Introduction

Hi! Long time lurker here. I've been quite happy with my intellijel 4u palette for some time now but really feeling the growing pains - I'm picking up an alm 6u 52hp case this week for a solid discount and have been plotting on where to go with it.

The Rack

I currently own the modules in the top row, with the bottom being the top next modules I'm considering aquiring.

Ethos

I had a previous career doing some touring and some spotify sucess in the lofi house / bass music scenes - I am honestly quite past that and focus less on percussion and more on sonic textures lately. For the past decade or so I've been all ableton, boxed up in my laptop. Now that I'm older and am often at home instead of traveling, I've started to build out my home studio. Eurorack is nothing so new to me, I've used friends and collaborators systems in the past and have owned plenty of semi-modular systems - although the hobby/passion has never resided within me until lately. Sonically, I'm attempting to move towards more nimble and needlepoint plucks and warm droney pads. For some equivalents, stuff like this:

Explanation

Rings into clouds has certantly given me the plucky delayed sharp as a needle ear tingling excitement I've been looking for - but I do want to have 2 voices in my rack now that its 104hp. I would'nt want to get any more voices really after that. The odessa and its overtones and beautiful chord + reese-y bass producing goodness seems like a great pairing to add a wash of sonic texture to the plucky walking melodies of rings. Please suggest any other voice you think might be better in this place! I have marbles but i'm honestly not set on it - I've been enjoying enigma in o_c more lately as a random generative melodic generator. I'd really like some more cv modulation and controllability! If you have suggestions, again please let me know. I know ochd is really popular, and I have a gitgud LFO from jolin thats compact and fun times, but my cv processing capabilities are low right now. The quadrax seems to be a great function generator / envelope / bursty module that'll help with some extra modulation. As for VCA's I really need more for cv purposes but the tangle quartet seems like a great place to start.

Now You!

If you have any feedback on where to go given my thoughts - or want to shame me for my module choice and case size - the floor is now yours! Thanks in advance ~

Zane

From the sound examples you shared, I would recommend Plaits (or one of its clones) with the newest firmware for your second voice. I mostly use analog voices, but have come around to the versatility and charms of Plaits recently. The new FM mode and many of the older modes just sound great. Quadrax is cool, but suffers from some of the same problems as a lot of Mutable Instruments' stuff in that there are button combinations and mode switching and color combos that were hard for me to remember. If that doesn't bother you, Quadrax with the expander is powerful. I like WYSIWYG but that usually means more space/more modules/bigger rack.
The biggest question you should ask yourself as you are building a small rack is how much of a trade-off between knob-per-function and mode-switching/button combos are you willing to endure. If that seems like a headache, definitely plan for a bigger rack.
Have fun and good luck!

Hi,
If you prefer something of Menu-diving instead of combination of buttons-colors... you have https://www.modulargrid.net/e/xaoc-devices-zadar instead Quadrax

Discolure: I have the Ornament & Crime with Hemisphere firmware, a Clouds clone similar to Monsoon, nanoRings. No experience with Odessa, Quadrax and Marbles, but know the concept of Marbles and Quadrax. Had semi-modulars for 4 years and fully into eurorack for another 3 years.
I'm not really sure if you'd consider yourself a beginner or not, as you seem to have a lot of electronic music experience but not as much eurorack experience. This is why I find a bit difficult to tell you if these modules are good choice for you.

The modules that you have chosen are understandable, as they are quite popular and versatile. Lots of eurorack videos online seem to include at least one of these modules. I've been drawn into eurorack by demos of Clouds too.

However, as farkas mentiones with Quadrax, you've chosen some top-of-the line modules, this makes them very appealing and versatile but also somewhat complex to understand. Ornament & Crime has a lot of "modules" in it, Monsoon has multiple modes in it with button combinations to remeber, and Rings is notorious for being hard to tune.
I can image that there's a possibility that you put this rack together, the modules are difficult to tame or button combo's are hard to remember, you have to read hundreds of pages from manuals and forum posts, and you eventually drown in all the possibilities.
If you consider yourself a "beginner" in the eurorack realm, the learning curve might be less steep by swapping one or two modules for more "basic" modules. If you find those too basic or easy to understand, you can always get the more fancy ones.
I'd agree with farkas that Plaits might be a good choice, for example instead of Rings. You can use a second-hand Quadra instead of Quadrax, or something like Nano Modules Quart. Maybe even a second Ornament & Crime, that one helped me a lot with a bunch of different eurorack concept because the screen gives quite a good visual feedback, and includes things like a scope, tuner, envelopes, logic, slew etc. Only down-side is that it's not very suitable for audio but mainly for CV. I have no experience with Odessa but it looks a bit intimidating. You could swap it for maybe one or two Befaco Pony VCO's, those have through-zero FM and wavefolding, cross-patching the two might give similar complexity to Odessa but not sure.

EDITED Jul 13th 2023, 12:50

Hi,
If you prefer something of Menu-diving instead of combination of buttons-colors... you have https://www.modulargrid.net/e/xaoc-devices-zadar instead Quadrax
-- ferranadsr

Indeed Zadar is often categorized as EG but I'd argue it's more of a complex shape LFO than an EG one can use to control the amplification section of a voice. You can do it, but it's not a great interface for it, something like Quadrax, Nano Quart, or even Maths offer better interfaces to play with the volume envelope. I personally found Zadar annoying as a classic EG, having both Quadrax and Maths at hand... But as an LFO, it's quite unique !

You can use a second-hand Quadra instead of Quadrax, or something like Nano Modules Quart.
-- dubstepjoris

Sure Quadrax is capable of being complex but it doesn't have to be if you don't go into the menus, in fact I used mine as a simple Quadra for a (shamefuly long) while before finding time to dig in (worth the hours, for sure). With the experience I have now in Euro (a few years), I'd say that's one of the modules I will never sell, it does so much and it does it really well.
In my mind, it's a bit like buying a Maths: it's something a newcomer has very little chance of using to its full powers, but that will become useful to almost any synthesist out there once experience grows. Maths is perhaps a better teacher because it can do more different things and also because there are quite a few learning resources available for it.

Looking at the rack, I find the Quadrax and its versatility would be one of the most important modules that make the rack "interesting" for me as it covers more EG, but also linked envelopes, waveshaping synced LFO's etc. For the type of music you mention, that will come in very handy as I suspect the O&C will be forever busy with something else...
In fact, I'd even say that for the music you want to make, Quadrax + Zadar would be ll you need forever. If you would consider another voice (Odessa is HUGE for this type of rack), you could free up some space for it. That free HPs game is one you'll have to play a bit with this size of rack.

All the best for your project !

Thank you all for the responses so far - a big update though! I ended up finding a doepfer lc-6 case locally for the same price I was going to pay for the alm case but almost twice the HP ( sub $280 total! ). Just brought it home and am very very happy to have all this extra space to work with.

I think a quadrax will be in my rack at some point in the future - I'm starting to get some of the criticism about rings though ( tunability is certainly one I've noticed already ). I think maybe a plaits to replace it and then some complex oscillator to go with that would be wonderful for this setup.

I'm not trying to ( or able to ) immediately fill up all of this new found 168hp of space. I will probably sell nanoring and honestly thinking of selling pachinko as well. Plop in a quadrax, plaits, and a nother voice and i'm starting to cook I think. To go with the doepfer-ness, and now that I have basically unlimited depth ( 100mm in this thing?? ) I waas thinking of picking up some of the very well priced doepfer modules. The octovca seems great for cv mixing and handling. Anyone got some fav doepfer utilities that would help make this rack be as expressive as can be?

Here's a sort of new iteration with the updated space and sizing. I have a gitgud lfo i DIY'd and this sputnik modular Variable Waveform Generator. I haven't put the VWG to much use do to the fact i currently dont have any VCA's!

Maybe even a second Ornament & Crime,
-- dubstepjoris

I think another one could be really fun too! I'm a programmer currently going back to college to major in EE with a focus on DSP and writing some modules for the O_C seems like a fun project. The more the merrier!

I've been curious about maybe adding a pams to the mix now that the PNW's are super cheap on reverb. having 8 outputs of gates/triggers/envelopes/looping stuff seems like a great addition to the modulation part of my rack. I think with the quadrax and maaaaybe the zadar ( or even batumi? ) - i'd have most modulation duties under control and should start really focusing on messing with cv through logic and mixing.

Another thing now that I have this amount of space, a control surface / tactile playable element would be quite nice. I know tetrapad/tete and rene both get a lot of mentions.

EDITED Jul 13th 2023, 20:30

@znschaffer In your opening post: ‘I'm attempting to move towards more nimble and needlepoint plucks and warm droney pads’. And a little further : ‘I'd really like some more cv modulation and controllability!‘.
So, I have two suggestions:

• Rings not being a traditional oscillator (in fact, as a ‘Resonator’, it is closer to an effect), for nice plucks and an easy tuning - you know what I mean - may I suggest the 2hp Pluck. A little jewel.

• For deep drones in motion, Zadar is probably one of the best solution today. It obviously generates traditional envelopes, but thanks to its 'loop' function and its two assignable cvs (adding the small expander Nin) you will be able to create vast complex landscapes.

I have included these modules in my setup, so it’s the experience that allows me to strongly recommend them to you.

I think another one could be really fun too! I'm a programmer currently going back to college to major in EE with a focus on DSP and writing some modules for the O_C seems like a fun project. The more the merrier!

I've been curious about maybe adding a pams to the mix now that the PNW's are super cheap on reverb. having 8 outputs of gates/triggers/envelopes/looping stuff seems like a great addition to the modulation part of my rack. I think with the quadrax and maaaaybe the zadar ( or even batumi? ) - i'd have most modulation duties under control and should start really focusing on messing with cv through logic and mixing.

Another thing now that I have this amount of space, a control surface / tactile playable element would be quite nice. I know tetrapad/tete and rene both get a lot of mentions.

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Adding a Pams to your rack sounds like a great idea, especially with its versatile outputs. And with Quadrax and Zadar in the mix, you'll have a solid modulation foundation. As for a control surface, Tetrapad and Rene are popular choices for their tactile playability. It's all about finding what suits your workflow and musical preferences.