Studio Electronics Boomstar Modular Oscillations
At the beginning of the tone parade, we cheer on another cagey Tim Caswell hybrid, which utilizes an exponential current source in a sympathetic spirit, to the through-hole, glory days circuits of ARP and Oberheim, followed in perfect sync by wave shaping circuits adapted from 2nd generation Minimoog Model D oscillator boards, and an incorporation of waveform mixing circuits pioneered by little old SE; that's us here at STUDIO ELECTRONICS! The gorgeous 100k spray on top all the way down to a boomin' sub bottom, engineer a extravagant variety of tones that would otherwise require several patch cords, and an external mixer; with a two oscillator system, 9 or 10 patch cords and an 8 input mixer would have to be tucked into your carry-on. Where then would you secret your laptop and raw almonds? What's nice about our OSCILLATION stunner (according to Tim) "is that the waveforms are DC-coupled [components connected directly together without any coupling capacitors], so they keep their shape even at sub-Hz speeds. The outputs are also buffered, so the amplitude is independent of the load they are driving. The waveform levels on some modern eurorack OSCs are often all different, and they vary depending if they go into the mixer or directly to the filter!" Coupling the circuitry without capacitors in-line gives the go-ahead for the full spectrum of frequencies to do their thing, and ensures near identical response over the years—audiophile, transistor-protecting signal path stuff here. You should see these beauts on the scope: a Class-A ballet of balance and proportion, only drawing modest current, rather evenly from plus and minus.
All Controls and Patch Points
- FREQUENCY – Oscillator frequency attenuator.
- NORMAL / LOW RANGE – Oscillator domain switch.
- TUNE – Oscillator fine-tune trim.
- PULSE WIDTH – Variable pulse wave width control.
- SINE – Sine wave on/off.
- TRI – Triangle wave on/off.
- SAW – Sawtooth wave on/off.
- SQR – Square (pulse) wave on/off.
- FM CV IN – Frequency Modulation control voltage input attenuverter.
- WAVE MIX – Composite wave output.
- SUB LEVEL – Sub (one octave down) level attenuator.
- 1 V/O – One volt per octave control voltage input.
- FM IN – Frequency Modulation control voltage input.
- SYNC IN – Oscillator Sync control voltage input.
- PW IN – Pulse Width control voltage input.
- SUB OUT – Sub Oscillator output.
- SINE OUT – Sine Oscillator output.
- TRI OUT – Triangle wave output.
- SAW OUT– Sawtooth wave output.
- RAMP OUT – Ramp (reverse sawtooth) wave output.
- SQR OUT – Square wave output.
Vitals
- Size - 16hp
- Depth - 39.7mm with ribbon cable attached
- Power Usage - 20mA, 39mA (+12 / -12)
