What’s your favorite envelope generator and VCA module?

I’ve been looking at the Intellijel Dual ADSR, Malekko Quad Envelope, and XAOC Zadar for EG. I’m leaning more towards the Zadar or Quad Envelope because of their somewhat smaller sizes and more envelopes. Which one would you prefer personally?

As for VCA’s, what’s your thoughts on the Intellijel Quad VCA and ALM Tangle Quartet?

Curious to know what you use as well.

VCAs: well, if you want the variable response curve AND need to optimize space, my suggestion would be the new 10hp version of Veils. Those can be shifted from linear response for use with modulation signals, CVs, etc...to the exponential response you need to properly maintain perceptual loudness in audio signals. And anywhere in between, for that matter.

As for the EG, the Zadar isn't a bad choice as long as you get Xaoc's expander for it, and as long as you don't mind some menu-hopping. Next fave is probably Intellijel's Quadrax/Qx combo, then the much bigger Buchla/Tiptop 281t. Maths can also do this, but using a Maths as just an EG is sort of like paying $20+ for a Arturo Fuente Opus X cigar, then smoking it while mowing your lawn. Definitely look through the "function generator" possibilities, too...

Hi Avesta,

Besides what Lugia already recommended, I can recommend the Hikari Instruments - Triple AD, it's a snappy triple AD that I love to use, it never disappoints me and it's not too bulky.

Regarding VCAs, my all-time winner is the Waldorf - DVCA1, it's large yes, but it's a great dual VCA that can do linear or exponential VCA characteristic, or... and that's what I love it for... mix both characteristics. It's getting sold out however those dealers that still sell them, you mind find very interesting and affordable special offers for this DVCA1.

If that's all too bulky for you then consider the Tallin from Xaoc Devices, that's a nice dual VCA too and has a much smaller footprint. Or take an affordable Doepfer VCA, they are, considering the reasonable price, good too!

For the VCAs, all mentioned examples and a few more, I have made review reports about that in PDF format that are downloadable from my website, see below my signature for the link.

Good luck in choosing a nice EG and a nice VCA :-) Kind regards, Garfield.

I combine the Zadar with a Veils VCA. Zadar isn't very menu-divey if you just want envelopes. If you want to use the CV inputs or set it to repeat or LFO, yes, but the menus are not very deep at all. I'm not using the expander myself. For envelopes, well, there's so many of them that it means quite some button turning before you find what you want. But that's just choice for you.

Veils is a very good, basic VCA. I sometimes move away from purely linear towards exponential (not all the way, though) to achieve clipping on the envelope. It's a simple way to add some distortion to your signal already before sending it to filters/fx. The two modules are side to side in my rack and all Zadar outs are permanently plugged into the Veils CV ins. It's a great combo :-)

Great answer from Lugia on the Maths cigar :)) Humor is too often absent here. VCA: I've been using the Intellijel Quad Vca for 3 years, solid as a Montecristo Nº 4. EG: Zadar recently completed (with Nin) my other modules like Tides. It's more like a VegaFina: a unique taste and concept, excellent value for money!

Now I wonder...what cigar would be an aesthetic stand-in for Schlappi Engineering's stuff? Probably something explosive...

Ha, ha!

How about that "screaming stuff" from Touell Skouarn?

If size is an issue this might not make sense but the STG Envelope Generator is worth at least knowing about. As far as I know, the feature set is unique. I bought one and liked it enough to buy another.

have to say i prefer analog envelopes, for various reasons.

to start off,

for acoustic, snappy, from sound of hitting wood, to plinking on a porcelan vase, to a small
drum skin percussion, i love Maths. its slopes and the log/lin/exp control are just perfect.
i keep a narrow vca nearby if i want to automate slope change, by self patching (env out into
vca into maths cv ctrl inputs - rise,fall or both)

for classic Rolandish snap/twang in ADSR form, the FC has done well with his X-Envelope.
reportedly designed after the transistor env in SH101. i have a pair and its great they take
little space. however, if you need CV control, then you might look at Befaco or Instruo.
havent tried em tho.

also, in the AD/AR domain, i do like what i am hearing from Delta-V. very punchy. it has
that micro short hold phase, just like minimoog envs. i was looking into getting another
Maths for a while, but now im debating should i add this instead, for little variety sake.

cheers

EDITED Apr 18th 2022, 03:34

@clusterchord Yes. For all its features, but also 'intellectually' :) Maths remains a must-have. The best cigar money can buy :))

@clusterchord Yes. For all its features, but also 'intellectually' :) Maths remains a must-have. The best cigar money can buy :))
-- Sweelinck

Makes me think of the parallels between Maths and, say, the long-lost Avo piramides. I seriously miss those...

But yeah...Maths is 100% a core module these days. The capabilities it has are super-deep, and it's a logical must-do choice as a modulation (and loads more!) device. Tony NAILED that thing!

Thanks everyone for the replies. I’ll definitely check out your suggestions.
I ordered the Zadar envelope and bought the ALM Tangle Quartet for now (heard it’s very clean) until I get my hands on a Intellijel Quad VCA or Veils.

I’ll definitely look deeper into Maths, but I always disliked the almost illegible font - i guess that’s probably why I’ve steered away from it for so long. I hope I can find a Grayscale version/faceplate of it. Are there any other versions of Maths you recommend (if any)?

EDITED Apr 18th 2022, 19:17

I’ll definitely look deeper into Maths, but I always disliked the almost illegible font - i guess that’s probably why I’ve steered away from it for so long. I hope I can find a Grayscale version/faceplate of it. Are there any other versions of Maths you recommend (if any)?

-- Avesta

I feel you...the Make Noise "edgy" look is kind of annoying. I prefer modules that clearly show what's being done instead of rockin' some graphics that only wind up confusing/annoying the user. This is why I don't think much about effects pedals that have overdone, elaborate graphics (see here for an example: https://reverb.com/item/53789313-digitech-dirty-robot) that makes it more difficult to see knob positions, etc due to all of the busy artwork on the case. So, yeah...get the Grayscale panel.

Now, as for Maths-ish devices, there's the direct predecessor of that, the Serge Dual Universal Slope Gen. Several years ago, I would've told you that if you wanted one in Eurorack, you'd be screwed. But these days, Random*Source over in...Sweden, I think?...has many of the Serge circuits adapted to Eurorack. So here's their version of the DUSG: https://www.modulargrid.net/e/random-source-serge-dual-universal-slope-generator-dusg-mk2 With these, you don't need an entire Serge panel or half-panel...you can get JUST the module, which is also rather un-Serge-like. No, not cheap...but still far cheaper than if you had to buy one in the "old manner".

As for the Tangle Quartet...there's a workaround for that if you want to use them for audio, and that would be an exponential envelope gen. And it does appear that the Zadar is capable of generating those, so not only would this be a decent EG for the rig, it would "correct" the VCAs so that they behave exponentially even with them being linear VCAs. DEFINITELY get the Nin expander, though...it's got some assignable CV ins and a four button direct selector for the envelope generator in only 3 hp.

As for function generator, definitely check out the Joranalogue Countour 1. I sent my maths back and got 4 Countour 1s and a Morph4. More expensive but incomparably better both in features, quality and usefuleness. The new Veils looks good for a quad vca, replaced my intellijel quad vca to it (the bottom most pots were difficult to access when the jacks are plugged and the layout is weird anyway)

I have three -- maybe four if we count a Patching Panda Punch. A 4MS PEG, a Make Noise Maths, and a Velectronic AEnvelope. I also briefly used a Befaco Rampage, but had the option to keep that or the PEG, and chose the PEG because it seemed a little clearer and I liked the layout better.

The Maths I picked up pretty recently and am still warming up to it. It's perfectly fine and I like it.

But as a general EG that gets talked about less, I've always really loved and still love my 4MS PEG. It has a lot of overlap with the Maths, but has its own depth, and it's a much more intuitive, clearly-laid-out, easy-to-get-into module. For me the Maths definitely doesn't replace it, but does offer a different (if somewhat more convoluted) take on similar functionality. You can probably go a little deeper with Maths due to the inclusion of the OR/SUM/INV section, the 4 available channels, and the inclusion of onboard voltage offsets. But then again, the fact the PEG has a pair of onboard quantized clock multiplier/dividers has always been a pretty great feature, to me, particularly if you have a QCD, which the PEG will sync to without any patching if it's on the same bus. There's also more variety to the curve shapes you can apply to the envelopes of the PEG, and either channel can be independently selected to be unipolar or bipolar, with an additional unipolar +5V out dupe. And while the PEG retails for more than the Maths, secondhand you can often get them cheaper than Maths.

I think a Zadar could be super interesting, but I feel like I wouldn't get on with its digital, menu-driven nature. I did some of that with an O&C and never cared for it much, though I'm sure the Zadar can do way more. Where the Maths seems kind of opaque until you get used to it, the Zadar seems too menu-reliant. (Just for my own taste -- I've never used one, so I'm not sure, and Xaoc makes some good stuff). If your primary concern is being able to create very specific envelope shapes straight from the module, and you don't mind little menus, Zadar is probably a good pick. Coming back to the PEG again, though, I really like the balance it strikes between being (relatively) easy to "read" (and thus patch/manipulate), while still being primarily tactile and knob-driven. The Maths I have to kind of pump myself up to utilize, at least right now as I'm still getting to know it, where the PEG I've always just immediately and intuitively reached for. If I didn't have a DATA to better visualize what Maths was outputting, I don't think I'd be too crazy about it. It helps with the PEG too -- a DATA is great all around to have, really -- but doubly so with Maths.

And as for the AEnvelope by Velectronic, I absolutely love that thing, too. It's kinda niche, fairly expensive, and not unlike Maths, takes a bit of work (and tutorial viewing) to get your head around -- but once it all clicks into place and you get the feel of using it, it's really great. It's actually pretty easy to use once you walk through its features, and I don't feel the need to pipe it through my DATA as much as the others -- it's just a little intimidating at first blush. My only nitpick really would be that I always find myself wishing the second row of outputs were inverted or polarized outs -- that would make them more useful to me. But it's a minor quibble. And aesthetically speaking, there's no contest, it's a truly beautifully designed module.

And while we're talking ADSRs, I also had a Doepfer A-141-2v that I've always vaguely regretted selling. It only offers one envelope, which in my experience wasn't the snappiest in the world, but you get a lot of control over that envelope, with some interesting self-patching options. It was actually pretty interesting as a weird oscillator when self-patched. I've tried that with my PEG as well, but I feel like the Doepfer rolled with the audio-rate abuse a little better than the PEG does, you could really get it to sound like its own voice. I imagine like other Doepfer ADSRs you can get these fairly cheap, I know I sold mine at a pretty big loss secondhand, which is one of the reasons I regret selling it. And while I've never used them, the Doepfer A-140-2 and A-143-2 both seem like tremendously good values relatively to what you can get them for secondhand (or even firsthand, really).

I can also recommend the Soundforce Dual ADSR, which was what my AEnvelope replaced. I'm 100% happy with my choice, but the Soundforce was perfect while I had it -- nothing too fancy too it, but always absolutely clear at a glance with its dual slider set, good responsive envelopes, good support from the company. It's a bit big for what it does, but if space isn't at a premium and you just want something useful and easy, it fits that bill nicely.

EDITED Apr 20th 2022, 00:33

my tastes went to

EG
- Peaks (it does a lot and is great to work with, shapes are a bit different than most EG).
- Delta V (fully featured, with VCA and Slew)
- FEG (price, fast, loopable, inverted output)

good value :

• Ataxia (but it's pink)

VCA
- Tallin of XAOC for how many differents "colors" it can bring and the 2 curves av. on each section.

EDITED Apr 21st 2022, 14:45

good value :

• Ataxia (but it's pink)

-- -ADR-

Doesn't have to be!

https://www.facebook.com/audioparasites/photos/pcb.1001852220419845/1001851137086620/

I've ordered from these guys, their plates are killer.

Tho' I liked it in pink.. But I was looking for black plates for the Antidote of the same brand before to finally sold it here! Thanks for the link, I will check what they do (brands/modules). Oops, they are in Canada, can't order there from EU (taxes etc..).

Doesn't have to be!

https://www.facebook.com/audioparasites/photos/pcb.1001852220419845/1001851137086620/

I've ordered from these guys, their plates are killer.
-- murmurant

EDITED Apr 21st 2022, 14:45

They’re in Australia actually.

EDITED Apr 21st 2022, 15:07

ooops yep sorry