#109

yikes, that is quite the rats nest! Nice to see some concentric pots on the front panel. The square knobs are fun too!

#110

Thatā€™s intense!
I do really like the idea of making music with stuff Iā€™ve soldered, the idea of diy modules interacting with ā€˜officialā€™ ones kinda excites me too, not sure why.

1 Like
#111

Building diy kits and playing the modules is very rewarding. Itā€™s not very difficult either, Iā€™ve only messed up one kit out of the eight I have built. And I learned from that.

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#112

Bastl Cinnamon (5hp) is worth a look if you want a versatile filter. You can get nice sine tones from it, all the way to gnarly distortion. I love mine!

#113

Short version: What can people recommend for boosting the outgoing signal from Eurorack?

Long version: The output module I use is a Bastl ciao!, which generally outputs a signal loud enough for my purposes as well as being a double stereo channel mixer. No complaints there.

However, occasionally I mix more stereo audio, and thatā€™s where the knob.farm hyrlo (a 4HP triple stereo channel mixer) comes in. EDIT: no issues with this module at all - it performs wonderfully! Huge recommendation.

Iā€™m wondering whether thereā€™s something anyone here can recommend that will boost the signal either between hyrlo and ciao! or between ciao! and external stuff such as the interface. I donā€™t like to boost the 2i2 above about 50% because of the massive noise it starts to add to the signal.

How about a compressor module?

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#114

Personally I would get rid of the knob.farm hyrlo if it distorts that easily.
But, if it stays, then maybe one of the various amplifier modules available would be useful to boost levels back up.
Iā€™ve used these two, mainly on the inputs/outputs of passive ring modulator modules which have pretty low output levels, and they work well.

http://www.addacsystem.com/product/addac200-series/addac202

http://www.doepfer.de/a1833.htm

#115

However, boosting your output signal will boost whatever noise that might have been picked up before this outputā€¦

:slightly_frowning_face:

#116

True. This occurred to me - itā€™s not an ideal solution. What I did last night, however, was to play into Ableton with the glue compressor (-19dB threshold, 16dB makeup) and there was still no unwanted noise of which Iā€™m aware. I know there is noise there, so Iā€™m sure one reason it wasnā€™t audible is just that a lot a lot of what I do on the modular is granular textures, often with crackles, jerks or elastic, squirming noises filling the higher ranges anyway. I suppose an amplifier module will make any noise easier to make out - or in a better-case scenario, simply give the glue comp less work to do. Letā€™s see.

Aha, amplifier modules. An entire category I never knew or noticed existed! :sweat_smile: My budget dictates that I try the A-183-3 - bless you, Doepfer - and the fact itā€™s actually in stock in the local shop doesnā€™t hurt either. Thank you for the suggestions!

#117

I want to piggy back on the boosting output signal direction here a little; Iā€™m having slightly the opposite problem.

Iā€™m at the point where Iā€™m starting to record some songs from my eurorack setup. First question I guess is this: Iā€™m erring on the side of running each voice as a separate track (in general) into Ableton, as opposed to introducing a mixer in my rack itself and running a single track into the DAW. I see this as a positive: I want to have a more granular level of control over each ā€œvoiceā€. That said, Iā€™ve never recorded from eurorack before: is this what yā€™all tend to do as well?

I am finding that the output from the eurorack runs quite hot. And I know that this is a thing with eurorack, I guess I want to make sure that the way Iā€™m thinking about it is right. At the moment, I think Iā€™m being a little lazy with my VCA duties. I have one dedicated two channel VCA, but beyond that Iā€™m trying to get real VCA behavior from modules that are only kinda VCAs (Streams in vactrol mode & Blinds, for example). With Blinds itā€™s possible to completely kill the signal, but not easy to get the positioning of the pots just right, and with Streams even with the Level all the way down signal still comes through. I guess the direction Iā€™m leaning is swapping Blinds for Veils (or another Just VCA VCA), and passing Streams output through a VCA before sending it to the interface. Probably the right approach?

Final thought: even the signals that I run through a VCA run before it hitting the interface runs super hot as it hits the interface, such that I can have the input pot on the interface turned all the way down and Iā€™m still getting almost sufficiently working signal through. This is with Pad enabled (itā€™s a Focusrite Scarlett interface). Question here: is this ok? Should I make an attempt to reduce this signal before sending it to the interface or is it fine to just address at the interface & DAW level?

Thatā€™s kinda a lot! Thanks to anyone who has insight.

John C.

#118

I tend to mix in the rack and just bring the stereo mix into the DAW, which Iā€™ve found works for me (keeps me moving forward and creating more rather than getting bogged down on unimportant details). I have an ER-301 now, which Iā€™m utilizing for much more sophisticated mixing in the rack than I was doing (which was left/right submixes from two quadratts). The con with in the rack mixing before recording is that if I want to cut/reduce something, EQā€™ing out a particular frequency is going to affect the whole mix.

#119

Generally, yes. While running direct from your modules to an interface can work, youā€™ll have less trouble if youā€™re attenuating first.

Eurorack signals are much hotter than line lever, so the problem youā€™re having is youā€™re attenuating too much. The ciao seems to have a fixed attenuation, and since youā€™re lowering the input into the ciao the signal is ending up too soft. You either need an output module with variable attenuation, or you need louder signals going into the ciaoā€¦

1 Like
#120

Iā€™ve done both recording separate voices from a modular patch and recording a single stereo (or even mono) output. Thereā€™s no right or wrong with this - whatever works for the music youā€™re making. Separate voices does give you more final control as youā€™ve said. But, thereā€™s something about the immediacy of a single output to DAW that is nice too.

If your audio interface has the headroom for modular levels itā€™s fine to sort out the hot signals with it as long as you can do so without clipping or distortion. This is what Iā€™ve always done. But, not all audio interfaces are created equal when it comes to handling modular levels unfortunately! So, you might find reducing the level before it hits your audio interface worth doing. Unless you want to have CV control over the final output of your modular you donā€™t have to use VCAs for this task though. A simple passive attenuator would do the job perfectly well and be a lot cheaper on your wallet :slight_smile:

2 Likes
#121

Thereā€™s a Ladik output module I use for this that does the trick; I have it permanently cabled to my interface. You can adjust the gain reduction via jumpers on back.

One useful side effect of this is that you always have a specific end point for your audio patching, which I find helpful, rather than trawling cables from VCAs or fx or whatever you decide your final output to beā€¦

2 Likes
#122

So far Iā€™ve tried these things:

  • just record the stereo out from my main end-of-chain mixer (WMD performance mixer) into the DAW
  • go straight from each voice in the patch to a separate input on the DAW
  • create pieces one track at a time via multitracking, going from the end-of-chain mixer to the DAW

I generally tend to agree with @jlmitch5 that not messing too much with the recording in the DAW is a good thing, except I like to keep the mixing part in the DAW. In general, the things I tend to do in post-processing are only small tweaks, mostly just tweaking/automating the volumes and adding reverb. I do feel that just practising a piece until it sounds right and then recording it in one take is a much more rewarding activity, so I think Iā€™ll try to focus on doing that in the future. Iā€™m not really sure I want to really avoid having access to the individual elements once they are recoded though, mostly for one reason: composing/performing should be a separate thing from mixing. So my ideal solution actually looks like buying a k-mix (one day) and then using that both as a performance mixer and to record the voices from the modular on separate tracks. In the meantime I mostly do record things one track at a time.

This said, I do also think that youā€™re assessing your problem incorrectly. Modular levels are usually about 3-4 times as hot as pro-level line levels. So thereā€™s not much too boost, you just need to attenuate them a bit, if at all.

5 Likes
#123

another thing Iā€™ll do is use the DAW as part of the modular process (route in, do some thing, route back out). That of course introduces phase/latency issues, and I havenā€™t quite figured out how to deal with them in an easy, set-and-forget kind of way.

#124

I caved in this week and bought a k mix for that very reason.

It seems a very elegant solution (Iā€™ve been looking for a new sound card for a while).

ā€¦ plus I think Emily sprague uses oneā€¦ and sheā€™s awesome :slightly_smiling_face:

2 Likes
#125

Ok I dream of making this out of mostly things I have on hand. The dream is to travel with something that can make sweet sweet Musique ConcrĆØte, inspired by my new T-Rex. What am I missing, what should I sub? Or should I lock this thing in?

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#126

My standard reply to this question would be: start to use it, reducing your modular to what appears as being strictly necessary to get started. Then the modular itself will show you, over time, what is missing.
Oh and also check out the Reflex LiveLoop in case you haventā€™ done so yet and in case you havenā€™t bought the Morphagene already. http://www.freshnelly.com/reflex/reflexhtml.htm

I agree with you that it really feels like the best, most elegant solution out there. Itā€™s small enough to not take up too much space on the desk, while freeing some space in the rack for other modules.

Yes, pretty much my experienceā€¦ plus it always feels a bit like a hassle to me. Same reason I never got into the idea of using something like Expert Sleepers to generate CVs, I like that the modular is the modular and the DAW is the DAW and each does its own thing, focusing on what each does best.

2 Likes
#127

Got my K-Mix hooked up this weekend.

Loving it so far! I wasnā€™t prepared for how small it is (a good thing of course!). It has a nice bit of weight to it, the faders are nice and responsive, very intuitive to useā€¦ feels like a quality bit of kit overall.

Itā€™s handling modular levels no problem (using line in channels 3-8ā€¦not tried the mic-pre inputs yet).

The only downside Iā€™ve found so far is the reverb. I think itā€™s in there more for tracking and ā€˜ambienceā€™ purposes rather than for mixing/special fx applications (the maximum decay is quite short).

1 Like
#128

Iā€™ve read many complaints about the reverb, as an included extra I guess itā€™s good to have isnā€™t it?
Anyway, thanks for sharing your experience with it!