Yeah, I have an A4 attached to my modular. It is great for drums but it tends to get used for more melodic stuff here. I did think about getting a second A4 but it feels weird to have 2 of the same instrument.
I’ve never had a problem with the sound quality of any of my Elektrons. Certainly not the A4 and DN. By comparison, I’ve been pretty underwhelmed by modern Roland gear.
Thanks. That confirms a lot of what I was thinking. The hats on the MD are great and possibly the one thing it does better sonically than the Rytm. Looks like you can do quite a bit more with the noise machine on the Rytm than on the MD though, which is great 'cos I love using noise. 
The modern Elektron sequencer is obviously a big plus. I use conditional trigs all the time on the A4 and microtiming is so useful on drums.
Machinedrum is bigger than TRX machines and a bit of FM…
Have you tried to use the sounds out of their comfort zone? To resample and mangle OT-like in live ?
MD can bring you to a lot of places you haven’t explored yet, I bet: maybe try to make a track out of cowbells or explore additive synthesis with only sine waves ?
Try not using the machines you’re used to, your sound will change and you should find a few nice tricks during the trip 
Some FX can also affect the sound in decisive ways.
big time. MD shines when used unconventionally imo.
like a single track modulated by 16 lfo’s, max Marco style, for example.
Ever consider using an Octatrack for your drum machine? You can load any drum hit into it. Or make any drum sound you want out of any sound. Could make all kinds of things from single cycle waveforms. I’m thinking about getting a second one but I’ve also been thinking about adding a ar mk2 to my md, ot, dt combo.
Machinedrum gets pretty deep with all different machines. Take the individual outs of one of your tracks and process it through something externally. Try things that you aren’t familiar with the make it new and sound different than what you normally make. I’ve been running mine through the Elektron drive and getting some Potter cool stuff. I need to get the Heat again.
is digital and 12bit, but much more flexible (routable LFOs for example) and has 2*voices of Rytm. Takes time to acquaint one with all the sound palette, though, and then there’s resampling (on UW)…
Rytm is analog but only 1/2 voices of , sampling engine has more bits, but overall 
limited its users in many ways - “absolutely non-overlapping features to make you own all the boxes” policy etc.
I do not (yet?) like 's compressor/distortion. I guess I’d like Rytm one, though.
No easy way to solo a track on stock , and it is 12bit only.
If You do need Overbridge - Rytm is a no-brainer. Performance features are somewhat better on Rytm too, but I doubt it has CTRL-All of
Modern sequencing features of (microtimings, probability and much, much more) can be unlocked by MCLive which also will help with 4 sound sequencing.
Me, I’d keep 'em both.
I didn’t think the synth engines are 12bit, just the UW sampling.
AFAIK perceived 12bitness mainly as a marketing move (“grit” etc). I do not have any information re: actual internal DSP limitations, but @v-yadli and/or @JustinValer might have, censure permitting.
Correct!
Over the years I’ve used a lot more than just TRX and FM on the MD. They’re just what I’ve moved towards as my most used machines these days. I guess at heart I always lean towards those kind of analog drum machine sounds for the music I make.
In some ways I wish I’d kept to my first non-UW MD. The UW features never quite clicked with me the way the synthesis machines had. I’ve heard some amazing stuff done with the UW so I know it’s just me and the way I use it rather than a limitation of the MD.
I often think that someone else could make much better use of my MD than I’m likely to at this point.
On Rytm the hats and cymbals are better than MD, the kick, snare, rim, clap, toms are better on MD IMHO.
But obviously it depends what kind of sounds you like, I find ironic that MD can do smoother kicks
The Rytm synthesis is a mixed bag, the noise and VCO are very useful, the kit sounds IMHO are not as versatile as MD.
But where the Rytm shines is in samples/sampling, the filters are very good, and realtime control over parameters is way better than MD, ctrl all was never something I found very useful, but scenes and perf mode are much more flexible.
To each their own, but for me that spend less time programming than jamming, CTRL-AL + Reload combo leads to easy explorations and fills, without having to set Scenes and Fills beforehand…
Having both would be great, but for lazy players like me CTRL-AL is a godsend 
for me too
Was way too lazy to set up performance macros. Same on the A4, I rarely use them, despite knowing how powerful they are.
I use scenes on the OT though, they are more fun to set up somehow
I went, I think, quite deep with the AR (MK I) and found out after several years that the sound, as mighty as it is, was not the one I liked best. Kicks are massive and all, but can be hard to fit into a mix (I think some people made the same remark about the Moog sound - very big on its own, but hard to play with others). So I moved to a MD instead and have been finding myself more than satisfied with its digital character and much larger sonic flexibility (16 assignable LFO’s and many available machines). The new sequencer tricks are not essential to me, though, and I’m really into early 2000’s glitch sound. This being said, to my ears, the MD kicks sounded immediately good and I find them easier to tweak according to the needs.
Regarding the AR MK II (and DigiTakt), my biggest gripe is why on earth did they remove the record-trigs for sampling? It makes it difficult, if not impossible, to do real-time sampling (and mangling), which the 2005 MD UW (and OT) supports.
Interesting that you rate the hats and cymbals over the other analog voices. Just goes to show how it’s down to personal aesthetics. The stuff I do tends to be like Pye Corner Audio (lots of analog drums - often a 606) or Boards of Canada (more samples and loops).
Having proper envelopes for filter and amp feels like a big step up from the MD. Quite often I have to use the exponential LFO on the MD as a makeshift filter envelope. Spent a little bit of time demoing an AR mkII the other day and I did really like how it layers samples and how they sound through the filter.
I get what people are saying about CTRL-AL. I’ve used it a fair few times but I can see how the perf/scene combination could work better for me. If I’m honest, most of my realtime tweaking is directed at the modular if I’m playing out. Setting up scenes in advance sounds very useful.
YES x1000!
I almost always keep the last four tracks for 1 recorder and 3 players ^^
And abuse retrigs and pitch for glitchiness + filters on top (with LFO as envelope) for acidness 
I might be a bit radical here, but I don’t see the point of a sampler in 2020 (or even 2017) if it does neither real-time sampling, nor auto-region.
Yeah, I like 606 sounds too, but I find the cymbals and hats can get 606/808ish yet the kick and snare don’t really cover that ground as easily 
All good and well, but I just really enjoy having MD and AR side by side. Here’s a live set practice recording. Drums are MD and AR. I challenge you to pick which is which.
Acid basslines are Circuit Mono Station. Other synth sounds also MD and AR. Expect for the outro soundscape, which is the Borderlands iOS app.
External fx used, of course.
Also, having 2 drum machines side by side has been key to finally reaching my dream of being able to play live sets with fluidly blending and overlapping parts. I had a hard time doing that with only the MD.
Damn, I can no longer see this video in that context.
Every discussion about the comparison MD - AR leads to this bashing. I own an MD UW + and an AR MK2. I love both instruments for their different uses. The interface is different. The sound is different. And everyone may see it the way they want, but a Max Marco who walks a few times in the synthi shop and plays around on the AR MK2 and then publishes such an condensed statement about it on youtube shouldn’t be the guide line for anyone who really wants to find out something about the instrument.
The MD has a different sound quality in my opinion. If you want to create hard, powerful kits that don’t sound crispy, you should use the AR. The MD is ideal for minimal or IDM experiments, because it is more flexible due to the interlinking of the LFOs, the use of the control all function etc…