New VC-Delay module for 5U modulars

[yusynth]

Hi all

I received three days ago a package from Doug Slocum containing a brand new VC-delay 1310 module. I have been playing with it for three days now and here are my comments :

The pros...
- The first impression is that the module is well built, the construction quality is comparable to that of STG and Synthesizers.com

- The controls and their use are straightforward : DELAY, RECIRC., MIX and CV AMNT. No need for a documentation, one can easily achieve a large variety of effects from chorus, flanging to echo.

- The module handles pretty well the high signal levels that are usually found in a modern modular synthesizer.

- I have a lot fun using it.

Now, for the cons...
The electronic design can be improved to the benefit of sound quality among two points.

- When the DELAY knob is set between tick 9 and 10 (corresponding to the longest delays) one can hear in the background some contamination from the sampling clock (whistle), when adding recirculation this creates aliasing noise that starts to get annoying. I thing that Doug can improve this by adding a switch that would let the user insert an low-pass filter to block this clock/alisasing noise when setting the module to long delays

- When recirculation is set above tick 8, a low frequency feedback is gradually building up which is perfectly normal and desirable as well. The problem I see is that clipping distorsion is also very high and harsh. It would be great if Doug could add a soft clipping limiter in the recirculation loop in order to achieve a feedback effect that sounds better just as in a vintage echo tape device.

Conclusions :
It is a nice module to complete a 5U modular system and I am glad to have one. It works nicely as long as you keep the delay under tick 9 and do not push to much the recirculation settings. But these are extreme settings and I am sure Doug will fix that soon (I discussed with Doug about that and he is already studying possible mods :tu: ).