Opinion on my first DIY rack.

Hello guys,
I am new to this community and I decided to build my own Eurorack. I am starting with building my case from a Thon rack case (about 100hp and 6U). I already have a Behringer Neutron which I now is not that good but I will use it until a can afford to replace it with better modules.
This is my rack:

I would love to hear your opinion on it and if it's even functional like that.
Side note:
I will first buy the things that are on this rack and then I am planning on removing the Neutron and replacing it with better modules.
This is the final one:

Thank you for all your answers :)

Whenever I design a case, I'm always asking myself - what is the general use-case or ideal system for the task at hand.

It would appear to me you're looking for a complex synth voice of some kind in the first setup and not a full on groove-box style approach. Where the second iteration looks a bit more random/percussive for whatever reason.

I've found that since the Mother32/DFAM come with a powered skiff, that I end up pulling it from my larger cases to use externally, but still patched to the system to save space. My question would be - what do you hope to get from the DFAM in the case? If its just for modular drums, it is really best at handling 1x drum tone at a time in a small system. You can do a little patching hack where you use the sequencer to control noise level - but its pretty simplistic with only the 8 steps to work with and no reset input for the DFAM (shame). Great for 4/4 kicks/percussion however - or if you modulate the 'time' w/ CV you can get more complex rhythms, however extremely hard to work with to get in-time with the rest of the setup (if that's indeed an issue/goal for your system). More complex systems with more CV control/switches allows greater possibilities of utilizing the DFAM as a full on drum voice, but takes some sophisticated patching/sequencing of CV inputs to get unique per step drum sounds.

The second system seems a lot more drum/percussion oriented setup to me given the main sequencing being the Varigate 4 / choice of sound modules. Is the idea to use the system in a live composition context? or just for patching in the studio to get cool sounds?

Based on module choices, I couldn't say whether the systems would work for any given idea, as we don't know the overall goal for use.

What is your reason for going modular in the first place? - just to break the building blocks of normalled synths, or for a specific purpose (ambient wave machine, groove box w/ bass & drums, complex synth voice, etc.) In my personal experience w/ modular, over the years I have drifted towards setting up standalone systems that complete a specific task. I have my main groove box system w/ everything needed for a live improvised set in 2x 104hp (Intellijel 7u performance case), but I also have a second case dedicated strictly to drum voices/sequencing w/ modular control, another case for sequencing/mono bass voice, and another for mixing/fx. It is called eurocrack for a reason!

You can certainly get all of the functionality you need in one case, but you have to know what the goal is, and that will drive your choice of modules over pure aesthetic/price, but for utility as it is needed to make the sounds you want to make with adequate control.

Yes I apologize for not explaining it in the post. So I have an separate groovebox (EMX-1) which would be for making drums and some synths (speaking for a live situation). So the eurorack would be for more percussive sounds, leads or riffs. Wanted to do it a bit like ASEC (check him out on youtube).
DFAM would mostly be for riffy hypnotic leads.
I would also like to use this setup in my studio for now as I do not have enough money to make two cases (one for studio and one for live).

In conclusion the rack would serve as the main synth and percussion part for live techno.

EDITED Jun 14th 2021, 20:05

If you don't have the $$$ for two cases, then don't put the DFAM in the cab. It's that simple. It already has power and a housing, ergo it doesn't need one, and by putting it in the Eurorack cab you're not only inflating the cost of the DFAM for no good reason, but you're taking up much of an entire row of the Thon cab that should be filled with modules that need both power and housing. And 60 hp is NOT a trivial amount of space! Same advice applies to the Neutron as well.

I agree with Lugia - also note standard size for rack cases is 19" which gives 84hp a row - not about 100hp - so unless it's a special order you may be disappointed - or you are confusing us (me) with thon rack case and purpose built 104hp thon eurorack case

also had a quick look at ASEC - music was ok, but I hate that frentic constantly micro moving knobs and touching the modular for no purpose performance style - the only module he really appeared to be paying any attention to was the erica bassline - by that I mean he twiddled those knobs for at least 2 seconds continuously at one point - he seemed to spend much more time interacting with the elektron boxes than with the modular

also I'm not convinced the DFAM is that good for "riffy hypnotic leads" - I think you would probably be better off with something else for this and for "hypnotic" I usually think of modulated reverbs and delays

Yes I apologize for not explaining it in the post. So I have an separate groovebox (EMX-1) which would be for making drums and some synths (speaking for a live situation). So the eurorack would be for more percussive sounds, leads or riffs. Wanted to do it a bit like ASEC (check him out on youtube).
DFAM would mostly be for riffy hypnotic leads.
I would also like to use this setup in my studio for now as I do not have enough money to make two cases (one for studio and one for live).

In conclusion the rack would serve as the main synth and percussion part for live techno.

-- Obscur

So - if you are using an external midi capable device in any way, I would recommend a midi to CV/gate converter right off the bat for a few reasons. The first being obvious CV/Gate patterns via existing Midi machines. Another is for setting up utilities like clock dividers, reset trigs, slow/odd sequence steps/timings, and I'm sure there is more that I am forgetting but external midi sequencers are highly capable of providing great utility to your modular setup (especially if you want one modular case for everything).

I cooked up a little rig quickly attempting to use some similar modules and some completely different ones. The artist you posted is a fairly popular style of techno so you should easily be able to achieve that with the DFAM. Using it in combo with the Morphagene might yield cool evolving patterns as well as an audio sampler so I kept that in there (and for background textures etc.). Mimeophon is great for an effect as it is delay/reverb-like.

The midi thing is just a decent midi module I have personal experience building. Pretty simple to work and good build quality from Befaco (I get the DIY kits). Muxlicer is a great sequencer as it has lots of utilities built in, as well as the ability to be manipulated via LFO to totally mess up the sequence order in-time. So plugging percussion trigs from the channel outs summed down into the Bytom and you get cool trigger sequences for drums/bass - mute/swap/mix them w/ the Mutes/Switchblade modules. Also swapping the CV from either the Mux or the DFAM or Midi pitch CV is great for getting a live groove vs a pre-recorded groove.

I'm not familiar with the Basimilus, but I know it is a drum module that can be 'struck' or 'trigged' so that's a bonus. You can plug it into optomix and get even chirpier 'plucks' and run it wide open/drone, or use the onboard decay control to shorten it up within the module itself. I kept the Belgrad filter in cause its multi-mode which is good. Optomix for the ability to 'duck' voices via CV or audio/mixing/vactrols are sweet. Maths cause maths.

Mutes for audio muting and then Mixer to finish it off - I didn't know what you would be into, but I find I like blending the audio together and summing down when I perform so I can get total control - so I threw the ALM mixer in for spatial and volume easy mixing solution w/ Ext In for external gear (not sure if the gain will be high enough though - didn't read the manual).

Mimeophon as a end of chain effect for good measure as it covers delays/reverb washy stuff.

There isn't a lot of "voice's" here - but if you pulled the DFAM that would give you more room for extra LFO's, some type of Turing machine sequencer would be ideal, maybe more elaborate mixer, sample and hold, and maybe another standalone voice in there if possible. With clever use of the Morphagene, you can get away with less modulators, as you can record knob movements and then play them back with audio recordings that layer up on stuff which could be awesome. Or even use Morphagene for drum loops along the rest of the stuff - who knows.

If you don't have the $$$ for two cases, then don't put the DFAM in the cab. It's that simple. It already has power and a housing, ergo it doesn't need one, and by putting it in the Eurorack cab you're not only inflating the cost of the DFAM for no good reason, but you're taking up much of an entire row of the Thon cab that should be filled with modules that need both power and housing. And 60 hp is NOT a trivial amount of space! Same advice applies to the Neutron as well.
-- Lugia
I don't even have enough to fill the rack all at once so I want to have at least two functional synths in it for now. As I would progress with filling up the rack I would eventually take it out and replace it with other modules.

I agree with Lugia - also note standard size for rack cases is 19" which gives 84hp a row - not about 100hp - so unless it's a special order you may be disappointed - or you are confusing us (me) with thon rack case and purpose built 104hp thon eurorack case

also had a quick look at ASEC - music was ok, but I hate that frentic constantly micro moving knobs and touching the modular for no purpose performance style - the only module he really appeared to be paying any attention to was the erica bassline - by that I mean he twiddled those knobs for at least 2 seconds continuously at one point - he seemed to spend much more time interacting with the elektron boxes than with the modular

also I'm not convinced the DFAM is that good for "riffy hypnotic leads" - I think you would probably be better off with something else for this and for "hypnotic" I usually think of modulated reverbs and delays

-- JimHowell1970
ASEC is not the only one that inspired me I also did a lot of research on Blawan, Ansome, Surgeon and Benki.
As far as I checked DFAM is really good for this kind of techno as it's not just a drum synth, but again I may be wrong about that as I am completely new to all this.

Also a BIG thank you to SCALEBRAIN for designing this rack, I already see that it's better than mine and as I said I will pull the DFAM out once I can get enough money. I wanted to start this project and build on it gradually!