Man do I need help here. I've tried to get used to using keyboards for creating drum track and I can't stand how slow and lame it is. I have excellent sounds, but the whole keyboard midi drum creation sucks to me. I am by no means a novice at programming. I earned a serious living in the 80's programming drums using Linn and MPC 60's. A few year ago my MPC died and now I'm dying trying to program drums via keyboards. I'm so used to pads and the simplicity and realistic feel you get with an MPC 60. Once you experience this, or become accustom this that era, its really hard to explain the pain I'm in with all the ITB midi clutter. I don't need all this crap with Sonar Cubase, Ableton. I have all these at my disposal and I can't stand all the crap that's in my face.

I have BFD, love the sounds and how you can space the drums out but I just can't get used to ITB drums. I have and Emulator x11 and that's okay but still lame compared to the feel I can accomplish with an MPC. I'd love to just use the sounds via an external sequencer
I need something like an MPC 60 to do drum tracks and link up to both external and virtual keyboard.
I want to create the majority of my midi tracks ( standing up with my guitar in hand) using a sequencer like an MPC 60 that will sync up with my Fireface 800.
I want to use my DAW for tracking vocals and guitar and use external keys and a drum machine that will run all the midi and sync up to my DAW. I want to be able to hit play and the drum machine either slaves or masters the song, without latency. Is this possible?
I want to do all analog summing using my MixDream.
I want to print all the midi to the DAW for final editing.
When the song is complete and want to do all analog summing and then prinit it all back into the DAW for mastering. I have a Lavry DA11 for this.

Here is my big question.

I need another drum machine like an MPC or drum pads ( maybe?) that will take me out of my time warp. Possibly another Akai 3000, 5000 maybe? Another problem is I don't need all the crap they that have with new MPC's. I just want the basics that the MPC 60 had that will hook up to my fireface 800 with little latency. Is there such a way? My old MPC didn't clock well. I upgraded it to 3.10 but it still had clock issues. SMPTE worked just okay.

I've never used a drum machine with a FireFace 800. I've build a new studio after my MPC 60 died and now I'm either dated or just know too much to accept the keyboard drum thing. I don't want to be looking at a screen during the creation period of music. This is something we have lost with a DAW.

Syncing my old midi ways to my DAW is my final obstacle. Is there anyone out there that has lived and programmed top 40 back in the 80's and knows what I'm going through? I really need to hear from someone from the past.

All this being said...
Maybe this is something for me:

Has anyone tried an MPD18 for drum programming?