Gear Lust Part 7

Overbridge public beta released>>>>>>

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Iā€™m surprised more people here arenā€™t re-amping, even virtually. Such sick sounds to be had.

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Anybody got recommendations for an audio interface? I like the way my current one enhances the sound, but I have to give it back soon. Looking for one not too expensive but it gets the job done.

What is your current interface?

What needs and features do you have for the interface? i.e how many outputs and inputs do you need? are you using monitors? headphones? both?

price range?

Monitors right now, Iā€™m not planning to use any synths or anything. 1700Ā„ CNY is my budget (250$ USD) Primary use is for better sound than my pcā€™s audio chip.

I used one of these for a few years and they sound pretty great for the price (the headphone amps are actually good as well as an added bonus). I really recommend these even if you wont be using some of the features, the sound quality is really good for a low priced usb interface. Having the button to change to Mono is also p nice to have. (make sure you shop for the 'Big Knob Studio" though, the original Mackie Big Knob is pretty much garbage haha)

https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/BigKnobStu--mackie-big-knob-studio-3x2-studio-monitor-controller

I owned a Focusrite Scarlett as well which is in your price range, but I donā€™t recommend it. Poor sound quality in my experiences with it.

Iā€™ve heard some good things about Audient interfaces so it might be worth finding some reviews on these to see if it fits your needs as well

https://www.sweetwater.com/store/detail/ID4--audient-id4

Iā€™m not familiar with the brand of the interface you posted pictures of, I looked it up and it seems to be a Korean company making them. I guess we donā€™t get those here. Iā€™m not sure if the ones I posted above will be available in your area but hopefully it helps a bit.

I am leaning on getting one with 2 audio outputs because if I have a freind over we can produce together and not feel left out :stuck_out_tongue:

Right now Iā€™m in between buying Audioprobeā€™s Spartan QUE or maby latter one you mentioned.

Focusrite Scarlett has done me well over the last few years, you can pick them up 2nd hand for under Ā£50 on eBay

The ā€œ2i2ā€ model that isā€¦

Doh !

Didnā€™t see you had posted about the Scarlettā€¦

I looked that up, pretty nice. But i decided on waiting a few weeks before I buy anything. I asked my freind when I need to return his gear, but he said he is too busy for me to return it, then he told me his computer broke. XD. So I donā€™t know, I may end up with his gearā€¦

It looks like the Korg modular does have a low pass gate. It has two of them.

got me thinking about how to simulate vactrols digitally. Came up with a decent implementation with 3 controls for dialing in the ring and sustain the vactrol provides. quick fm-y demo showing off a quad LPG.

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What do you think of comments like these?

They are not stocked because nobody is using them in large quantities. The kind of designs that can be (kind of) achieved with vactrols can also be done with op amps and LM13700s, and will yield much better results.

They are not used because other, easier to use alternatives exist ā€“ namely, translinear VCAs and multipliers. These donā€™t require specialized drive to cancel out nonlinearities (in fact, you can get VCAs with linear-in-dB control inputs nowadays, which makes life quite easy), nor do they run afoul of RoHS regulations as they are quite standard bipolar or CMOS ICs, unlike the Vactrol which requires both a CdS photocell and specialized manufacturing processes.

I havenā€™t heard of vactrols until this week.

Vactrols are kind of an inherently flawed electronic component. They have a lot of artifacts on the signal passing through them. These flaws though have been exploited for synthesis because they provide something really unique. When you send a short trigger signal through them, they ring. They have a quick but subtle slew on the rising part of a signal, but a slow exponitial-ish-ly decaying response to falling signals. It negates the need for an envelope (very handy in modular systems where those are limited) if you just want hard transients with a natural, almost acoustic decay. If you do send an envelope through them instead of a trigger signal, it does a nice job of shaping your envelope in a pleasant way. It kind of breaks filter FM though, so pros and cons.
I think a big part of why they arenā€™t used very often is that there is an absurd amount of variability in that response curve from vactrol to vactrol. I used to work for a eurorack company that used a bunch of vactrols in their designs and it was always a pain trying to find ones closely matched enough to be used in a unit. So you wind up needing to stock way more of the part than you actually need to ensure that you always have good matches, and then you need to take into account the time it takes to manually test the response curves per part and sort them into close-ish groups.
Also should add that they are used in compressors very often for the same peculiarlies that people love them for synthesis, those nice natural sounding decay shapes. Every opto compressor uses them as the side chain detector

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korg v teenage engineer, i guess mini modular is the trend

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Soo loverrly !