Roland TR8 vs TR-09 vs Cloud - TR909 Comparison 

Crazy how different they sound! Thanks for the comparison!

TR-09 is my fave drum machine.

Another great comparison video. Thank you.

This just prove that sometimes having less (features) means more (or better sound) TR8 / TR8S try do to too much but nothing really great while the Tr-09 just do one thing but do it great... thanks for the video!

The TR8 was the first digital hardware recreation from them and I think they've refined in since then. Ihave a TR8 and have always been disappointed and not used it that much, very clean and flat - when you switch from 808 to 909 on it you realize how similar they are on the TR8 on a lot of sounds.

Love your track at the beginning and end

From this video, the TR-09 overall sounded best. To me, the snare and kick were better, while the open hat was no worse. Having the original workflow and pattern storage definitely puts the TR-09 a step above the TR-8 in just about every way.

Was a little bummed when I realized the Tempest doesn't include the full 909 sample set - somehow didn't notice all these years till I went to make a TR-Techno kit!

This gives me hope that Roland can release a TR-606 Boutique that sounds right! Is there a Cloud 606? Would love to an improvement on that TR-8 expansion kit.

Thanks for doing this! I think it's interesting how on the TR-09 snare, you can hear the noise oscillator trail out even after the envelope finishes, but with the other two, it's as though they have a noise gate. As far as Roland analog drum machines, I've only owned a DR-110 and a TR-606, but the behavior of the oscillators in the TR-09 feels the most authentic. That being said, it's such a minimal difference between the three, and it seems like the choices made in the cloud & AIRA versions probably save a standard step or two in the production chain.

I loved your voice work in Portal 2

Great comparison. All sound good. The 909 cloud seems to have better editing but with the TR8 & TR8S you get the extra 808.

via expansions didn't the tr-8 have several 909 sounds available?

This might be of interest: the Roland TR-6S has two 909 snare variations, both ACB (909 Snare1 and 909 Snare2). I isolated the snare hits from this video, and compared them to the TR-6S models, thereby following Starsky's edits to the Tune, Decay and Snappy parameters. 909 Snare1 sounds and behaves exactly like the TR-8. 909 Snare2 sounds and behaves exactly like the TR-09/Cloud909 (I strongly suspect the perceived 'differences' in sound between the TR-09 and Cloud909 as heard in this video all stem from amplitude and velocity variations).

They are different, I asked Roland, they told me the output stage of hte TR09 replicates the original where as the TR8 has a more mastered output stage to make it sounds more like a finished produced sounds. That was what Roland said years ago via email.

all 3 sources are great. no matter what, regular listener don't care about analog, vst or emulation. its all about final product. anyway thank you for your time and presentation.

I love the midi drums the TR boutiques spit out, I finally have the holy Grail drum computer I've been searching for all these years.

They all use a compressor in the chain, right? Even when compression is off, it's still part of the signal chain. Could be that this is implemented differently?

Yeah I was impressed when the boutique tr-09 came out. It immediately sounded like the tr-909 I used to have. I stupidly assumed the later released tr-8s would sound the same as the tr-09, and traded it in towards the tr-8s, but they don’t. Now I want to buy a tr-09 again, but they’ve shot up to about $600/700.

The TR8 seems to be tuned slightly lower.