The Yamaha RY30 is a great old drum machine, mine is 10 years old and I picked it up on eBay for next to nothing. To my ears, it has a rich, organic sound that is much more alive than the 808 or 909. Apart form the kick drums, all the samples are excellent. I've recorded them from the machine and am making them available here for free download.

So help yourself...

Download RY30 Samples

Its certainly usable

The problem I always found with it was it didnt offer a great deal more than anything you can get using XG sounds- and those that werent XG were direct samples from other well known drum machines.

I disagree- i always thought the kicks were good- nice digital thump on them. Im pretty sure I got some good stuff out of this using sysex and other mind numbingly tedious programming stuff before- but its been donkeys since i used one so cant be sure.

Currently I am obsessed with the Roland 727......... also pick-up-able for a fraction of a 909.
As you may be able to tell, im a hardware nut

One great feature of drum machines in particular, is that they save you from Sample Choice Anxiety. With a drum machine you work with it and try and get the best out of it. With sample CDs it's "Which one is best? there's too many to choose from" syndrome.

Sample Choice Anxiety... now that is worth a new thread...