2021: A Year in Gear (What You've Bought or Want to Buy in 2021)

[Shabdahbriah]

Had to get this:

Elements Panel.png

... and this:

Rings Panel.png

For the two brand new ('legit') MI modules I got in a straight across trade, which are en route. I've never had either of these (though I have wanted to experiment with them, for years), and am well pleased that I procrastinated.

The ambient cool-kids, are doubtless shaking in their Wellies.

they look lovely in black
[...] but rings is one i do like the sound of!

Yeah they do. As do I.

Rings has been one of those things that as I'm hearing what others do with it, or run through it, and 'imagining' what 'I' would do/run through it, I consciously kept putting off getting one, because I know I will probably "need" at least three, or maybe four of them, to 'tune' while manipulating the same (albeit evolving) source material... for days, and days.

I'm a 'resonance' effects whore, sooo... we'll see.

[justin3am]

That is quite the project! I see you can still buy the PCBs with preprogrammed CPU for $135. Would that still get you in the $800 range as a finished project? I see they're going for $750 - $800 built

I think PCBs are a little cheaper than when I put mine together... I'd estimate PCBs+BOM would be around $500-700 now, depending on which case you end up getting. It's a lot of work but not very difficult. The voice cards are pretty dense but not too bad.
If the experience of building it is important to you, that's the only reason to consider the DIY route. It's practically the same price to buy an assembled unit.

[elxsound]

That is quite the project! I see you can still buy the PCBs with preprogrammed CPU for $135. Would that still get you in the $800 range as a finished project? I see they're going for $750 - $800 built

I think PCBs are a little cheaper than when I put mine together... I'd estimate PCBs+BOM would be around $500-700 now, depending on which case you end up getting. It's a lot of work but not very difficult. The voice cards are pretty dense but not too bad.
If the experience of building it is important to you, that's the only reason to consider the DIY route. It's practically the same price to buy an assembled unit.

I enjoy the DIY but it's been a bit of time since doing any soldering. My projects were all video game related, but this would be fun (and even more so with the end result).
I'm going to bookmark this for a bit later. I potentially have a big shopping list for this weekend (and I'm hoping there are some sales to lighten the load a bit).

[elxsound]

And on that note, I just purchased custom-cut rails (18.75") and plates/brackets from Synthrotek. Next up, decision time on power!

[pekbro]

And on that note, I just purchased custom-cut rails (18.75") and plates/brackets from Synthrotek. Next up, decision time on power!

Um maybe don't buy the power supply from Synthrotek, in case you were thinking that.

[Shabdahbriah]

And on that note, I just purchased custom-cut rails (18.75") and plates/brackets from Synthrotek. Next up, decision time on power!

Um maybe don't buy the power supply from Synthrotek, in case you were thinking that.

+1

[foosnark]

Rings has been one of those things that as I'm hearing what others do with it, or run through it, and 'imagining' what 'I' would do/run through it, I consciously kept putting off getting one, because I know I will probably "need" at least three, or maybe four of them, to 'tune' while manipulating the same (albeit evolving) source material... for days, and days.

I'm a 'resonance' effects whore, sooo... we'll see.

Heh I had two for a while and had some fun running them in parallel, or in series, or in feedback loops where I'd mult an output from one for mid and an output from the other for side. Eventually I decided I really only needed one Rings though -- after I got a Mimeophon and started playing with resonance on it. Very different flavors that complement each other nicely.

Got my Erica Pico BBD today. At 4096 stages it doesn't really do resonance/Karplus stuff but is very nice for slappy, dubby delays. Like the Doepfer, it has no internal filter and is gloriously noisy, and there's nasty clock whine at longer delay times (not too hard to filter out in software, Izotope RX De-Hum works well). Unlike the Doepfer, overdriving it a bit doesn't sound like garbage

Also I'm eager to try the Multi Versio third party firmware!

Since my wife has gotten into scroll sawing, I kind of want her to make me a veneer faceplate for the Versio and then I can cover it in whiteboard tape to relabel the knobs as needed

[elxsound]

And on that note, I just purchased custom-cut rails (18.75") and plates/brackets from Synthrotek. Next up, decision time on power!

Um maybe don't buy the power supply from Synthrotek, in case you were thinking that.

+1

I haven’t narrowed it down yet but that is one I had stumbled on that looked convenient. So thank you both for the heads-up!

[pekbro]

I think it's pretty safe to consider Synthrotek the bottom of the barrel in terms of eurorack manufacturers. They have a few well respected modules (that were designed by others mostly), but they also are well known to have some serious QC issues. Seemingly their designs are passable, if you can go the DIY route or in the least, verify their work.

They are a popular source for rails though, so they should be fine. But mostly, their stuff is cheap for a reason. At least from what I have read of their reputation. I can not say from experience

[elxsound]

I think it's pretty safe to consider Synthrotek the bottom of the barrel in terms of eurorack manufacturers. They have a few well respected modules (that were designed by others mostly), but they also are well known to have some serious QC issues. Seemingly their designs are passable, if you can go the DIY route or in the least, verify their work.

They are a popular source for rails though, so they should be fine. But mostly, their stuff is cheap for a reason. At least from what I have read of their reputation. I can not say from experience

Damn, good to know! I would think the rails would be hard to mess up, but I guess I’ll know soon enough.

[elxsound]

I wasn’t planning on it, but Quad Drums was on my list and it’s on sale so first holiday weekend buy
has been made.

The uZeus are also on sale, so I might just head this way for now until I get a better idea of what I want for power. Like imrae pointed out, there’s still use for them later even as DIY testers.

[pekbro]

I wasn’t planning on it, but Quad Drums was on my list and it’s on sale so first holiday weekend buy
has been made.

The uZeus are also on sale, so I might just head this way for now until I get a better idea of what I want for power. Like imrae pointed out, there’s still use for them later even as DIY testers.

I have a couple uzeus as well and think they're fine, handy too.

*I've thought pretty hard about the quad drum as well, have yet to pull the trigger.
There are a few modules I am considering in the same vein. I do like having a separate
kick drum module, and something else to compliment it would do well for me I think.

[elxsound]

I wasn’t planning on it, but Quad Drums was on my list and it’s on sale so first holiday weekend buy
has been made.

The uZeus are also on sale, so I might just head this way for now until I get a better idea of what I want for power. Like imrae pointed out, there’s still use for them later even as DIY testers.

I have a couple uzeus as well and think they're fine, handy too.

*I've thought pretty hard about the quad drum as well, have yet to pull the trigger.
There are a few modules I am considering in the same vein. I do like having a separate
kick drum module, and something else to compliment it would do well for me I think.

I definitely want a separate kick drum module too, but from what I've seen that's another rabbit hole (at the moment).

I think this falls into a fun category for me, but it's missing shaping features on top to replace a dedicated kick. It's also digital, but what I like is that it's very flexible (samples, wavetable, drum module) with some onboard mixing options which will be nice. Or at least, I should say that the videos I've seen look very promising!

[whyterabbyt]

I think it's pretty safe to consider Synthrotek the bottom of the barrel in terms of eurorack manufacturers. They have a few well respected modules (that were designed by others mostly), but they also are well known to have some serious QC issues. Seemingly their designs are passable, if you can go the DIY route or in the least, verify their work.

Yeah, seems to match what I'd seen.

Actually speaking of them, anyone know anyone else that does a triple-PT2399 delay like their Verb ? (ideally as a kit)

[imrae]

Actually speaking of them, anyone know anyone else that does a triple-PT2399 delay like their Verb ? (ideally as a kit)

This is a triple-PT2399, but probably not what you had in mind Synthcube do a kit version.

https://www.nonlinearcircuits.com/modul ... -no-more-3