Marion MSR-2 Analog Synthesizer - RARE (Oberheim MSR2) A- 01307

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"Tom Oberheim (of Oberheim synthesizer fame) founded Marion Systems in the early 1990s to develop a mainframe modular synthesizer that was planned to accomodate differerent synthesis technologies as plug-in boards. The MSR-2 chassis, which is 1U rackmountable, supports 2 plug-in boards. The subtractive analog ASM was the only plug-in board ever offered for the MSR-2 -- it offers 8 voices (16 HROs) of analog synthesis using Oberheim's new DCO-based HRO (High Resolution Oscillator) technology with continuous waveshaping to create waveforms that bridge the gap between the usual saw/square offerings. A derivative of this CEM chip-based HRO design lives on today in Dave Smith's Evolver and other DSI instruments.

A slightly less expensive version of the MSR-2 was sold as the Pro Synth which included a single ASM board but I don't believe the Pro Synth was expladable like the MSR-2. Like most MSR-2s, this unit has one 8-voice ASM board, so it has room for another ASM board in the 1U chassis if you can track one down. If two ASM boards are installed, they can be used as one 16-voice (32 HRO) synthesizer, or they can be layered.

The best features of the MSR-2 are the filter section with very powerful FM capabilities and the deep modulation routings offered -- not surprisingly, they are very similar to the modulation capabilities of Oberheim's Matrix 6 and Matrix 12 synthesizers which preceeded the Marion. Also, even though the unit only has a few knobs, it is very easy to program even with complicated patches. The MSR-2 operating system is very similar to that of E-mu's Proteus line -- very logical."