My First Modular (Opinions Appreciated!)

Hi everyone,

After years of guilt-tripping myself, I've finally started building my first modular and I could not be more excited. I purchased the NiftyCASE with the two included modules (I know it's tiny but it will work for awhile until I eventually upgrade to either the Pittsburgh EP-270 or maybe even the EP-420).

I would love any feedback on what people think of this:

My main plan at the moment is to just have a fun little jamming box for whipping up beats and synth lines on recordings (and coming up with song ideas, and just having fun with it). The long-term plan is to have a self-sufficient song creation machine at my fingertips. So if I'm being honest, I'm more into having something I have a lot of control over than a machine that does a lot of generative or experimental stuff.

My two main concerns with this prototype are the following:

1) I like the design of the Dreadbox Hysteria. 10hp is great for such a tiny case and it's hard to beat that price, but VCO's are important to me (obviously) and I'm wondering if this is the best choice to start with. I'm considering a clone of Plaits instead, and I'm really into the Soundforce DCO, but I already own a Juno 106. Is the Soundforce a redundant choice..? I can't decide! Help!!

2) I'm not entirely sold on the Disting. It seems like a wise choice since it will fill a lot of gaps I'll have in my system at first and help me experiment with a lot of stuff instead of buying 50 different utility modules...but one of my rules going into this was I didn't want to do any menu diving. Like, at all. My goal is to one day be able to basically play this thing blindfolded. I know I can sell it down the road, but I'm just looking for feedback. Maybe there's a more basic and fundamental module I should get instead?

Any comments, suggestions or criticisms would be hugely appreciated. This is a huge world I'm stepping into as I'm sure you all know. I have no idea if there's anything I've overlooked or if there are any better options to consider for my limited real estate. I guess I should mention that I'm sequencing it with my Beatstep Pro and Ableton Live before anyone points out the missing sequencing options, haha. Thank you all, I'm really excited to finally be part of the community!

-Z Wolf

An output module might be a nice touch as well as a MIDI to CV converter if you plan on playing in sync with a DAW and recording.

I would ditch the Plasma Drive. Not because it's a bad module... it's a great module. But it's really expensive and quite an HP hog for a small case. Leave that space open so you at least have some wiggle room for additional, smaller modules.

Don't be in too big of a hurry to fill your case immediately.

Hi Ronin,

Thanks for the input! The NiftyCASE comes with USB MIDI in the back, which was a big selling point for me.

I was thinking the same thing about the Plasma Drive but I am pretty hyped about making really dirty, noisy synth lines with it. Would I be better off getting the Basimilus Iteritas...?

I was considering possibly removing Chips and Cells from the rig eventually once I filled up the other slots because I won’t be getting a ton of use from them.

This is hard!! Too many awesome modules :O

Hi Ronin,

Thanks for the input! The NiftyCASE comes with USB MIDI in the back, which was a big selling point for me.

I was thinking the same thing about the Plasma Drive but I am pretty hyped about making really dirty, noisy synth lines with it. Would I be better off getting the Basimilus Iteritas...?

I was considering possibly removing Chips and Cells from the rig eventually once I filled up the other slots because I won’t be getting a ton of use from them.

This is hard!! Too many awesome modules :O
-- zwolf

Wow... that Nifty case is niftier than I thought. The Basimilus isn't a bad module. The Manis Iteritas is better for dirty synth lines. But both will require a lot of modulation to get that really filthy feel out of it... which means throwing other modules at it. They are both also horrible to try and tune.

Rather than the Plasma Drive or the Iteritas, I would go for one of the Ruina series from Noise Engineering. They are basically different flavors of distortion in a much more affordable and SMALLER footprint.