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Hi Ronin1973,

What exactly do you mean by what you just wrote? That the module is diode-protected against connecting the power cable the wrong way? I had played with the idea of that to add that indeed as one of the many parameters to the review report however not all manufacturers mention that in their manual and/or on their website, so would it be clever to add this parameter? Please do let me know and I will seriously consider this.

Or if you meant something else, please let me know in more details what exactly do you mean? Thank you very much in advance and kind regards, Garfield.

Hi Plragde,

Thanks a lot for your feedback and ideas. Not all of them but quite a few of your ideas, I was playing around with that as well. Not so long ago, I also came to the idea of splitting the document into more parts, something similar you are suggesting. That has in a way certainly some pros... however...

I see some serious cons with that as well. I do for my profession quite some documentation as well and what I observe for large document-setup systems is that it can be come easily and fast quite non-logically, i.e. one might loose easily an overview of the entire structure. What might seems logic to you and me, perhaps because of our work or because the way we think, doesn't mean that it is easy to understand for others, or even if it would be, the danger is still there that people might be no longer interested in it, i.e. dis-encourage them and that's something I would like to avoid.

I do believe that if I would split it into more documents that it becomes for the majority of the readers even more difficult "to look through it" and to understand it. I take the feedback of Ronin1973 to my heart about 60+ pages is an overkill. Yes, he is most probably right, then by splitting this documents in several parts, I do think that makes things worse rather than better. I might be wrong of course and I am open for discussion if you like. Another important point is and must be that the amount of work should be decreasing or staying the same for me, it shouldn't become even more, this what I am doing now is already close to insane ;-)

Things from your feedback that I will take back and chew on it for a while is a change log, I was already playing with that idea but not so sure if I should do that, that would cause even more pages, and your feedback about the non-chapter number of an appendix. I only have Word as a tool and I hate it but since I have no other better tool available and I don't want to spend too much time in getting to know other tools that might be better, I need to somehow learn to live with the dreadful tool called... Word ;-) Anyway, it's the tool I usually use for my work too, so it's "easy" to stay with the same documentation tool. Once I am in a good mood (towards Word) then I will check out that chapter number regarding the appendix :-)

Thank you very much for your open feedback and kind regards, Garfield.

Hi ModLifeCrisis,

Yeah, a nice video from you again! :-) He, he, that kind of stamping sound just before 04:00 sounds very good, you later transform the sound a bit. Then around 4:20+ that sequence kick in there is nice too!

I enjoyed your video and listening to it very much, thank you and kind regards, Garfield.

Hi Lugia,

It was indeed inside the module original box but your suggestion that the retailer might have threw it in... yes that starts to sound more and more logical to me now... hmmm.... I guess that must have been the case indeed.

Thank you for this feedback/idea and kind regards, Garfield.

Hi Lugia,

Interesting that you mention the Central Station Plus from Presonus, that's the only rack mounted monitor controller that I could find so far. How happy are you with that device, is it worth it? How is the sound quality or perhaps I should ask it differently, does it has any influence on the sound quality?

Writing review reports (the way I do it) might seem like overkill too, but I get your point, sounds to me that it makes sense and therefore it doesn't sound like a large overkill to me; perhaps a small overkill ;-)

Hmm... you make me hesitating... Central Station+ or using a mixer for controlling the monitors...?

Thank you very much and kind regards, Garfield.

Hi Gworn,

Nice track accomplished with a good video, it's nice to see you at work :-) He, he, nice cat at the end of the video! :-D

Thanks a lot for sharing this with us and kind regards, Garfield.

Nice! Well done, Gworn.

Nice, is the sample at the start played in with the micro cassette?
-- wishbonebrewery

Yep, its from the deleted scenes of the movie "Galaxy Quest" (RIP Alan Rickman, one of the greats)

Nice, is the sample at the start played in with the micro cassette?

I had seriously considered the Vector, but ended up going with the Frap Tools Usta. It fit my experimentation style. I also have an external box, the Akai MPC One which has midi and 8 CV outs, for when I want to do straight melodic stuff via a piano roll interface. I'll expand from there, eventually, once I've decided what direction I want to go.

SO, after some more thought, IMO the practical next steps for me are:

-- grab another sequencer when one I like is in stock. I generally don't like very menu divey modules or ones with huge instruction manuals; I prefer something that can be learned by working with front panel controls and modest manual/video reference. My current top picks for a next module are Rene2, Verbos Multistage CV, and as I'm interested in acid, the Stepper Acid. Those are all out of stock currently at my preferred vendors. Waiting would be okay. I'm also considering Mimetic Digitalis or Verbos Sequence Selector to give an ability to select sequence steps like @Ronin1973 was discussing; both of those modules remain somewhat baffling for me, the Verbos especially. WMD Metron is a top candidate for me for trigger / gate sequencing, though I'm feeling that as a lesser priority currently. And @Lugia and @eexee points about a smaller seqeucner being useful, I will keep in mind. Then of course I would need supporting modules (some of which I have on hand already), @farkas ideas of switch and bus would be great, as well as the variety of support modules mentioned by Lugia above. SO many possibilities!!!

-- all considered, more time on rig, more exploration using what I have, that should help me get a clearer sense of what will suit my tastes. But practicing is harder than fantasizing about new modules! ; )

Last, a couple random responses to above items:
-- @eexee, thanks for the post and video above, very cool! I also suffer from a lost post every now and then. Re: Nerdseq, it looks deep, powerful, and well respected (?), but IMO its not for me because of the interface. If it appeals to you, then it could be a good choice!? On scanning the Doudoroff list, I did not see a lot else that looks just like it, it seems pretty unique. I can recommend you check out Five12 Vector, it is very powerful, yet still very easy to use, which is great for me.
-- @farkas, I'll have to try the switch and bus setup you mentioned, that definitely appeals to me! BTW have you yet seen the additive sequencing post (#5 above)? I get a sense that that setup would be interesting for you.

Thanks everyone! Additional ideas / questions / comments would be welcomed.

EDITED Jul 27th 2021, 22:11

Looking at synth designers can be a great way of re-discovering or re-imagining your own system.

I've recently been learning about Serge modules and some of the ideas behind his designs. One of the most interesting things to me is the idea of patch programmability - which, so far as I understand it, is the idea that Serge modules can be many things depending on how you patch them.

This prompted me to look at my own little case and try and put some of my modules to different uses - I've had a go at turning DivKid's OCHD into a drum, my 2hp Rnd into an oscillator and using Make Noises Maths as a subharmonic divider.

The resultant short piece of 'music' is a little different to what I might normally have come up with.

I had that same moment re Modal, on my Braids. there is a similar function. I thought the module was broke !!!

In the summary, for the quick read, I'd like to know if the module conforms to the Eurorack power standards, or not, or if the power leads are agnostic to which direction the red stripe goes.

Hi there, I'm currently updating the manual for TexMix:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1vae1EN4fMGtUhlCPmYTmMSbE-9Ip4i1NLRefINSQALA/edit?usp=sharing

a set up i will procure my self in the near future.
this is a patch o one narly square wave bass and an improvise subh made of sinewave.
the bass line vca is the clean out put of the crush delay and the subh is a full wet glichy output( aka send out)
if you have this set up, let me know how it sounds.

have a nice one

i Don't own this, yet.
I will slowly build it. till then the sound in my head are patched this way.
if you have a similar set up and patched to have nice pad for a lead, weird experimental stuf, a drum maschine, an improvised subh with some reverb and the posibility to mix in a bass guitar, let me now how it sounds.

have a nice one

It would be also very good to be able to search for power consumption. It could be very handy for small cases where where it's important to put an eye on the power consumption

Thanks Ronin, your advices give me a line to follow in evolution on my rack. I'm just thinking some effect and mixer module and a turing machine.
Thanks Lugia for link, i check subrack and I'll take that into consideration as alternative to wood-box.

Yep...I also use a combo of on-desk monitor switching AND an outboard (Presonus Central Station +). This lets me swap from a monitor bus to the actual stereo mixbus (or others) if something seems off, and then the Presonus handles the switching between the Altecs, the KRKs, and the TADs, plus it handles the "B-feed" to the tc Clarity-M. This might seem like overkill, but after 40+ years of playing with these toys, I'm a picky SOB.

Or why even bother with the usual racks? I was doing a bit of poking around on nVent/Schroff's website last night, and you can slap together a bespoke 84 hp rackmountable for next to dirt. Granted, this trick requires a little knowledge of how subrack assemblies are outfitted and assembled, but just look at that as "knowledge gained"...for a big discount, too!

https://schroff.nvent.com/solutions/schroff/applications/19-subracks-and-chassis

Note that you can go as basic...or complex...as you like. 3U or 6U, the ability to add tile rows (with a little ingenuity), bespoke depths, bespoke busboard placement, and so forth. No, not as easy as just snagging something like...hmm...this: https://www.perfectcircuit.com/doepfer-a-100g6-6u.html ...but at the same time, you should remember that what you're looking at there IS what's at Schroff's site also. But it doesn't cost $530.

Was it actually in the module box, or was it something the retailer threw in? Sweetwater has long had a tradition of enclosing penny candy with their orders, and an order I got from Perfect Circuit back in the days before the plague also had that.

A few suggestions for possible reorganization. You don't have to have everything in one massive document. You can have a short summary, a longer report, and technical appendices in separate documents. You can have a paragraph or two on the Web site to motivate the reader, or maintain all the short summaries of all modules in one document with version numbers and a changelog. You can take all the meta-information (explaining what the purpose is of each section and subsection) out into a "Overview of Report Structure" document so it appears only in one place. You can cross-reference all these with clickable links in the PDF. I don't work with MS Word unless forced to do so, but I'm sure it can handle appendices without giving them chapter numbers. Just a few suggestions. This is obviously a labour of love for you, so do what you think is best for your readers.

Hi Ronin1973,

Ha, ha, thank you very much for your honest opinion and feedback on this matter. This gives me valuable feedback, realising that my idea didn't work very well, since I thought when I explain in chapter 1 how to use the review report, readers don't have to read the entire review report...

The idea is, that if you don't have time, that you just check out chapter 2, which is a short summarise of the (entire) review report.

In case you have a bit more time, then you only need to read chapters 2 up till 6, which is less or just at 20 pages (without contents and the bla-bla stuff).

If you yet still have more time you can go through chapter 7 which explains every parameter or characteristic that has been used or indicated for in the review report, but you don't have to read chapter 7. If you read it once, it's valid for all the review reports. The version number of chapter 7 provides you an idea if you might want/need to reread chapter 7 in another year time if the version number is too far of from when you read it for the last time but even that isn't a must to understand the rest of the review report.

By the way, the review reports are not a replacement for a user manual, I refer explicitly in the review report to the manufacturer's manual (if one available).

To summarise: For those who really have less time only read chapter 2. For those who have a bit more time read chapter 2 up till chapter 6, around 20 or less pages.

I hope this explanation helps :-) Thanks a lot for your feedback and if you have suggestions for improvements, add-ons, or what-so-ever, please do let me know. Kind regards, Garfield.

Hi Ronin1973,

Thanks a lot for your suggestions. I like the idea of using a mixer as a gate-keeper of one's monitors. I will play around with this idea and see how that might fit in my situation, that indeed perhaps solves a few problems since I have perhaps a mixer left over in my new studio setup and that would save me getting a monitor controller. Interesting! :-)

Thank you very much and kind regards, Garfield.

Hi Bleepadelic,

Nice one! But so short... Hopefully your next track will be a bit longer? :-)

Thanks a lot for sharing this with us and kind regards, Garfield.

Blind Noise is classic black but the white model just doesn't look right

This one reminds me of the trailer shots for Blade Runner 2049 that are on a lake shore. It was created with my usual process of designing the scene and letting the synths run without touching them during recording.

Maybe Sweetwater will redirect this to either the Mutable or Intellijel version on their website, like they did with the Swing. I thought that was a nice gesture...and once they did it, you really didn't hear much about the Swing anymore.
-- Lugia

@Lugia Did they really do this? I never noticed but that is a pretty cool move for a company that I thought had done a complete 180 on Behringer. I remember years ago when they didn't even sell Behringer products at all, for whatever reasons they had.
-- merzky_shoom

hay guys, I just did some link checking, and if you go to Behringer's site for the FOUL PLAY, and click the affiliate buy link for Sweetwater, you do in fact, get the Intellijel Quad VCA Eurorack Amplifier and Cascaded Mixer Module

so ya, there is that.

This entire Behringer thing reminds me of the old Kush vs schwag argument. Both do the job, one is just way more expensive and "luxury" while the other is for the "lower class" .

So this schwag going for 105.13 USD or £89.00 Euro.
The Kush is 189 USD or 159.99 Euro

https://www.andertons.co.uk/ shows a 3 month lead time.

wuba wuba wuba

60 pages on a VCA is quite extensive. I think it might be information overload. You're basically writing the instruction manual we wished came with the module.

The work looks to be top-notch but an overkill for most people looking for reviews.

In no means am I denigrating the sheer volume of time and experience put into the docs. But someone who will read 60 pages on one module would seem to be rare.

I have bought from Michigan Synth Works. I would buy from them again.

I find Mutable Instruments stuff to be powerful. But you really have to learn and memorize the functionality of all the different modes to get the most out of them. They are surprisingly complicated when you consider that one knob might control three or four different parameters depending on which mode(s) you are selecting.

This tends to kill my modular buzz. I would definitely consider Mutable's stuff to be the West-Coast side of modular. How a module functions tends to be the most important thing to me after a few years of doing this... even more so than its actual functionality.

I got the Mackie Big Knob Passive for a coworker. It's around $70US. It allows you to switch between two sets of inputs and two sets of monitors. It comes with a mute and a dim switch. It'll last forever since it's passive.

Your other option is to buy an inexpensive four channel compact mixer to be the gate-keeper to your monitors. A four channel, stereo output mixer is $60US. That will come with more routing options like control room vs main outs.

The case... is just a box with rails stuck to it. It's no more complicated than building your own 19" studio rack. Where I would NOT build my own is anything to do with the power supply. You can buy complete solutions for power. It really boils down to how much time you want to invest in building your own versus just paying for something prefabricated.

The Intellijel 1U standard is becoming more and more popular and there are other vendors beside Intellijel competing for that space now. Having 1U units is great but it's not a necessity. I like mine. But I wouldn't say that it makes that much of a difference unless you have a specific need... like air travel or limited space. Almost everything you see in 1U has a comparable 3U module. You won't be missing out if you don't go with 1U.

Finally, the resale value on Eurorack is pretty high. So there's not a huge penalty for changing your mind on a few modules. Buy or build your first case. Make it as large as you can reasonably afford in cost and space. Since you already have two semi-modular synths, start slowly. Some sequencers, a couple of effects units, and some mixer/utility modules will add a lot of possibilities to what you already have. Then you can always add more modules as you develop your own tastes and style.

I think we'll see a stratification of the market. The "simple" analog modules will get less and less expensive. When it comes down to it, for the bread & butter stuff... people are all drawing from the same pool of electronic components. If you're rolling your own diodes and ICs and next-level stuff... okay.

But if you're building yet another MS-20 filter clone, not so much.

I'm fine with Behringer blowing out the easy stuff and low hanging fruit. It introduces more people into modular synthesis. How many buffered mults do we need?

The creative Eurorack builders will still be around. The innovators will be around.

We get it, you had a bad experience with Cr8audio... but I had bad experiences as well, and with well-known manufacturers, yet you don't see me dissing on them everywhere I can, it's called restraint and perspective, you should try it some time.
And no, people hating on Behringer are not all 50+ white men in their man-cave trying to gatekeep the Eurorack niche, you've been pointed to the information before but chose to ignore it because that serves the rationale you use to justify buying it yourself... It's getting awkward.

-- toodee

Just for the record, I'm not a 50+ year old or a white man. This is probably the first post on here that I've seen that has anything to do with age or race. Can we keep it about the synths? I always thought of this site as some place we can all connect with our shared interest.

EDITED Jul 26th 2021, 15:52

"They're destroying the modular community!" Lower costs and quality products will only expand the modular community.
-- Valektricity

lol "quality products" is doing a lot of heavy lifting here.
P.O.S 💩 more like

Modular is certainly an expensive adventure. Sometimes the economical route is the only choice, and I wouldn't hold it against someone if they choose that route. But one thing to keep in mind, if everyone gives their money to the cloners instead of the innovators, we are eventually going to run out of innovators.

Uli… is that you?

Hi ModularGridCommunity
I'm very newbbie, i'm play around with Neutron and Model D but i'd like to build my own modular to upgrade my layer of sound.
I'm oriented to ambient/drone music and this two machine start to be to tight.

I'd like to start from case and i have 3 question:
-I think to project an 82 or 104 HP rack system, my goal is to think a modular that can grow up in future and also can be portable, i can't decide because i can't figure how this machine can evolve, have you got some advice about it?

• I'm stuck on decision to project a rack with 3u+1u or 6u, this because i see some intresting 1umodule and this can make me save space for portability, but intellijel module are expensive and there is some 3hp module that do the same. What you think about it? Is there a plate that can mount 1u in 3u?

• Buy just build or diy rack? I watching around for case and the affordable option for me is Bheringer or tipTop rail to insert in case, seem like easy but less flexible. Buy 84hp prebuilt rail or buy the components for diy have similar costs.
  I see on modularsynthlab . com that offer all components for build rack. For case i'd like to build myself (some like a wood suitcase where i can insert also my neutron and model-d) also because suitcase modular are too expensive. The power adaptor that i choose is Eurorack Power KIT, Modular Synth Power KIT, MW RT65B - KIT 2 (1x PSU + 1x Power Socket + 2x Bus Board) and seem like a safe starting point.
  What you think about diy or buy and kind of issue i can find building case?

Thank to all for your answer, I am sailing in the open ocean on a nutshell :)

Glad you liked :)

Not a peep about Mutable Instruments Veils, or the countless other module companies with a quad vca clone LMAO!!!! This is just the newest one. People love to bash Behringer, meanwhile, they're killin it. You should go to their page and see what some of their customers have to say about their products. For some it's life changing being able to afford that gear. It's only people sitting in there studios with thousands of dollars of gear all paid for whining. These stuffy fools can't stand to see someone pay less money than them. "They're destroying the modular community!" Lower costs and quality products will only expand the modular community. But hey, feel free to disagree

Hi Wishbonebrewery,

Ha, ha, naughty you! Teasing me with techno ;-) Still lots of fun to be heard in this remix jam. That kind of ping pong sound you got there, reminds me a little bit of the classic Popcorn track ;-)

Thanks for the fun and kind regards, Garfield.

Hi Farkas,

No worries about the trouble part, writing a review report is no trouble to me, that's what I want anyway. Every month I have to think of one or two more modules of which I shall write a review report. So I will write a review report of the A-103 anyway, you made me curious :-)

Ha, ha, thanks regarding the new setup. Just only today, being almost ready with cabling the new setup, I realised that I totally forgot to connect my Vermona DRM-1 to my mixer... and I don't have cables enough so I need to get some more cables before I can continue :-( I was hoping I was ready with the cabling... anyway, hopefully in August I am ready with my new setup.

Thank you and kind regards, Garfield.

Hi Lugia,

+1 regarding the workflow, sounds totally logically and I need to check if it's worth the investment for a monitor controller, my new main monitors (KS Digital A100s) will be connected to my main switch, so using the main mixer in combination with the Mackies will be only for rare occasions where I want to check the sound on more than one monitor brand just to make sure it all sounds okay-ish (in case of finalising a recording).

I agree and like that motto of that Nashville engineer! Thank you very much for your help and feedback Lugia, kind regards, Garfield.

Hi All,

Does for nobody rings a bell which brand's modules came (or still comes) with a lollipop in the original box?

Thank you very much in advance and kind regards, Garfield.

Thanks everyone for the replies above!

Informed by those ideas, and in hopes of giving myself some further clarity on the issue, I'll try to summarize below what I presently see as the main use cases for multiple sequencers (note what follows are not strictly exclusive of one another):

1. more sequencing lanes & CV outputs: simple idea here, yes, but sometimes you just need more
2. running different instruments or instrument groups: the most standard instance of this would be percussion on one sequencer, pitched on another
3. complementary sequencer styles: for example, a "normal" sequencer vs. an acid specialty sequencer vs. a "euclidean" sequencer like Rene 2, etc. A good list of sequencers with style labels is at: https://doudoroff.com/sequencers/
4. derived sequencing: requires 2 or more sequence signals run through logic (e.g. AND modules, etc.) to output a derived signal. This hits on what @Lugia was indicating in his 1st post above. Tons of ways to do this, potential modules to involve, potential patching. In general, this gives a good way of getting some complexity and change in an output signal from two pretty basic input signals.
5. additive sequencing: not wholly distinct from other techniques mentioned here, but worth spelling out, this is adding gate signals to construct more general stepped CV signals, see https://www.modulargrid.net/e/forum/posts/index/9928 for a very interesting detailed example
6. function-specific sequencing: an example of this would be like @Ronin1973 indicated, e.g. where one sequence chain is driving pitch CV and another is driving gate/trigger signals. The main premise here is, for a single instrument voice, there are multiple sequence inputs driving the score and realization
7. compound sequencing: sequencers feeding sequencers, as if SeqA outputs go to SeqB inputs, or SeqA outputs go to SeqA inputs (if it was capable of that kind of feedback). This is kind of a bottomless pit topic, and surely depends on the specs of the sequencers involved

Of course one or more of these use cases could be combined at any given time, if the modules support doing so.

[This post is edited to shorten... additional ideas / comments later.]

EDITED Jul 27th 2021, 19:22

:)

I think effectively for every other manufacturer modules are always 'original manufacturer' (unless you count the b-company)

apart from the b-company's intellijel quad vca clone, I think the only other brand where clones of 'in production' modules are available is mutable - there were a few pcb/panel sets going round a while back for 4ms SWN, but other than that I know of nothing

the purpose of the open-sourcing of the mutable modules was for educational purposes - ie how to design modules with SM32 mcus/2164 opamps etc etc - and so that anyone who wanted to build one themselves could - NOT so that micro versions could be cloned

reputedly a lot of the builds are decent quality - pachinko seems to be a decent implementation of marbles, if you desperately want to shave off 2hp or whatever...

as I said before the difference in price is in most cases not that much and the usual reduction in size can make the modules difficult (or unpleasant) to use in some cases - tightly packed jacks and trimmers, especially when next to other similar modules etc etc - if you buy a real one then Emilie actually gets paid

I had a button break on my marbles and had to send it back to mutable - fixed free of charge and back within a week (NL -> FR -> NL) - I have mostly factory built and a few DIY mutable modules - if I decide I need any more I will definitely buy them!

supercell looks like a good implementation of clouds though

EDITED Jul 25th 2021, 20:55

the 'by far the best' manufacturer of mutable instruments is - mutable - ergonomically sound and great support, plus the original designer gets the money not some guy(s) who took a github plan for a module and shrunk it - mi also have great support!

I'm not sure I follow ... does Mutable Instruments oppose or have an issue with the clone builds? I'd assume that me buying one of those isn't any different than me getting a DIY and paying someone with more experience to build it, and many of the clones seem to have additional features not including in the MI version and/or attempt to improve the aesthetics or UI. Does this practice negatively impact MI in some way? It seems so prevalent that I guess I just assumed MI made these designs open source by choice and had no problem with the existing market for its designs.

Beyond that, thanks for the recommendations so far, though I am curious for more answers regarding those who have used the clone-brands and the originals -- is there really a negative difference w/ the clones? Senior-bling mentions that the clones are less "fun," -- but what's that mean to you? Do you mean the smaller sizes just make the knobs harder to navigate and work with? You mention 3 clones you've used that were superior to the MI versions -- have you used others that are inferior? If so, why?

I'm not trying to nit-pick here, I tend to prefer to go "original manufacturer" myself when possible -- I'm just trying to understand the rationale, when the clone brands would seem, at a glance, to generally offer the same or better functionality for a lower price. (Good technical support is great and all, but not a big selling point for me personally). If those brands are ripping MI off in some way, or people have found they don't replicate the MI modules very well or work as good or flake out or something like that, that's one thing. But is that really the case? More input welcome.

EDITED Jul 25th 2021, 20:24