Great sound but... 
by Scott from Omaha, NE, December 2007
Music Background:  Home recording enthusiast

The sound quality and features are outstanding. There is however a problem with the way the triggers are on the circuit board. Some of the buttons on my unit started having trouble making a connection and the only way to fix it is to replace the entire circuit board. Keep it squeaky clean to avoid problems.

  Hard to use. 
by Rob from VT, August 2007
Music Background:  weekend hacker

Overall sounds are very good, and yes there are plenty to choose from, but as another reviewer noted, they're hard to bring up. Instead of entering a number to bring up a preset or pattern, you have to hold two buttons simultaneously and scroll through the whole mess, then do it again to set the tempo. OK I guess if you're using it for home recording (and you've got plenty of patience), but virtually useless for live performance and/or rehearsal.

  Best Money Iv'e EVER spent 
by Ramiro Guzman from Walnut Creek CA, January 2007
Music Background:  Pro musician for 35 years. Oldies, Standards, Latin

What a deal!!! The sounds are great, it is easy to use and program. The variety of rhythms is good. Your'e bound to find one that suits your needs,it also comes with preset fills and it runs on batteries. I take it to work and on my hour lunch break and noodle around with it. If you need a good basic drum machine with good sounds and are not a snob that needs it to do your laundry or whatever, this little guy kicks butt. It is not very often that I get blown away with a product, but this puppy for it's price did so. I highly recommend it.

  A must have 
by Old Rocker from San Antonio, Texas, December 2006
Music Background:  Bedroom Jammer

For $99 this thing is loaded. Quite easy to use once you get a hang of it. Very realistic drum sounds and pads you can drum on. Easy to record in real time or step timing. See the pads light up as it plays. This machine smoothed out my guitar playing and just plain fun. Lots of grooves (there's 396 of 'em built-in) and after I found a few, I jammed, jammed, jammed till I can't jam no more. I'd never thought I can improvise like this before. Improved my playing too. I must warn you, this thing's too much fun.

Are there a downside? One thing, while it looks pretty well built I'm afraid to drop it so I'm going to build a wooden box for it(or find one)and it'll be permanently installed in it. That's a $100 unit and it looks too easy to break.

Another thing, how can I save my song outside of the box? Lots of work to put together patterns (or write your own) to make a song and accidently wipe them out. Most likely I would have to live record them by mike and save them to disk.

Powerhouse! 
by Mike from New Jersey, May 2006

When I opened the box, I was amazed at how compact this drum machine was. Then I plugged it in and turned it on. Wow! Amazing sound quality. I'm sold. Yeah, there could be more sounds, but what's there is totally useable. For less than $100.00, you can't go wrong.

Great 
by Anonymous , May 2006

The Zoom MRT-3B is a great machine. It has a lot to offer and is reasonably priced. All of the preset patterns are very good and inspire you to write a guitar riff to go with them. The machine has a lot of ways to customize your rhythm. The kits are really cool to experiment with and have a large variety. I would definitely recommend this tool to a beginner or intermediate level player. It takes time to figure out how to use everything, but it is definitely worth it.

The only thing I don’t like about it is the way you go through patterns. You have a + key and a – key to go through about 500 patterns. It takes a while. They should have used a knob or something better. Other than that, I recommend this to anyone.

against the competition 
by Anonymous from wisconsin, September 2005

I had a friend buy a bxxx brand drum mechine not only was his mechine diffacult to use the audio out put was weak and sounds wimpy during live proformance. my Mrt-3 zoom was the life of the gig and performed with out a single hitch. 99 bucks vs 299.00 I know some one is green with envy now.

zoom rt-123 / rt-234 etc. 
by yuri vielot from new york city, February 2005

i am interested in seeing zoom technologies incorporate a hold or guard function on your drum machines and other recordable products.
i recently accidently pressed the delete all function and erased 89 arrangements i was totally distraught.
therefor as a loyal customer and one who appreciates your products please consider this application.

also would it be at all possible to include remote capability in the future.

i believe that this will provide convenience in the times when we are alone in the studio and have to perform multiple tasks.

a remote control for track advancement, volume, start and stop would be ideal.

i haope my suggestion will be appreciated.

have a great day.

yuri vielot...

ZOOM MRT-3 
by Richard UK from England, February 2005

This is a small drum machine,and does not look much to its big brothers, BUT,what a sound on it.It is easy to work and works great through midi.This machine has one very big punch to it.For what it costs and what you get, i will give it a 10 out of 10.

Well done Zoom.

Write Your Own Review!
We all love gear, and we all love talking about gear with our friends and bandmates. Why not share your thoughts with the hundreds of thousands of customers who regularly visit Sweetwater.com? Write your own customer review on this product! To begin, just Click Here!