Can we talk about modular synths?

[D.o.S.]

That swarm sounds nice but price is double what I thought it’d be.

It's been at 500€ since day one

[D.o.S.]

V V

[oscillateur]

also also, i know this will NEVER happen, and mebbe it's offensive to the whole idea of a Completely Modular Setup, but what i would loooooooooove......

if every module that had a Clock In/Out had it on the back of the module as well. and normalled so if you put something in the Clock In/Out on the front it broke the path. but if you wanted to have a master clock, you could wire all that in the back. i get annoyed at myself whenever i'm tearing a patch down and i forget to leave the clock paths in.

When Dieter Doepfer started Eurorack modular (that rack format existed before but he was the first to use that for modular), he wanted to do things like that, which is why there are so many pins in the power header. Sadly, this was never enforced as a format and thus very few modules use this. A couple of other manufacturers tried things like this too later but as there are now hundreds of modules (if not manufacturers), it's basically too late.

[Dark Barn]

A few modules do this and it is kinda neat to see in action. When I had the Varigate 8+ in my rack along with my PEG they would sync automagically. Other modules like the Disting can recall presets using the same technology (I could have but never actually did try it.) The caveat is that all modules must be on the same bus. And I have heard some people say it has caused other modules to behave oddly if they were on the same bus as modules that use this feature.

[Dark Barn]

Need to start a What Would Dieter Do? awareness campaign.

[popvulture]

Little Dieter Needs to Clock.

[behndy]

Germanic Regimented AWESOMENESS please.

hurm. i was thinking of an actual jack to run 1/8 cables amongst modules in the rear (heh), over the same bus that carries power seems.... problematic.

well. someone else start complaining with me. it would be BOSS to have all the Standard Let's Go ACTION TIME cabling all hidden and neat, yet breakable to play with.

also, i applaud Rabid Elefante dooder for trying to improve upon what doesssss seem to have some shortcomings in it's design (why. WHY would anybody NOT use keyed headers?), but his New Improved Everyone Will Adopt This THEY WILL REALLY power format seems very cool but..... a bit.... hopeful? that it will be universally adopted?

[Dark Barn]

Yeah the Rabid Elephant power solution seems a little goofy, that he needs to educate each and every customer how to use it with a little note in the box just underscores how goofy. Imo he should have saved this solution for whenever he releases his own bus boards, and then sell power cables to people that subscribe to his system. And for everyone else he should have shipped a regular header power cable that ends in his own format on the module. Either way it’s not a huge deal but it just strikes me as backwards way of circulating a new idea. ‘Here’s my improved system that would be safer if you had the right busboards but since nobody has those please consult the scrap of paper I included in your module. Blue equals red, mmkay?’

Natural Gate is really good though!

[behndy]

YOU HAVE ONE? GIMME. I WANNNNNNNNT.

[Dark Barn]

Yeah I got one. It’s got a great sound and nice playability with the sliders. It’s simple but has some neat possibilities with the ‘gate memory’ or however they have marketed it. I mostly use the setting that avoids/reduces the memory effect but with the right inputs the memory can be really neat. Sorry can’t tell you much more than that but everyone seems to love it. I hope you can get one in the second batch.

[behndy]

OR YOU COULD GIVE ME YOURS. JUST SAYING.

yeah. i wannnnnnnnnt.

[dozicusmaximus]

Plonk patch tips, anyone?

I've only really ran some Pam's into pitch/Trig it and a bit of LFO or ENV on other parameters.

Looking for some more glitchy esque stuff. Not full on everything is modulated weird noises. I got a cool crackley thing last night on one of the Tom presets. I'm kind of getting where I want with it.

[_r_]

So, I'd always considered modular as something interesting but I never really had a reason to get into it. I never had a good answer for the first question you should ask yourself when building a rack: "what am I trying to get out of this?".


That changed for me today at Music Expo SF. I really have had very little hands-on time with modular synths (played the rack at Switched On a few times, and I've got VCV rack). 4MS was at the expo, Hugo there was a super awesome dude to meet and chat with, and of course they had a 9U case populated with all of their modules. The new tapographic delay they're doing is very cool but I was drawn to this large module with a little ring of LEDs. It looked cool, and said "resonator" on it, which very much interests me. Fast forward about 30 mins later after Hugo talked me through some of the many ways to use the spectral resonator and I'm just feeling totally obsessed. The sound from that module is exactly the answer to my question "what and I trying to get out of modular?". I look up the price as soon as I'm home and of course I've chosen something silly expensive to get hooked on right out of the gate. I know there are other, more affordable modules out there that are resonators, but I'd like to get into the idea of building a small case focused around the 4MS resonator. I'm specifically interested in just making textural drone stuff with a heavy focus on that 4MS resonator. I'm sure I'll have lots of noob questions later but I'm just going to dig in and start with some reading. I'm not in a rush to do this, as I'm moving soon, but I've definitely entered the planning/pre-planning phase.


And it isn't pre-pre-planning if you haven't started on MG yet, right? https://www.modulargrid.net/e/racks/view/543963

Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith does some cool stuff with the Spectral Multiband Resonator and Tempi, don't know if you've seen this:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fcb-xv174GM[/youtube]

[Strange Tales]

I love my SMR. I don't think I'd ever sell it because I'm proud of building that thing.

Either way, great for drones, gongs, modulating other things. The selection of scales is awesome. I sort of want to build a second one to try the vocoding patch they have listed in their manual.

[rainlet]

Saw r beny's new 4-track/tape warble custom unit on IG and it broke me. Guess I've got an ER-301 order in the queue now. Luckily, by the time it's built and shipped, my budget will have recovered to the point where I can buy modules again.