I bought this as an upgrade from a KD8 and the mesh head is better to play than the KD8's rubber head but then it should be when it costs so much more. I would never buy one of these new as Roland's prices are completely unjustifiable; they are no better than Alesis electronic drums but are double the cost. I use this to trigger the kick on my Octapad SPD30 but in the past I used an Alesis DM10 kit, which like the SPD30 was used for recording and was only sold due to a move to a smaller property. My advice is that if you want an electronic kit, buy an Alesis DM10 with a DM5 brain. If you need to trigger an SPD30, then this is better than the much cheaper KD8 but only just.