BAF 2024: New Systems Instruments - New Modules

video upload by sonicstate

"At Buchla and Friends 2024, Sonic State caught up with Evan from New Systems Instruments to discuss their latest modular offerings. Evan showcased three main modules: the Triphase Oscillator, the Harmonic Shift Oscillator, and the Inertia function generator.

The Triphase Oscillator offers three phases of a sawtooth oscillator with a bipolar mixer, allowing for extensive control and the creation of unique super saw sounds. On the other hand, the Harmonic Shift Oscillator provides control over level and stride which controls the spacing between harmonics, enabling users to create a wide range of sounds with non-integer spacing between harmonics. This FM-inspired oscillator introduces a unique twist by omitting negative frequencies typically associated with inharmonic FM. The Inertia function generator, with its rise and fall momentum controls, allows users to shape snappy envelopes, add peaks, and even function as an LFO at extreme settings. Additionally, it can serve as a versatile filter, producing squelchy filter sounds.

All of these modules are currently available on the New Systems Instruments website and selected stores. The Triphase Oscillator is priced at $385, the Harmonic Shift Oscillator at $365, and the Inertia function generator at around $345.

https://nsinstruments.com/"

Jamuary 11, 2024: Lost

video upload by stujay

"Lots of Instruo here. Main melody = Cs-L panned left, Ts-L+Neoni (FM'd) panned right. Assists from Make Noise Mimeophon and New Systems Instruments Inertia. Harmonaig on quantizing duty, melody played on Doepfer Trautonium ribbon controller. Big bass at the end is Therevox Ondes VCO. A touch of weirdness courtesy of Slate+Ash Spectres."

New Systems Instruments #jamuary2024 no 1

video upload by New Systems Instruments

"Apologies for the unedited mix. Patch notes: audio out from the keyboard is going directly to the mixer and also to the Eurorack, landing in the sync input of a Triphase. Triphase out 1 and 2 are going to two Inertias configured for frequency division. So basically, frequency multiplication followed by division. The noise is pink noise through two VCAs, modulated by a fast and a slow LFO."

https://nsinstruments.com/

When Mathematics & Physics Influence Eurorack Modular // New Systems Instruments at Knobcon 2023

video upload by DivKid

"It was great to see New Systems Instruments at Knobcon 2023 and learn about some of their modules. They caught my eye around their release and their "a bit like Serge but from a mathematical" approach certainly fascinates me. We look at Inertia, a function generator that has inertia, an resonance like overshoot of voltage travelling as well as the oscillators."

NSI are here // https://nsinstruments.com

Midiverse - TV Knobcon 2023

video uploads by Midiverse - TV

Playlist:
Steady State Fate - Knobcon 2023 - Midiverse - TV
New Systems Instruments - Knobcon 2023 - Midiverse - TV
Kilpatrick Audio - Knobcon 2023 - Midiverse - TV
Karltron - Knobcon 2023 - Midiverse - TV
SetonixSynth / Tidbit Audio - Knobcon 2023 - Midiverse - TV
Infrasonic Audio - Knobcon 2023 - Midiverse - TV

More info @
https://midiversetv.blogspot.com
@midiverse_modular on Instagram

“Finding the Right Words” (Triphase + Babel)

video upload by New Systems Instruments

"(Use headphones/good speakers or the hf might be too piercing.) Patch notes: another duophonic Triphase patch. Each mix out is going into Babel as the only input, taking the XSOME output, which means Babel is functioning as an octaver/saw-to-triangle shaper. These are going to the left and right inputs of the Quad Mid Side, then the L-R and X inputs are attenuated to narrow the mix (in stereo, X is just a second L-R). Output through some long reverb, pretty low in the mix. I’m using two channels of the Quad LFO plus two Phase Expanders to modulate the center of the two Babels and 2/3 phases of the Triphases. The Triphases are tuned to cancel the first two harmonics, so on top of Babel’s octaving that is being disturbed by LFOs to center, the pitch is much higher but there’s a whole bunch of sub harmonics that come out and blend with the higher frequency triangle waves.

Modules and more info at https://nsinstruments.com"

Warm Nights

video upload by New Systems Instruments

"Patch Notes: this is a polyphonic Triphase patch. Both Triphases are set up to emphasize the first harmonic, by blending the top two phases at around +-90deg. Two phases of the quad LFO and phase expander modulate the first phase of each Triphase. A little bit of the third phase is blended negatively which helps to ensure we don’t entirely remove the fundamental. These are going through a stereo low pass filter (MMM), which is following the notes in an interesting way. After buffering the volt per octave for each Triphase, It’s sent into Babel to get the maximum. This is then sent through an Inertia with a slow rise time and a bit of rise momentum, so the slew is limited and you get interesting filter sweeps that get more dramatic the bigger a jump you make with the notes. Lastly, the two modulated Triphase outputs are mixed together and sent into a second Inertia configured as a filter with a good bit of resonance and some skew on the frequency to make the resonances saw-like and give it that characteristic distorted feel. This is drenched in reverb and buried way back in the mix.

Triphase and the other modules are available on https://nsinstruments.com/
#eurorack #ambient #ambientmusic #dronemusic #modular #modularsynth"

Patch Notes: Stone Hall (Babel/Triphase/HSO/Inertia)

video upload by New Systems Instruments

"This is mostly a video about Babel, and techniques to use it at audio rate. But IMO when Eurorack modules are done right, they show us universal things about music. Hopefully this generates some useful ideas for whatever modules you have.

For more information on these modules, check out https://nsinstruments.com"

Stone Halls: Babel/Triphase/HSO/Inertia

video upload by New Systems Instruments

"Patch Notes: I'm going to make a video about the patch soon (trying something new). But here's some quick notes. Babel is the heart of this piece. Everything is going into it and modulating each other. Mixing is just the most basic form of modulation, so think of this as advanced mixing. There's three voices: two Triphase Oscillators and a Harmonic Shift Oscillator. One of the Triphases is droning. The HSO is doing the lower voice and the other Triphase the upper. Inertia is detecting the variation in amplitude and exaggerating it with momentum, then feeding that back to change the timbre of the Triphases as well as the center for Babel's modulation. Now just what all of that means...that'll be the subject of the next video.

Just a note: I get frustrated making Eurorack videos where the music ends up secondary to the content, but you need music to explain the modules. So the solution (hindsight is duh) is to just separate these, and give patches two videos. Or at least, I'm hoping that works out the way I'm imagining.

These are all available from https://nsinstruments.com"

Afternoon Musing #ambient #dronemusic #eurorack #modular

video upload by New Systems Instruments

"Patch notes: This is two triphase oscillators modulated from four phases of an Quad LFO+Phase Expander pair, mixed together, then fed into Inertia configured as a filter with a bit of resonance skew. The inertia filter parameters are what I’m adjusting. Buried in the background is the unfiltered mix fed through Babel, taking the XSOME mix, with one of the phases of the LFO modulating CENTER."

Harmonic Shift Oscillator as a double Percussive + Melodic Voice #ambient #darkambient #eurorack

video upload by New Systems Instruments

"July 4 sale ends today! Save 10% at nsinstruments.com w code NATIONSARELIES

Patch Notes: output is one of the HSO outs (the other is just going to the oscilloscope), through the VCA. The V/O input is driven by a keyboard going through one Inertia which is giving it just a bit of portamento. That Inertia also has pitch cv negatively modulating the rate so that it slews less on lower frequencies. The keyboard trigger output is going to some manual switches (ADDAC 304) so I can control which envelope to trigger. Two Inertias are acting as envelopes, one for the more percussive sound and one for the melodic sound. They’re joined in Babel via the ANY (maximum) out and sent to the VCA. The Inertia doing the percussive envelope also has the second order out going to the harmonic stride CV; the Inertia doing the melodic envelope has the second order going to the harmonic level cv. Last, pitch cv is going to the percussive inertia fall time, such that higher notes fall faster than lower notes."

Triphase Oscillator: an epic analogue VCO from New Systems Instruments

video upload by Tom Churchill

"The Triphase Oscillator from New Systems Instruments is a complex analogue VCO that’s based around the concept of phase cancellation, which is a key part of the sound of everything from chorus and phaser effects to PWM and supersaws. And as you’ll hear, it can sound absolutely huge.

Just like the other New Systems modules, the Triphase Oscillator is deceptively minimal on the surface - it’s essentially a triple sawtooth oscillator with voltage-controllable phase of each, and a bipolar mixer to combine them - but its relatively simple architecture unlocks a whole world of rich, complex sound design. In this video, I give an overview of its features and build some patches so you can hear what it’s capable of.

Thanks to New Systems Instruments for supplying the module. All opinions are my own. Find out more and check out the manual at https://nsinstruments.com/modules/tri...

More stuff from me:
https://tomchurchill.bandcamp.com/
https://soundcloud.com/tomchurchill
https://www.instagram.com/tomchurchill/"

See this post for an additional demo and details on the Triphase Oscillator.

New Systems Instruments Inertia, Harmonic Shift Oscillator, Babel & Quad LFO

video upload by Tom Churchill

"This video is about New Systems Instruments - one of the most innovative and underrated brands in Eurorack.

I’m looking at four modules: the Harmonic Shift Oscillator, a unique analogue VCO; Inertia, a ‘universal movement simulator’ or function generator that can be anything from an envelope to a filter depending on how you patch it; Babel, which is a one-of-a-kind analogue logic and intermodulation utility; and the new Quad LFO with Phase Expander.

I give a quick overview of each module before building some patches with various configurations of the modules to demonstrate a range of sounds and techniques.

Chapters:
00:00 Preview
00:56 Introduction
02:48 Harmonic Shift Oscillator overview
05:56 Inertia overview
11:15 Quad LFO and Babel overview
13:33 Harmonic Shift Oscillator: basic bass voice
16:22 Inertia as a waveshaping VCO with FM
18:54 Harmonic sequencing for techno loops
21:13 Drones with Inertia as a complex filter
24:32 Exploring FM on Harmonic Shift Oscillator
27:06 Experimenting with percussive effects
29:22 Complex wave combinations with Babel
32:00 Final thoughts

Find out more about the modules on the New Systems Instruments website (and do check out the manuals - they’re incredible!): https://nsinstruments.com/

Big thanks to New Systems Instruments’ distributor, Signal Sounds - https://www.signalsounds.com/ - who hooked me up with Harmonic Shift Oscillator, Inertia and Quad LFO to use in this video. All opinions are my own.

More stuff from me:
https://tomchurchill.bandcamp.com/
https://soundcloud.com/tomchurchill
https://www.instagram.com/tomchurchill/"

New Systems Instruments Introduces Triphase Oscillator Eurorack Module

video upload by New Systems Instruments

"A quick overview of the Triphase Oscillator. For more information, check out our website: https://nsinstruments.com/modules/tri... Patch notes below.

The Triphase Oscillator is a Eurorack Module from New Systems Instruments that lets you explore the space of phase interference. It is an oscillator with three independent phases, with modulation, and a bipolar mixer to combine them.

The first / last patch uses two Triphase oscillators. The lower Triphase is taking two outputs panned left and right and one panned center, with different LFOs modulating the left and right phase. This gives it a stereo chorus type of effect. The higher/melody Triphase has an envelope controlling one of the phases, and an LFO controlling the other two. This makes a square notch that is large at the beginning and then becomes smaller, with both the width of the notch and its position relative to the saw changing. End of chain reverb is added. There are no filters, VCAs, or other modules making or modifying sounds.

Most of the other patches should be pretty self-explanatory. They are recorded dry.

The melodic patch is sequenced from a keystep.

The FM patch is doing audio rate FM from the Inertia, which is configured as an oscillator here.

The hard sync patch is synced with an offscreen oscillator, and uses the Inertia as an envelope to control the pitch of the Triphase."

"New Systems Instruments announced today that the Triphase Oscillator is now shipping and available. The Triphase Oscillator gives you three sawtooth waves with independent control over the phase of each wave, combined with a bipolar mixer. This creates a comb filter pattern in the harmonics, emphasizing some harmonics and canceling others.

The Triphase Oscillator works with phase cancellation, combining three waves at different phases and polarities to remove or reinforce regularly spaced harmonics, such as odd harmonics or every third harmonic. With the bipolar mixer, you can control how the waves interact, canceling or reinforcing parts of the spectrum either fully or partially. Applying CV to the phases creates variable-width pulses, subtle detuning effects, and a continuously moving soundscape. Phase cancellation is related to pulse width modulation, but pulse width modulation only has one dimension of control instead of the multiple phases and polarities of the Triphase Oscillator. A closer relative is a chorus effect, which creates frequency-dependent phase differences by delaying a signal.

One way to use the Triphase Oscillator is to mix all three saws at the same polarity, modulating their phases to create a supersaw, similar to mixing multiple detuned sawtooth oscillators. This creates a classic thick analog sound, further enhanced by the internal CP3 type mixer—a discrete transistor mixer that reportedly gave the Moog IIIp modular system a good part of its sound. With the individual outputs, you can also use a full featured stereo mixer and pan the saw waves left, right, and center, giving a stereo supersaw or stereo chorus type of effect.

Apart from its unique phase modulation capabilities, the Triphase Oscillator is a very capable analog oscillator in its own right, giving a tuning accuracy of around 8 octaves and ranging from 1.5Hz–60kHz, well into the sub and supersonic ranges. In addition to volt per octave and CV over phase, it has a hard sync input, and a linear FM input. All the CV runs at audio rate as well, meaning the Triphase Oscillator can produce some interesting FM + phase modulation sounds.

New Systems Instruments is a modular manufacturer located in the San Francisco Bay Area, focusing on creating new analog designs based on different ways of thinking about music and synthesis.

The Triphase Oscillator retails at $385 USD."

Rhythmic LFOs How-To w/ NSI Quad LFO + Expander + Babel

video upload by New Systems Instruments

"This video explains how to make rhythmic LFOs with your Eurorack modular system, using the Quad LFO, the Phase Expander, and Babel from New Systems Instruments. You can use these same principles to combine any modulation sources that give you control over the phase of the outputs, and with any maximum/minimum/analog logic module. But note that the behavior of exclusive some (XOR/balanced middle) is unique to Babel.

For more about these modules, see:

https://nsinstruments.com/modules/qlf...
https://nsinstruments.com/modules/bab...
https://nsinstruments.com/modules/HSO...

Module descriptions:

The Quad LFO is an 8 HP analog sine core oscillator, giving four independent sine wave outputs. Each of the outputs ranges from nearly stopped to about 23Hz, covering the full sub-audio range and just dipping into the low audible frequencies. Each has linear voltage control as well, meaning that an increase in control voltage gives a proportional increase in output frequency. While each LFO is initially configured as a sine wave, there are four jumpers on the back to switch between sine and pulse wave outputs. This can be handy for using one of the four LFOs as a clock, or if you just want a square wave LFO for some other reason.

The 6 HP associated expander gives you three more LFO outputs, in a controlled phase relationship with the LFO to which they are connected. That is, each of the outputs is delayed by a certain percentage of the LFO cycle. The first output ranges from 0–180º, or from unison to a half cycle delay. The second ranges from 90–270º, or from a quarter cycle to three quarter cycle delay. And the last ranges from 180–360º, or from a half cycle to a full cycle delay. The phase expander can be useful for creating interesting rhythmic modulations, or when the LFO is configured as a square wave, giving you three phases of a sine wave LFO synced to a clock."

New Systems Instruments: Quad LFO and Phase Expander Eurorack Modules

via New Systems Instruments

New Systems Instruments just released two new modules: the Quad LFO and an associated LFO Phase Expander. With four independent LFOs, each of which can have its own expander with three more outputs, this gives you a ridiculous number of modulation sources with a small HP footprint.

The Quad LFO is an 8 HP analog sine core oscillator, giving four independent sine wave outputs. Each of the outputs ranges from nearly stopped to about 23Hz, covering the full sub-audio range and just dipping into the low audible frequencies. Each has linear voltage control as well, meaning that an increase in control voltage gives a proportional increase in output frequency. While each LFO is initially configured as a sine wave, there are four jumpers on the back to switch between sine and pulse wave outputs. This can be handy for using one of the four LFOs as a clock, or if you just want a square wave LFO for some other reason.

The 6 HP associated expander gives you three more LFO outputs, in a controlled phase relationship with the LFO to which they are connected. That is, each of the outputs is delayed by a certain percentage of the LFO cycle. The first output ranges from 0–180º, or from unison to a half cycle delay. The second ranges from 90–2a70º, or from a quarter cycle to three quarter cycle delay. And the last ranges from 180–360º, or from a half cycle to a full cycle delay. The phase expander can be useful for creating interesting rhythmic modulations, or when the LFO is configured as a square wave, giving you three phases of a sine wave LFO synced to a clock.

The Quad LFO is quite capable. With the addition of the phase expander it does more than a lot of LFOs that are twice the size. While of course you can find features on the bigger LFOs that this doesn’t have, it’s hard to imagine doing more in this size without recourse to a digital design with menu- or button-controlled modes.

New Systems Instruments is a modular manufacturer located in the San Francisco Bay Area, focusing on creating new, analog designs based on different ways of thinking about music and synthesis. They are best known for Inertia, a complex function generator based on physical motion.

The Quad LFO retails at $239 USD.
The LFO Phase Expander retails at $99 USD.

https://nsinstruments.com/modules/qlfo.html

Inertia and Complex Filtering, or Waveshape Dependent Filtering

video upload by New Systems Instruments

"This video explains how to use Inertia, a Eurorack module from New Systems Instruments, as a complex filter, or a waveshape dependent filter. Both terms are interchangeable.

For more about inertia or to check out the manual, see our website:

https://nsinstruments.com/modules/ine...

Inertia is a new take on a complex function generator that models real world systems, adding a "momentum" parameter that can go into self-oscillation. It produces extremely nuanced, clean, and natural exponential envelopes and skewed sine LFOs. At audio rate, it works great as a VCO, a frequency divider, and a very unique resonant filter. It tracks 5+ octaves and in skew mode has a single frequency knob, so there are no compromises in using it for audio."

Inertia Acid // Minimal Eurorack Setup

video upload by New Systems Instruments

"Can [competing function generator] do this?? 😈 A little acid track made with Inertia as Kick, Snare, Envelope, Oscillator, and Filter. Listen with headphones!"

New Systems Instruments Releases Inertia, a “Universal Movement Simulator”

video upload by New Systems Instruments

https://nsinstruments.com/modules/inertia.html

"New Systems Instruments announced today that Inertia is now shipping and available. Inertia is a new take on a complex function generator. It models physical motion with analog electronics, adding a rise and fall "momentum" parameter to the more familiar rise and fall rate controls. This extra parameter radically expands on what a function generator can do, with the most obvious addition being lush, resonant filtering.

Inertia’s physical model produces exponential envelopes that are extremely natural, comparable to a vactrol ping but much more configurable. The inclusion of rise momentum gives an easy way to get an ADSR type signal from a gate input, with momentum adding a peak or accent to the initial rise. It has two types of output curves as well, with the second phase delayed from the first.

Unlike a traditional function generator, Inertia doesn’t generate LFOs by cycling its envelope. Instead, you just turn up the momentum until it self-oscillates. As an LFO, it has a useful skewed sine shape. It’s also very syncable, either with the trigger input or just by plugging another LFO into the input.

At audio rate, it makes an excellent VCO, tracking 5+ octaves. Plus it has a second interface mode that allows you to control the frequency and the skew independently, instead of having to fiddle with rise and fall to get a particular frequency and timbre. Skewed all the way to either side, Inertia is as bright as the best sawtooth wave.

Where this module really shines, however, is in use as a filter. It produces anything from subtle to squelch to glitchy scream, depending on how big you let the resonance get and—since it’s got a skew control—what waveshape you give to the resonant frequency. You can skew the resonance itself as well, making Inertia respond with different resonances to the rising and falling edges of an audio waveform. All of this makes Inertia into a filter with the same level of complexity and configurability as a complex oscillator.

The function generator space is pretty crowded in Eurorack, but Inertia is not just another DUSG clone. It stands out as a unique and capable implementation, giving you a huge variety of control curves, an excellent oscillator, and a wild and distinctive filter, all in a single module.

New Systems Instruments is a modular manufacturer located in the San Francisco Bay Area, focusing on creating new, analog designs based on different ways of thinking about music and synthesis.

Inertia retails at $329 USD."

New Systems Instruments Babel w 3 OSCs & 2 LFOs

video upload by New Systems Instruments

"Babel doing a rhythmic thing as the result of various interferences between 3 oscillators and 2 LFOs. See https://nsinstruments.com/modules/bab... for details.

Output is Babel’s XSOME to attenuator to mixer, with a bit of reverb.

Babel’s input is 1 triangle, 1 saw tracking the keyboard, and the Harmonic Shift Oscillator VCA’d with an envelope triggered by the keyboard. A second LFO feeds Babel’s center CV input."

via New Systems Instruments

"$135

Babel is a tool for creating massive intermodulation, and a workhorse for analog logic, depending on your use and interpretation of its function. It provides three inputs, which can be arbitrarily increased with the chainable expander (see below). For each of those inputs, Babel outputs the maximum value (ANY), the minimum value (ALL), and the balanced middle value (XSOME), which follows along the center values of the input waves. What CENTER means is adjustable via knob and CV control. XSOME is particularly interesting, as it has the same general shape as a multiplication function, but with sharper edges. What this means it that Babel will create ring-mod like intermodulation—but with extra harmonics like those produced with a wavefolder, and with an arbitary number of inputs, instead of just two.

When viewed as a logic module, Babel takes any group of truth values and tells you whether any of them are true (ANY, the equivalent of “or” with just two values), whether all of them are true (ALL, the equivalent of “and” with just two values), and whether some, but not all of them are true (XSOME, the equivalent of “xor” with just two values). Turn CENTER all the way to the right for 0–+5V logic, or leave it centered for −5V–+5V logic—handy when your “logic” modules are really LFOs"