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I've been interested in building a small rack with some synth/digital piano modules, samplers, effects, recording gear, etc.

Honestly, I'd really love an Electron Fuzz Custom Studio, Sherman Filterbank 2x2, Culture Vulture, Plasma Rack, Deckard's Dream, and some nice utilities (interface, patchbay, power conditioner, etc.), but that's not going to happen any time soon. I'm definitely on much more of a budget than that.

So talk to me about classic and criminally underrated rack gear that can be had at a reasonable price. Anything I should keep my eyes on?

Yea I bet this is an obvious one but I still love the sound of the Alesis quadraverb and midiverbs... any version but the midiverb ii is just so easy to use.


And then, I might be alone on this one but the boss gx-700 and a few fuzz pedals is about all I need for guitar effects!

There was a Roland P330 and Alesis MidiVerb available locally for $50 each. Tried to buy them, but the owner never responded

I'll check out the Boss GX700. I've got a Boss DE200 that I've really been enjoying.

For fx, I love the Lexicon Vortex all day--I've picked up two, each for less than $90. Lexicon Reflex is a decent reverb with a very cool resonator unit that can be had for not much more.
Synth wise, the Roland JVs are cool 90s romplers. I paid less than $120, including the Keyboards of the 60s and 70s card. I scored a Fantom XR for under $275, but I think that's still a rare price, and maybe more than you want to spend? Also lurve my $80 Midiverb 2.

That's all what I got (I'm a rack bottom-feeder).

Oh wait--also, the 1/2 rack wide Boss fx are cool, especially the pitch shifter and sampler/delay, but also the flanger. There is a doohickey to mount 2 of those side x side in a standard rack....

Yeah I saw a pile of those Boss 1/2 racks on Instagram and they looked pretty nice. I would definitely grab some of those if I got the chance

I've heard good things about the Roland JVs as well

I like the Ibanez hd1500.

Don't know if it's underrated but the vermona ring mod is great.

Agreed on boss half racks. Sampler and Pitch are awesome.

Monomachine can rack mount!

I'd stay away from the old Roland samplers unless you really want to buy a lot of accessories.

ADAT

Ensoniq Mirage (it's a classic though)

Bode Frequency Shifter!

Let's all go in together for a group buy of a Bode

My little Yamaha FX500 half rack was a lot of fun until it eventually died on me. I also have a really cool Image IDL-1000 that looks like maybe a rebranded Ibanez delay of some kind. It's got a hold function that's super fun for drones.

It's not as cheap, but the Lexicon PCM41 is awesome. I think the 42 is the more coveted one, but the 41 sounds great to me.

Watch for noise gates and other dynamics boxes with a “key” or side-chain input. Feed with an oscillator, a drum machine, or some random audio for weird tremolo.

Investigate any rack delay with knobs, particularly if they do feedback/regeneration and assuredly if they do positive AND negative feedback. The only things more you could want for flanging are an input for external LFO with more waveform options and an effects loop in the feedback path. (Well, and two of them for through-zero.) If it has a hold/infinite mode, it may act differently from other brands with the feature in terms of whether you can permanently mangle audio in the buffer. So get more delays so they do different things.

Digitech DHP-55 harmonizers often go for less than the IPS-33b/DHP-33 that people chase for WH-1/Gilmour/The Edge but, while sounding a bit different, the 55 does a lot more things with deeper control.

A Lexicon LXP-5 or LXP-15II is a cheap gateway into Lexicon’s “glide” delays, where you can adjust the speed of the pitch change in a modulated delay. Very deep stuff can be done with the 15, which has a ton of modulation sources internally and accept five CV inputs.

Watch for old graphic eq’s because they may not be “constant bandwidth” types. Constant bandwidth types are the boring stuff lame-o people use to try to tune the room flat in a hifi of PA system. IIRC, the other type is called proportional because the bandwidth of the band is proportional to the boost intensity. You can do weird fun things like encroach on of augment the intensity of the boost or cut in the adjacent band and have really intense effects on the input.

I don’t have a ton of rack gear experience, but I will echo that the Alesis half rack reverb units are sick. The lexicon reverbs are awesome. My favorite vocal reverb, but pretty good all around.

Lexicon reverbs are legendary. the MidiVerb II is the best of the Alesis iterations...it's not exactly adjustable, but the sound is awesome. it's such an essential part of Tommy Emmanuel's sound that he carries a spare in his small rack. the Yamaha SPX-90 is really good for modulation and has some interesting reverb tricks; the guitar-specific GEP-50 loses some of the more arcane mod and reverb presets in favor of some pretty dreadful digital distortion patches, but is cheaper. either will give you the backwards-reverb setting that Kevin Shields famously used c. the You Made Me Realise EP, but you have to tweak the hell out of it to get something useable. i run the GEP into the SPX's effects loop and set them up with matched reverb settings i need to get a FX-500 so i can do that Slowdive shit. if you can find the old Ibanez analog multi-effect units from the early 80s they're really nice in a primitive Martin Hannett sort of way. the nice thing about this kind of equipment is that most of it is less than $200/unit other than the Ibanez which is fairly uncommon. $100 SPX-90s are as common as dead deer at the side of the road. hauling a big rack around is a pain in the ass, though. or should i say pain in the back?

for example, i would buy the fuck out of this thing. i got to play with one c.1982 and it was delightful.

https://reverb.com/item/20303214-vintag ... footswitch

I get an email whenever an Alesis DEQ 230 D comes up on ebay, but they're always too expensive. Dat display doe.

I'd like to replace my Line 6 Filter Pro and Korg TR Rack that I sold someday.

Fantom XR is the only thing I ever found that could load and play midi files with non-midi synth voices, that was pretty cool.

Kurzweil Mangler can be recorded digitally if you have a SPDIF input, and it has a nice clean boost available. The effects are fine, nothing amazing but all very usable stuff, and some good combo algorithms too.

Paging rfurtkamp....

Zooms half-rack units are pretty awesome super grating distortion machines. Boss SE-50/70 are pretty nice effects units that are pretty common, theres also the VF-1 which supposedly is a really good quality piece of gear. Yamahas samplers are pretty cool and not very sought after but have a very cool sound to them.