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Still learning/ building out my first system. I spend a lot of time head scratching, but it's really neat when something comes together

Very cool. I have two S.B.G.s in my minimal system.

Since this build is more intended as a "sidecar" as far as its own voicing goes, I opted to add more in the way of modulation sources so that these can go out to the Hydrasynth and/or Minibrute as needed.

This is fantastic, thanks so much for your input on this!

Like I said, this is sort of an "example"...but it's actually not a bad example as it is. But it does hit all the bases...you've got a very capable voice section, modulation is nicely overspecced for the modular and other synths to use, and you get onboard FX and stereo mixing that can also take external signals. This is pretty much the sort of thing that would be ideal as a Rackbrute complement for both the Hydrasynth and the Minibrute, though.
-- Lugia

I just received my RackBrute 6U today and want to start building this out. I can't afford to do this all at once so I'm wondering what makes sense in terms of starting points? My thought was to build out the top row first by adding the first four modules and then playing/experimenting with those for a few months until I add the other four and then again playing around with everything for a few months before doing the same on the bottom row. Is that a realistic approach considering the recommended build?

EDITED May 19th 2021, 12:38

Sure thing @nickgreenberg,

Glad to contribute and help. Everyone here is great and helped me when I had questions as well. I am using Vector and Stillson Hammer for leads/pads and Eloquencer/Metron/Euclidian Circles v2 for drums/beats. I clock them all together using Pamela New Workout or Data module.

@Lugia Wow I will need some time to go through the suggestions and understand them. Thanks a ton for putting so much time and effort into doing this, I truly appreciate it!

I just had a quick look and was wondering if you had any suggestions to include the possibility of converting trigs/gates from this system to midi to be able to sequence some midi hardware. I'm not sure if the Mutant Brain can do this. Also, I am starting to learn Max Msp and would like to be able to use it someday with the system. How would you go about changing this system to include these features as well?

2hp verb-
2hp delay-
Pico vcf1-
Strymon aa1-
4ms row power 45-

Oh wow I didn't expect such great involvement in this forum. I was kinda overwhelmed with all the possibilities and fear of picking the wrong modules or missing out on the "better" ones. I appreciate all the inputs!

@nickgreenberg - Great links, I will check them out. Haha yes, I found all these weird / strange modules and I have a tendency of being overambitious without giving it a thought whether I would be able to truly understand and use them as I wanted. But I guess I am willing to put in some serious hard work and see how things go :)

I'd go as minimal as possible to start with - probably just some ways to sequence and combine triggers - unity mixers, switched multiples* and gate/trigger combiners etc - and a trig31

get that working how you want and then consider adding a sound source

how are you mixing/listening?

*this is contentious - you shouldn't use multiples as mixers - bad, bad practice - it will work until it fries your expensive module - but if you only ever use your switched multiple for this purpose then it works
-- JimHowell1970

Thanks for the inputs Jim I will take it into consideration! I was planning to use the expert sleepers connected to my audio interface via adat for listening and mixing in the box.

I have noticed when adding modules to your racks on this site there are some well known DIY pcb kits in the list, BUT is there a way to add your own custom modules or faceplates to the rack if you are a mostly DIY build your own guy? I want to setup my rack on here but not able to figure out how to add my custom modules and faceplates.

thanks.

Hi, I also dabble in inharmonic sounds and got two modules for it:

1) Harmonic Shift Oscillator
As you mentioned, it allows you to change the harmonic stride in the range from 0.0 to 4.0. A natural, harmonic sound would have a stride of 1.0. This parameter can even be CV controlled and is a really funky and unique feature of the module. Be aware that you need at least two of those modules to make the kind of experimental intervals as shown in the video you posted.
With the HSO It's pretty easy to generate bass sounds that have a gnarly bass guitar feel to it, by using a slightly inharmonic stride (e.g., 1.05) . As with low piano strings, bass guitar strings have a noticeable inharmonicity due to the stiffness of the strings.

2) Dreadbox Antiphon
This comes with 8 sinus oscillators which you can use to build up complex sounds by mixing them together and adjusting the frequency of each harmonic to your liking. However, you need to tune the range and offset for all 8 oscillators which is really difficult and time consuming and you need some external tuner or spectrum viewer to do that properly.

iirc - go back to the page and refresh it and then repost the link

@Lugia, thanks for the heads up!

Everyone else, yes copy your favorite Lugia racks (and related posts?) before that stuff disappears. Totally agree with "while these were done for different individual users, they're still super-useful as studies on how successful basic builds are put together." I've copied 13 of my favorite Lugia builds / examples.

Do we happen to know, as Lugia deletes older racks, will those disappear from forum threads? There are a lot of useful threads with racks posted as examples + some discussion. I haven't been on the forum long enough to know if the in-thread rack graphics get deleted if the original rack poster makes a rack change or deletion.

EDITED May 18th 2021, 22:23

-- @ffsimpson, on the topic of "understanding utilities," practically, if you spend some time scanning the Doepfer and Ladik modules, and read about anything you don't immediately understand, that will give concrete examples of a TON of various modular functions, including lots of utilities.

EDITED May 18th 2021, 05:33

Strange, it's not showing everything... I don't have a Dixie 2 plus, plaits, or vca. What's wrong with sharing my module???

EDITED May 18th 2021, 16:11

OK...I had a bash at this, starting with my recommendation for the cab...in this case, I used a 3-row 126 hp design by Case From Lake that runs roughly $650, powered. The nice thing about Case From Lake is that they can do bespoke alterations to their base-level cabs, so if you need beefier power, more depth, etc etc...they do that.

Woooooo...was this ever NUTS! Normally, I would say that drums don't belong in a build, but in this situation, the requirements all revolve around timing and sequencing, so I knuckled-down and had at it, deleting a number of modules that either made no sense in the build's context or which were better-filled by other modules.

Top row: This is generally "voices" in my builds, and it's that here as well...with some tweaks. All of the original percussive modules are at the left side of the row, and then I added a pair of Bastl state-variables (mainly for the Chimera and Plonk) and a six-in manual stereo mixer to submix the entire percussion complement down to stereo. I didn't bother with VCAs here, because percussion largely doesn't require them. After that, there's the Spherical Wavetable stereo VCO and an Intellijel Morgasmatron...in this case, also without VCAs as the performance mixer below has those.

Middle row: The percussion sequencer is on the left end, conveniently located below the percussion modules. Then the next several modules are all modulation: a Synthesis Technologies Morphing Dual LFO, Intellijel Quadrax + Qx, a dual VCA based on the Veils VCAs, Tiptop's MISO for modulation signal alterations, then ADDAC's Stochastic Function Generator. Since so much of what's in the build depends on a certain degree of stochastics, I figured that this would be a more appropriate substitute for Maths. Then a Happy Nerding FX Aid is located right by the Toppobrillo Stereomix2, which gives you four input channels with VCA over levels, CV panning and AUX send, a headphone preamp (with a CUE function), manual mutes, and an FX send/return path.

Bottom row: Mainly, this is timing and control: Mutant Brain for MIDI, Pam's, O&c, Sloths...then a Doepfer noise/sample and hold module. Then the real clock manipulation starts with the QCD setup, followed by a dual gate delay and a dual probabilistic gate skipper, followed by the Illyana Boolean module. On the other side of this, there's a Joranalogue Dual Window Comparator for picking gate signals off of modulation. Then the Tool Box also has another comparator, along with a number of other useful submodules that all have potential uses in this build. The Ladik Derivator also picks off gates, but this time they're dependent on CV movement. And for CVs, on the right end is a Time's Arrow, a stochastic pattern generator which I've tandemmed here with the Stochastic Inspiration Generator to cause much more complex melodic/harmonic pattern behavior than just the SIG alone.

This is a pretty complicated build. Things that I dropped included the Hexmix, all of the mults (use inline ones...no sense in wasting functional panel space!), the trig-to-MIDI modules, and the multiplexer...mainly because they didn't appear to have any functions that couldn't be filled by changing other modules in the build, or because they simply didn't appear to make sense. So there was a good amount of "streamlining" going on here, even though this result might still look overly-complex. Some others, such as the PEG, were just too big to be sustainable here, plus they also were able to be swapped for similar/identical functions in other modules that made more sense, space-wise. Plus, some things here violate my usual build pattern (most notably, the performance mixer being on the middle row) because...well, space has demands. But this final result is pretty cohesive, partly from dropping some modules, and partly from speccing different modules that could take up the slack for the removed ones. So, it's better...it's COMPLICATED, but yeah...better.

EDITED May 18th 2021, 02:15

Thanks for the help everyone, I think Lugia got it right with the m32 preferring gate impulses. I've tried multing the trigger from euclid through moms onboard mult to no avail. The trigger output from my disting won't do the trick either -but pams gates work like a charm. And thanks for the heads up about the m32's scaling, the more I try and make mom work with my eurorack stuff the less I like it... If only she could be perfect like Pam.

If you're at all curious about the new Xaoc BBD delay "Sarajewo" this is a 'first look' demo based mainly on feedback tones with a more traditional melodic sequence at the end

See Page 59 infra here: https://back.moogmusic.com/sites/default/files/2020-07/Mother_32_Users_Manual.pdf

There's two possibilities here...one of them is that the clock input might be set to the wrong mode, and the pages above show how to correct that. The other could well be that the Euclidean module is only outputting trigger pulses, and the M32 prefers to see gate pulses, which have a longer duration.

One other point: you won't have full CV control over the M32 from Eurorack without the use of a module such as Erica's MSCALE, as the M32 uses -5V to +5V as its scaling, and generally you don't see negative CV values in Eurorack modules.

The point about utilities being the secret sauce of modular is interesting. I guess, like Nick said, its hard to grasp at first because unlike oscillators, samplers, filters, envelopes, LFOs etc, 'utilities' don't really exist in the conventional world of music and are unique to modular (to my limited knowledge).

Sure they do! Let's look at an actual instrument...in this case, bass clarinet, as I know those like the back of my hand.

While you won't have a sampler on a wind instrument, everything else actually IS THERE...it's just not apparent. The "oscillator" then becomes the vibrating reed that energizes the air column, "filter" is all sorts of timbral modifications that can be done with fingering, altering embouchure, etc, "envelopes" are controlled by breathflow and tonguing, and "LFOs" are whatever you do to induce vibrato...embouchure movement, changes in breathflow, physically moving the instrument, etc. Plus the "controller" is all of those keys and pads and stuff. But are any of these things "modular", per se? Again...sure. Modern compositions are chock-full of what you'd call "extended techniques"...and one that comes to mind is using a trombone mouthpiece instead of a single-reed mouthpiece on a tenor sax. Sounds pretty "modular" to me!

I live in Australia which has unbalanced mains power. How much of a factor is noise? I've read that modules tend to put out a pretty hot signal, but yeah I might just follow Jim's advice and try without, then attenuate, then balance. I'm only running it into either an octatrack or external soundcard.

With UNbalanced power (which we also have in the USA), yes, isolation becomes important to deal with all sorts of sonic crud, hum, etc. And one other useful point: if you get an output module that has a balanced output via transformers (like Happy Nerding's Isolate), you can overdrive the transformers a bit and get a nice signal warmup. That's great for basslines and percussives, to get them a little more crunchy and in-yer-face.

Re VCAs: what's the difference between a VCA and an envelope/LFO module? also VCA vs attenuator?

A VCA (stands for Voltage Controlled Amplifier) is a circuit that controls gain. You feed a signal in one side, then send a control signal to it, and the original signal is now under the control of that control signal, which can be all sorts of modulation signals. There's two topologies, also...AC-coupled and DC-coupled...and two types.

AC-coupled VCAs are definitely for audio ONLY. These don't have DC coupling, so they can't pass signals below the subsonic range. As a result, AC-coupled VCAs tend to be logarithmic in response so that their dynamic changes fit with what human hearing considers to be changes in "apparent loudness", which we perceive on the logarithmic dB scale.

Then there's DC-coupled VCAs. These can pass DC, which means they can be used to control the amplitude of modulation signals. And since the changes these make are linear, it's possible to use these VCAs to modify modulation levels to make the modulation follow specific scalings, etc which are VERY necessary for oscillators, VCF cutoffs, etc. But also, there is a hazard in having these as your output VCA(s) as the DC they can pass isn't something you can hear...but your monitors will notice, and enough DC fed to a speaker will cause it to pop as well as also potentially causing amplifier damage.

It's also worth noting that VCAs usually don't provide a gain factor higher than 1, meaning that if you send 2.5V into a wide-open VCA, you should get 2.5V out the other side. Some do, however, and these are often useful at the end of the audio path...either as a preamp for the mixer, or to "push" the level after the mixer.

Envelope generators and LFOs are modulation sources. You can feed their outputs through VCAs to control their levels, but they themselves aren't designed to be the control circuit for the level changes. Instead, a VCA needs a modulation source to be fed to its control input so that its gain factor can be changed to anywhere between factors of 0 to 1, imposing those changes on the VCA's thruputted signal.

Attenuators also control amplitude. But attenuators can control CV voltage levels, so if you need to have a device track at 1/2, you'd use an attenuator in the device's control path, and this would allow you to have half-scaling for that device. This can be very useful for manipulating VCF cutoffs so that they can track in proportion to, but not the same as, the main pitch CV. Plus, there are attenuverters...these have their zero-point at the CENTER of the pot, and their full outputs are at either end...but with one end, the signal is inverted. These are great for inverting modulation signals for a number of things; you can cobble together a crossfader, for example, with two VCAs and an attenuverter to provide the negative control signal for one of them.

-- ffsimpson

Uhm...yeah. Or rather, no. Jim's done a great job at the debug, and I'll have to concur with him that this looks like no fun whatsoever to work with. Plus, it doesn't really have all that much to it that complements the Mini 2S; I would expect to see more clock manipulation, logic, etc...the sort of modules that can make sequencers do utterly crazy things. But this looks aimless, like a lot of stuff tossed in with no particular order or signal flow, so for starters I'd suggest making that aspect more cohesive FIRST...then the operational flaws should be a lot more apparent.

Hi ModLifeCrisis,

I wasn't aware of the SBG module yet, so very informative video this was for me, thank you very much :-)

Kind regards, Garfield.

Yeah, the uses for the send/return modules go deeper than just an insert point for stompboxes. For one thing, it's basically an "unfixed" effects processor, as the actual processing done depends on what you choose to drop into the insert, and this can be as simple as a fuzzbox or as complex as an entire pedalboard. And then there's their uses as extra mono-outs or external signal inputs.

One thing I need to try is using something like this to admit a no-input system's signal into a modular for final manipulation. My AE system has a couple of their 4I/O modules (like these, but with four "soft" I/Os instead of the dedicated input and output), so it should be a good candidate for this.

@visakhv16, welcome to modular and Modular Grid!

A few comments:

-- the case size you picked is good, IMO big enough to be interesting, small enough to be portable, not cost a fortune, and not be completely baffling. I personally like Doepfer cases, and you can surely find those in a size similar to above.

-- regarding your goal "I'm trying to create a system which could act as a complex, evolving rhythm-generator/sequencer." IMO this is one of the harder things to pull off with some understanding and control of what's going on. SO I would say if that's what you want, patience and doing some "homework" will be very rewarding. See this post, the 3 links mentioned at the top https://www.modulargrid.net/e/forum/posts/index/9906 and also this post https://www.modulargrid.net/e/forum/posts/index/9928 ... those will have a lot of ideas and draft racks for you to explore!

-- your draft rack above has about as many complex modules put together as I've ever seen. I can tell you, as a 37 year musician and 15 year synthesist working with VSTs, getting into modular was still tough for me! It is hard enough to really understand a "basic" module, or function generator like Stages, let alone other modules which can be far far deeper and mysterious. This is not to say "avoid complex modules" -- but to point out it takes some real time, manual reading, experimentation, and practice to start to get some control over their behavior. Jim's advice (above) to do "minimum viable" or core system, then 1-2 modules at a time is good; that said, the urge to dive in (and maybe go overboard), I get it!

Good luck!

is it this rack??

I'd replace the vca with a quadcascading one such as veils, if you can and the filter with something smaller - doepfer perhaps - and add a kinks - and possibly a disting if it will fit

utilities more important you already have 2 modulation sources - tides and maths

just checking, but you are triggering the 2hp module from pam's aren't you?
and you are sure you plugged it in correctly?

the 2hp euclid module outputs +5v for 6ms - check the mom manual for how long it needs too be triggered?
pams outputs also +5v, but buffered

do you have a buffered mult? - you could try that - I have a few modules that Maths doesn't trigger for until it goes through a buffer

@timmy373, I can't tell how this 2nd rack is different than your first rack. I pulled up your prior post (1st rack) and the rack there and here look the same.

A few comments on what's above presently:

-- I've heard good things about Erica Black Sequencer BUT it is not quite for me. I find sequencers very deep and personal in fit (e.g. down to personal workflow and control preferences) SO I would urge anyone looking for a sequencer to shop carefully, watch some videos, browse manuals, and really consider workflow preferences. Personally I'm a huge fan of Five12 Vector sequencer.

-- I own QPAS and like it as a choice for filter to use, but I probably wouldn't go with it as my main or only filter. If I had only one "power-filter" I would choose from Morgasmatron, Rossum Linneaus, or SSF Stereo Dipole. Again, a matter of personal preference. Just wanted to highlight that there may be better "workhorse" filter choices if you're only having one in your rig.

-- Scanning the rest of the rack, I think you have a lot of good picks there. PNW, Maths, Links, Kinks, Triplatt, Battumi -- hard to go wrong with those! The 3HP expander for Batumi is nice, if you have the 3HP to spare. Bifold is great.

-- I'm not sold on MiniMod and ADDAC703 for you in this setup, though I'm not super familiar with those modules. Instead of those what about: i) something like 4ms SISM or Tiptop MISO for attenuating / offsetting CV ii) a stereo mixer like one from Doepfer (A-138s) iii) more VCAs? I see your comment above you end up using triplatt / tangle quartet more as mixers -- just adding more VCAs could give you some of what you want plus flexibility plus CV control. Intellijel Quad VCA remains a fav of mine on that front. Food for thought.

-- my biggest response / question re: above is "where's the room for future growth?" Have you considered a bigger case? If you had the exact same modules above, but in a bigger case with say 30-50% room left open (but IRL covered with blank panels to avoid accidents), then I would think "that's a pretty reasonable set of modules, he can add a few more in a couple weeks / months after he has a better idea what's underrepresented in his rig." BUT if you're committed to this size case above, then IMO it warrants a bit more scrutiny (on module selection) to get the most fun and function out of that much HP.

-- A couple last comments: as a rack, it still seems relatively heavy on sound sources, and light on utilities. Again, if you had HP left over to add modules over time, no big deal. Layout is rather scattered, but you can update that any time; I would tend to group together voicing (OSC, filters, waveshapers), CV, utilities, fx, then last line out.

So those are a few of my personal reactions to the build above. Hope to see some other forum folks chime in here soon. Good luck!

EDITED May 17th 2021, 22:20

First time posting.

Got into modular back in February. Next module purchase in July will be the Maths. So I'm currently really enjoying the Bloom, tides, and Dixie2 and making quite a few melodies and soundscapes. I would like to do more modulation and experimenting with automating sounds (especially the tides and filter). So here is my question: what do I fill the last 4 HP with? LFO or VCAs?

Currently looking at an OHCD. But not sure if that would be as useful as a dual VCA in that space.

Thoughts? And thanks.

@sacguy71, thanks for the tips and references above!!!

I can do that with pam's (which is what I'm going to try next). It's the 2hp euclid module, which is being clocked by pam and the steps are being modulated by a disting in random step quantize mode (like a turing machine). Pammy can even do the euclid+turing machine thing by herself I believe. Thanks for the tip about the "hotter" triggers.

I'd go as minimal as possible to start with - probably just some ways to sequence and combine triggers - unity mixers, switched multiples* and gate/trigger combiners etc - and a trig31

get that working how you want and then consider adding a sound source

how are you mixing/listening?

*this is contentious - you shouldn't use multiples as mixers - bad, bad practice - it will work until it fries your expensive module - but if you only ever use your switched multiple for this purpose then it works

can't you do that with Pam's anyway? definitely has euclidean

it's possible that mom needs hotter triggers - so you'd need an amplifier - do you have anything else that can do that - veils r intellijel quad vca perhaps?

which euclidean sequencer is it - does it need a clock? or do you need to switch on an internal clock?

New guy here. I've been trying to trigger my mother-32 from a euclidean sequencer all morning only to find that the mother will listen to pamelas workout, but not my euclidean module... Is this an issue of gates versus triggers? Honestly I'm getting pretty discouraged with the amount of time I spend just trying to connect stuff together.

(The idea with the euclid module is to get variable pattern lengths and steps on the fly)

Yes, I recommend the YT videos by Steve Turner as he is a real Vector guru! The main thing is to understand how routing and parts work on the sequencer. I am getting the hang of it and by far my favorite sequencer now for Eurorack and easiest to understand. Here are some links:

Basic tutorial on Vector

vector blog and tips by Steve Turner
https://steveturner.com.au/blog/blog/five12-vector-sequencer-links-to-all-articles

Also be sure to join the large Vector 512 Facebook group and forum as well!

Both Steve and Jim are stand up gentlemen always willing to help out with questions.
After playing with the sequencer this weekend, it works better for melodic lead and pad sequences and not as good for drums as my other sequencers like Metron and Eloquencer but that's ok because what I was looking for at this point was a good complex melodic composition sequencer tool for modular and this ticks all the buttons. Plus it looks amazing and fun to use.

Thanks Jim! I'm trying to create a system which could act as a complex, evolving rhythm-generator/sequencer. I do have a few elektron boxes for which I would like to send triggers out from this system via midi. That's why I added 2 trig 31s. As for the mults I just added them in there as I thought it would be helpful to route copies of signals to different destinations but I guess I could also do that with the 32:1 which I added today?

As for the modules I would like to keep, they would be the IoLabs Flux, Stochastic Inspiration Generator, Chimera, Fracture, QD, QCD (I like the idea of the expander but not sure if its super necessary), RCD, SWN and maybe Pams new workout.

The main goal is to create a generative system which helps me program complex rhythmic sequences which would be difficult with a linear / step sequencer setup.

starting with which modules you want and the modules you need to support them and leaving some space for expansion would probably be a good idea - a couple of mantises will work perfectly in that regard - start with one and add a minimum viable system and get to know that first - then proceed with the rest of the modules one or 2 at a time

I would suggest you add some more information - what sort of music you want to make with the modular and which modules are 'keepers' in this rack

then one or more of us can rip it apart and you'll end up in a better place - there are some obvious questions too - why do you need 2 trig31s? and 3 passive mults?

Thanks for the responses everyone – learning a lot.
The point about utilities being the secret sauce of modular is interesting. I guess, like Nick said, its hard to grasp at first because unlike oscillators, samplers, filters, envelopes, LFOs etc, 'utilities' don't really exist in the conventional world of music and are unique to modular (to my limited knowledge).

They are mostly hidden

I'm pretty committed to 2 x 84 HP, just because I don't have a lot of space, and want to keep the arrangement of gear on the desk relatively flexible. Also I don't plan on building a massive collection of modules, I'll probably buy/sell stuff until I have a setup I'm happy with, but who knows... If I do eventually want to go bigger I'll probably just get another 2 x 84. Also I think I want to stick with eurorack because I'm not too interested in building a conventional synth – I like the range of unique stuff in eurorack.

104hp is 10cm wider - depending on the case a mantis may only be 8cm or s wider as it has very thin sides

I live in Australia which has unbalanced mains power. How much of a factor is noise? I've read that modules tend to put out a pretty hot signal, but yeah I might just follow Jim's advice and try without, then attenuate, then balance. I'm only running it into either an octatrack or external soundcard.

good luck!!! - are the inputs balanced or unbalanced on the octatrack and sound card????? if so then you may want a balanced output!

hot doesn't have anything to to with balanced - it just means the peak to peak of the voltage is higher than line level

Re VCAs: what's the difference between a VCA and an envelope/LFO module? also VCA vs attenuator?

a VCA is a voltage controlled amplifier, although most only have unity gain, so are technically attenuators and not amplifiers

you send a signal (audio or cv) through the VCA and control the amount of the signal let through with an envelope or lfo

attenuator is manually controlled - vcas may also be able to be manually controlled

Definitely not something I would want to play with!

TOP ROW
Plaits, nRings, Monsoon - personally I would go all original and I would hold out for a beads - better ergonomics and Emilie gets paid!!!

I'd dump the doepfer mixer and get a second quad vca (veils is really good!)

The filter is fucking huge!!!! way too big in a case this size find something smaller

Unity Mixer I would replace with Links - depending on how you use it there are up to 2 buffered mults, a precision adder, and 2 mixers - in 4hp!

TM - if you are going to use this you need to get a quantizer too (I suspect you want to use this to transpose the minibrute sequencer) no quantizer means no need for precision adders...

BOTTOM ROW
attenuator - Hasn't the Dreadbox WL series been discontinued? you could swap for a 2hp trim (or get a bigger module that is easier to use - shades perhaps (will also double as a precision adder)

Slew Limiter - find the space for Maths or Rampage or a DUSG - you will get a thousand times more mileage out of one of these (especially Maths with it's brilliant illustrated manual - 32 self patching examples)

Precision Adder - you probably won't use bus access and precision adding can be done elsewhere

VCADSR - again huge - find something that does the same job but smaller - 8hp or so - or go for stages which can do more interesting envelopes and much more - make sure it will work with triggers as well as gates - you don't have a lot of gate sources and some ADSR type modules only work when they are held open - triggers only last a few ms

DADSR - ok - again make sure it will work with triggers as well as gates

Disting EX - ok

seq switch - ok

passive mult - get stackcables or headphone splitters

is that the wk1 or the wk1 aroom mod? aroom mod and you need no other precision adders - as you can transpose 3 voct signals at at a time

clock divider - ok

batumi - ok but seriously consider the expander (or diying one) so you can switch the assignable waveform easily

scale - see above, the attenuator - shades will also cover this

logic - I would replace this with kinks - logic, noise, sample and hold and rectification in 4hp

midi interface - won't the minibrute do this?????

vca - I wouldn't bother unless you need another one after replacing the mixer with a quad cascading vca

GENERAL
your idea of stereo audio path is not quite true plaits is not stereo it is dual mono (as is the filter - a couple of doepfer SEM filters could replace this in less space) - 2 different signals - rings is stereo ish - depending on the setting! and both have vcas built in - so you really need the vcas for modulation and not audio!

also no way of moving audio in the stereo field - where is the panning???

I'd add an fx aid xl aswell!

I'm building my first rack and welcome feedback, suggestions and modifications. I haven't decided a case and power supply too. I would appreciate some suggestions for the same.

Nice work :)
-- wishbonebrewery

Thanks a lot :)

Hi ModLifeCrisis,

Wow, that's amazing, you have a waterproof Eurorack ;-)

Drone or not, nice ambient track it is! :-) It's lovely relaxing to listen at, watching the video, feeling so relaxed. Yes nice, I want more of this :-)

I miss a bit your commentary at the beginning of each track, any chance of that happen again? :-)

Thank you very much for sharing this and kind regards, Garfield.
-- GarfieldModular

Thanks Garfield. Just for you, I have uploaded a video which is virtually all talk - about the ALM S.B.G. Hope you enjoy it.
Regards, MLC.

I was recently asked in a forum (not this one) why I had the ALM S.B.G. or Stompbox Gateway in my rack when I could just put an FX module in instead. This got me thinking about the S.B.G., which I often use to plumb in external guitar pedals I have, such as the MXR Carbon Copy analog delay.

But with so few modules in my rack, I have also found myself using the S.B.G. for other things, besides routing audio to stomp boxes. In this video I go through some of the bonus uses I've discovered for the S.B.G., which make it, for me, a surprisingly useful little box to have in my Nifty Case.

Oh my goodness! Lugia, thank you SO MUCH! This is BRILLIANT! It's exactly what I needed! I can't wait to put this into action! Feels like it will be a steep learning curve but that doesn't put me off! :)
Thanks again!

Hi everyone,

I've been working on a little project to scratch a personal itch called the kxmx_bluemchen. It is an open source, 4HP, Eurorack module powered by the Electrosmith Daisy Seed, and I've decided to make a handful of them.

The Daisy Seed is an embedded DSP development platform with an ARM Cortex-M7 MCU, High fidelity AKM stereo audio codec with up to 24-bit 192kHz, 64MB of SDRAM, and 8MB of flash memory. The Daisy Seed is a formidable platform which already powers a number of reputable Eurorack modules such as the Electrosmith Daisy Patch, the Qubit Surface, and the entire Noise Engineering Versio series.

The kxmx_bluemchen is a fully open source hardware design that attempts to expose as many capabilities of the Electrosmith Daisy Seed as possible, while remaining a compact 4HP wide. It features:

• 1 rotary encoder with push-button function
• 1 64x32 pixel OLED display
• 2 potentiometers
• 1 MicroSD card socket
• 1 MIDI TRS input
• 2 CV input
• 2 Audio input
• 2 Audio output

These hardware features can be used, in combination with the open source software libraries, to create the module that's in your head.

Being built on the Electrosmith Daisy Seed, this module leverages the open source libDaisy library for simple, intuitive access to the hardware features.

The DaisySP library provides you with a rich selection of curated DSP building blocks such as:

• Synthesis Methods: Subtractive, Physical Modeling, FM
• Filters: Biquad, State-Variable, Modal, Comb
• Dynamics: Compressor, Limiter, Crossfade
• Effects Processors: Reverb, Delay, Decimate
• Utilities: Math Functions, Signal Conditioning, Aleatoric Generators

If C++ is not your thing, I'm working to make kxmx_bluemchen available as a target for oopsy - Which will allow you to export Max Gen~ patcher to the kxmx_bluemchen hardware.

The kxmx_bluemchen is available as a built module or a DIY kit

So now that I have all the orders for parts out and I’m waiting for them to arrive, I'm going to start taking requests. I’ve put up a website and a registration form for those of you genuinely interested in buying a DIY kit or a module. I’m selling 10 DIY kits and 10 modules and will be handling requests first-come-first-serve. There’s a very good chance I won’t be making any more after this, so grab one now if you want one.

EDITED May 17th 2021, 12:22

Some words on the module arrangements.

• Upper part is mainly audio path, lower part mainly modulation and gate processing
• Attention has gone into getting the best reach to all buttons and switches, by doing the following:

1. Observe the upper part modules have been selected as much as possible to have the buttons above (jacks below), so no wires get in front of them
2. Small modules have small knobs, which make them difficult to handle. So those small modules are positioned at the full left or full right side
3. Jacks are as much as possible concentrated together, to provide more space around knobs.
4. At three places additional 2hp plates are installed, each with 6 additional switches or jacks to expand the possibilities of their adjacent modules. They were originally blind plates or passive multiples, and now enable the following
   • Gemini 2412: filters can go into resonance or not
   • A-135-2 : additional normalling paths added
   • A-141-2 and Ladik C-211 : additional options added
   • Disting EX: additional Midi In/Out via 2 mini-jacks
   • Clock Divider and Batumi: additional options added

EDITED May 17th 2021, 12:03

I started off making a traditional subtractive modular synth, only to realize I was remaining on known territory.

So I changed the challenge, and this is what I went for:
- no standard analog (emulation) oscillators! Therefor the choice for the Mutable Instruments based Plaits, nRings and Monsoon
- the minibrute has standard analog oscillators and a Steiner-Paker filter so these are already covered
- make us of the Minibrute 2S sequencer outputs and its noise generator in combination with the rack to create percussion
- have a stereo audio path from start to finish (stereo oscillators, mixer, filter, VCA)
- at least one advanced envelope (Doepfer A141-2)
- at least one delayable signal (found in the Ladik C-211 envelope generator)
- SEM-filter (Gemini 2412) (ladder filters are abundant)
- have the Wasp as additional filter, a sound different from all others (Doepfer A-124)
- lots of LFO's (Xaoc Batumi)
- at least two V/Oct precision adders (Doepfer and LPZW) for duophonic use
- midi interface (2HP)
- gate processing (Seq. Switch, Clock Divider, Logic module)
- CV processors (VCA's, attenuators, scaler, TM, slew limiters)
- top it off with a double 'Swiss Knife' as the Disting EX.

This rack does stuff I can't do with any of my other 20 synths, so it has its place!

That's actually a good question, i did not thought about. Luckily the 2 LPG are passiv. I could exchange the utility mixer and mult for an other links. I could leave out the Midi and Line-out tiles. Thats down to 30 still in need for changes.

Maybe it's an option to use 2 or 3 Make Noise Chain Cables. I'm not sure if they have impact on the signal quality but i can imagen its not a problem sinds flying busboard is a thing as well. The power consumption is well within the spec.

EDITED May 17th 2021, 11:26

That should work again, thanks for the report.

-- solitud

Fantastic, thank you!

EDITED May 17th 2021, 14:25

I notice that there seems to be no way (anymore) to go from a users list of marketplace entries directly to a specific offer.

That should work again, thanks for the report.

I notice that there seems to be no way (anymore) to go from a users list of marketplace entries directly to a specific offer. You can click on the module name and end on the module page and can then open the offer (if you remember the users name) from there, but that seems complicated. Would be nice if there was an additional link to the offer directly, which existed before.

Nice case! i love the variations. One Question. How do you fit so many modules in the Intellijel case with just 28 slots without to much Noise?