If you are new to the world of music creation and you are into metal in particular - you should definitely take a look at EZdrummer with the EZX DFH (drummer from hell) add on - check it out at www.toontrack.com . There are beats prgrammed by the drummers from Meshugga, Naglfar, Persuader, Nocturnal Rites and a few others - lots of blast beats and monster double bass lines. The cool thing about EZdrummer is it is easy to use from the box - no learning curve. All of the beats are pre programmed and you just have to join them together, splice the parts you want and drop in the rolls and fills etc. The software itself is programmed in midi (you can also program your own beats if you want) and it triggers real sampled drums so it sounds like a real kit played by a real drummer. Each drum is sampled a number of times so the beats sound more organic and realistic. The library of beats is massive but if you want more you can always buy another library from www.groovemonkey.com

EZdrummer is very cool but if you wanted to bring it up a level then you could look at Toontrack's DFH2 (Drummer From Hell 2). It's way more advanced and allows you to tweak any element imaginable, it also includes a number of different kit types and effects - reverbs, room types, sticks/brushes, compression, EQ etc. Plus a massive library of beats - the cool thing with any Toontrack package is that the beats are compatable across the board. So if you start with EZdrummer and like it, then when you upgrade to DFH2 you can still playall of your old beats and recordings.