After many weeks debating whether or not to buy this drum kit I finally made the plunge. I've been drumming for almost 20 years and have had many acoustic kits during that time. I wanted something that was compact, quiet and usable for home recording and for drum covers in the future. Plus,I live in an apartment.

Connected to my Mac fine, but had to remap the MIDI. Pads were assigned to different notes in my DAW (Logic Pro).

If you're new to drumming, or even have been playing for sometime, this kit would accomodate your needs perfectly. Having said that, people need to understand that an electronic kit plays and feels different from an acoustic kit. So heavy hitters will have to adjust accordingly. It can take a bashing alright tho. My background is Post/Hardcore Rock.

The kit is not perfect out the box (module settings) wise. However, you REALLY need to TWEAK the module so that it suits how you play for a more natural response. (Threshold, sensitivity, velocities, curves, and xtalk etc.) There are many YT Vids that explain all of this, so do your homework. Definitely worth the time. I love that this set has all mesh heads as you can loosen or tighten to mimic the real thing.

PROS
-All Mesh Heads (tunable)
-Full Hi Hat Stand
-Robust Module (can tweak settings unlike similar kits in the same price range)
-Module has volume faders for each pad for quick adjustment on the fly.
-3 zone Ride & chokable cymbals
-Bang for buck. You get a lot kit for the money
-Nice sized kit and compact.
-Works well with VSTs

CONS
-Sounds aren't too bad, but you have enough to get by. Grand for practising.
-Hi Hat doesn't respond quick enough, sometimes the foot splash/open hat continues after foot is pressed down. Really noticable when playing fast. I still need to tweak it a little more to match how i play.
-Rack clamps seem to not tighten but still become loose, so I find myself correcting this often. Like for example the snare support arm, can move with your hand even when the clamp is tightened.
-Rubber rims look flat and squared and seems like there's a lot of space between them and the mesh heads. Can also see metal gap in between them. Isn't a big deal but noticeable.

Overall, I'd highly recommend this drum set, I've owned a Roland TD9 in the past but honestly can't justify the money for big brands anymore, if you're on a budget and want to play/learn drums, this is the kit for you.

I've had the MPS-850 for a couple of weeks now and had a chance to give it a good thrashing, so here are my thoughts in case they're of interest to any potential buyers.

I want to say up front that I scoured the reviews to get as much idea of whether this kit was any good or not prior to purchase and I had it ordered and in the shopping cart and back out again about 4 times over about a 6 week period during which I was clearly being indecisive :-)

Thing is, for me, it is a big purchase that I can just about justify but only if it is worth that expenditure. But it's obvious that I was interested.

So, cut to the chase, is it worth the money ? Absolutely yes.
I have an excellent quality acoustic kit and I hit hard, so I was a little sceptical about the mesh heads and if the rack would stand the use but I needn't have worried. The heads can take more than you might expect and despite the fact that yes, you do play a little softer naturally on an electric kit compared to hammering it out on stage behind a 'proper' kit, it plays well and has a great feel. To be honest you're not really going to be going full on Keith Moon in your living room or spare bedroom anyway are you ?

I'll not bother going into a full review of everything about sounds etc because it's already been covered in most of the other reviews. I'll maybe just mention a few things that I didn't notice in the other ones.
If it's your thing .... I use a double kick pedal with this kit and it works perfectly. I have heard people say that they don't work very well on leccy kits because the beaters aren't hitting the optimum centre spot of the kick drum skin (mesh). Well the response is great and feels very natural to me straight out of the box, but if necessary you can adjust the sensitivity as you choose. I haven't because I don't think it needs it.

I haven't had any problem with finding the (apparently elusive g-spot) bell of the ride cymbal that others have mentioned and it doesn't need hitting harder or anything like that, it's very nicely playable actually. And while I'm mentioning cymbals - the choke function is great when you have found how to do it. It's very easy to use but makes it more 'real' sounding and less 'electric' kit.
Hi - hat .... what can I say - great to have a proper one and works well once you get used to it. Never had more than a floor pedal and flat plastic cymbal for a hi-hat on my previous electric kit.

Last thing I'll mention that I haven't seen anyone talk about is that the module and kit has very low latency which is great. I like to play online with other people around the world and latency of getting the signals around and through a computer before you even involve the randomness of the internet and it's volatile connections and speed, is the biggest issue. The MPS-850 has performed extremely well in this department so I'm happy with that too.

So in conclusion, I am over the moon with my purchase. The kit as a whole far exceeds the price tag and is easily a match for other 'named' brand equipment selling at a far higher price. It ticks all my boxes for what I require from an electric practice kit and to be honest I can't praise it highly enough. I'm sure that kits that cost many hundreds of pounds more, have more features and samples and voices and songs on them but if you really can't find anything you like on the MPS-850 module then I'm sorry but I think you're being rather over critical.

(My only criticism would be that you can't specify a time to have it delivered so I had to collect from the parcel carrier depot but that's nothing to do with the product).

A great kit. I'm a very happy customer.