racks

[Martin Czech]

First have a look at :

http://www.analogsynths.com/newproduct/selector/home.html#contents

(No , no advertising intended here)

Then :

The Technosaurus (Selector ?= Elektor) synth 

(recently on the Frankfurt Music Fair
sorry, don't know the url, actually an expensive swiss Formant 
remake, but I must admit that the blue wave finish looks cool)

features an interesting idea :

The panels are separated into the "knobs" controll area,
and below that the "patch" or jack area.

------
| k  |
| n  |
| o  |
| b  |
| s  |
-----
| p  |
| a  |
| t  |
------  ( not to scale ;) )

pro : patchcords do no longer disturb controll handling
con : it'll take some time before you know, what jack
      corresponds to what functionality

(By the way, the also have subharmonic dividers,
like in Oscar Sala's Trautonium. Sounds cool)

I think I'll adapt this construction for my machine.

I found that the whole mechanical stuff (drilling, grinding etc)
of the synth housing is a pain in the but and awfull time
consuming,
whereas the electronic is relatively easy and fast to do.
In fact, the whole housing item kept me from building
synths a long time.

So I'll use 19" racks which have a variety of
components on the market.
Some allow single and double height modules in the
same rack.
But I will not use a backplane pcb for signal or power
routing and I will also not use pcb-connectors.
(Ground problems, crosstalk etc).
I'll also use plain aluminum panels, no printing etc,
just edding marker (I might change this later on).


Waste no more time with optical gimmics, just enjoy the sound !