Synths: Cwejman VCO-6 Oscillator. Reviewed by Hexfix93.

May 12th, 2008 by Hexfix93

I’ve had it for over a week now. What can I say? I think it is a lot louder, bigger, and fatter than the mfb dco I have. It pairs up very nicely to it. What it does do better than all the others is tracking the keyboard and staying in tune(update: the rs95e is a tad better at tracking). So I find this a lot more musical. Hey, before I go any further, I have to say that the pwm on this is the best. Better than any of the other units I have used. There is a pwm saw as well that I really like. Kind of like the old alpha juno. This does those wicked animated leads when you use pwm. It can sound really buzzy and alive and thick. The sync sounds it can make are huge and my favorite so far of any of the oscillators I have used. The square waves on this are godly. I have never used the cwejman vco-2rm, so I have no idea how it stacks up against that oscillator. This is a very stable VCO. That can sound huge. I think the triangle and sine waves on the vco-6 are really good, but I must say that the plan b model 15 sine wave is a tad better. Why did I end up choosing this over the rest? Because stability is the thing I desire the most. I wanted something to cut in the mix and stay really musically IN TUNE with the other gear I have. I had a lot of trouble with oscillators before the vco-6 and mfb dco. My leads would sound like massive detuned trance leads because the tuning and stability of the model 15 was all over the place. I like to have control over the detuning, with the vco-6, I have complete control. It does what I say. It is well behaved. Some people hate this. I love it. The tone is kind of clinical. People say it sounds like roland vco. I compared it to my sh-2. The sh-2 was pillow warm and softer. The vco-6 is like a razor, clinical, and cutting, but still fat enough for most bass duties. I would say over all that the VCO-6 does remind me of roland a bit. But it’s so clean compared to roland stuff. I think it is in it’s own class. I can see the roland comparison, but honestly, it is it’s own thing. Unique in its precision and cleanness. I give this a 5 out of 5.

Pros= Many inputs and attenuators, a switch for dc and ac on fm input 1. Can double as a LFO(It cannot go as slow as some others, more like a moog lfo). 2 pwm inputs, 2 pwm attenuators, 3 fm inputs with 3 fm attenuators, octave switch + fine tune, sync input. The build quality knobs and jacks are so much better than anything else on the market.

Cons= In some cases too clinical. Lacks a bit of warmth and filth(this can be good or bad), not vintage sounding at all.

Here is a little demo of the VCO-6 that I put together, just going up the keybaord on each voice output. At the end I mess around with all the PWM modes. Right Click Here, to save as an mp3. HEY, all you VCO-2RM owners, you can use this to compare the sound to your oscillator if you are still on the fence. Hope this helps. PEACE. hexfix93.

Category: 08-Synth Reviews! | 3 Comments »

Synths: Moog Freqbox mf-107 Oscillator. Hexfix93′s Take.

May 2nd, 2008 by Hexfix93

The moog freqbox, a versatile fx pedal unit that can be used as an oscillator in a modular synth setup. When I first plugged them in, I noticed how huge they sounded. How alive. They reminded me of the older moog stuff, like tarus pedals and model d minimoog. With two, the oscillators would beat and sound pretty vintage. These things are FAT. The biggest. The sync sounds were so mean and huge, it would make my whole house shake. I ran these into my doepfer custom eurorack filled with rare boutique modules. I loves how the moog oscillators sounded through the polivoks filter the most. I prefered these oscillators for BASS duties. There is this warm beef that you get in the 60 to 200hz range on the low end of the frequency spectrum. No other synths and oscillators can pump this style of sound out. These pedals really did sound more vintage to me than the little phatty and the new minimoog voyagers. They had plenty of high end frequencies which I think are lacking a tad on the newer moog synths.

As far as the tracking goes? Well I ran into a little trouble. But once they warmed up I could get about 3 octaves of stable tracking no problem. Amos Gaynes, one of the techs who works at moog saw my initial comments on the tracking that I posted a while back, and offered to modify them so they would track better. After the mod, they did better. This is how great the customer support is over at moog music. A couple of things that I think would make these better would be a fine tuning knob for the osc, and if they could be put into doepfer format and make them track a tiny bit better they would put the competition in the modular synth world out of business when it comes to fat big bass oscillators. That would be so awesome. I kind of did not like having two wall warts. I also was not fond of having them on the floor with long cables to my modular, but that is something I could of fixed If i bought a rack mount for the pedals. For synth oscillators, these are the best for modular bass lines. Better than any other modular doepfer eurorack oscillator that I have used in the bass dept. for sure. I still like other things for leads more though.

We did run our guitar through this pedal, and we could get some really strange sounds with it. Something new and different for sure. The sound quality of this pedal is top notch and will enhance any guitar or modular synth rig with ease. You really cannot go wrong here. I give this a 4 out of 5.

This is a link to a video I did that shows off the moog in action: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9_wAH_Z6R3Q

Category: 08-Synth Reviews!, 09-ProAudio Reviews | 2 Comments »