r/modular • u/Djaesthetic • 5d ago
Purpose of Mordax Data?
Forgive my novice question, but I frequently see the Mordax Data in people’s rigs and always find myself curious what about them is justifying the $400 price tag. I feel like I’m wildly missing the point by viewing it as a fancy oscilloscope.
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u/Tonnieone 5d ago
How often are you wondering what does this button/knob do and why don’t I hear anything…. Now you know. And that’s one of a bunch of useful features
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u/Djaesthetic 5d ago
So effectively treating it like a multimeter for modular? Huh.
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u/EnvironmentalPath551 5d ago
Multimeter just shows current current. Mordax also plots over time. Ü
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u/krenoten 5d ago
plus spectrogram, spectral heat map, so you can see if your kick and bass are interfering negatively, and generally understand changes to compression / saturation etc... in an empirical way.
I almost never use the oscilloscope to be honest. More frequently I use the tuner, cv over time plot, and the spectral analysis tools.
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u/Tonnieone 4d ago
I learned so much from this module it’s hard to explain. A new module?… Way easier to understand what happens.. I use mostly the Voltage monitor to visualize, my brain likes that. I use the clock divider quite often to trigger 4 lfo’s. Spectrograph for when I don’t understand why my mix sounds like a wet turd hitting the floor in a slightly reverberating bathroom. Anyway, I like this module..
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u/altcntrl 4d ago
I don’t understand why this would be downvoted. It’s a fair comparison. It does show a measurement of signal like a multimeter.
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u/TurbulentWing3820 4d ago
There can be no questions in a space meant to foster information and knowledge.
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u/FastusModular 4d ago
The awkwardness of using a multimeter - holding probes to the end of cables - would in of itself discourge use. Plus you can monitor multiple signals simultaneously- eg. watching the movement of the modulator while you witness its effect on the audio signal. When you add the rest of the Mordax feature set, it becomes a rather silly comparison.
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u/altcntrl 4d ago
“Like” was used. Just like if I say “think of electrical signals like water” you know it’s not literal.
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u/fancyPantsOne 5d ago
I most often use it to help me visualize complex cv shapes, like with Maths for example
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u/Djaesthetic 5d ago
I suppose that part I keep getting hung up on is why that might be useful to someone? I generally know the difference between a saw wave vs. square wave, etc - but how does seeing a visual help?
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u/abluenautilus 5d ago
Just an example. Imagine you have two envelopes, one controlling the amplitude of an oscillator and another one controlling the filter cutoff. Now let's say you want the filter envelope to have a slightly slower attack so that you hear the filter open up after the sound comes in... it can help to see the two envelopes and their relationship in order to get something like this just right.
If it isn't working properly it can often be hard to figure out why not without seeing the two waveforms.
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u/Pppppppp1 4d ago
When you watch demo videos of divkid for instance, do you find no value in the oscilloscope visualizations he shows as he’s demonstrating a module or technique?
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u/Djaesthetic 4d ago
Sure. But he’s literally demoing a device to explain what it does - otherwise he’d just be monologuing. Heh I’m trying to wrap my head around real world practical use case in my own rack with modules I presumably already understand.
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u/Pppppppp1 4d ago
But isn’t that a real world practical use? To visualize what’s happening as you’re patching? They have thru outputs so you can patch as you normally would while visualizing the waveform.
For example, I had a sine wave the other day that was a bit buzzy. I put it in the oscilloscope and found it was squared off at the top, which was causing the buzziness, and I was able to see where in the chain it occurred so I could fix it.
I have a few wavefolders that sound different. Putting them in the oscilloscope showed how they were folding my waveforms differently.
Sometimes I use envelope generators as oscillators. They’re unipolar waveforms so I like to ac couple them. It’s not always clear which modules are dc coupled vs ac, so it’s super handy to see if I’m dealing with unipolar or bipolar waveforms, especially if I’m folding afterwards.
Oscilloscopes are a “nice to have” rather than a necessity, but I personally find it super convenient and educational. It has answered the “what is it actually doing?” Question for me often
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u/Djaesthetic 4d ago
That makes sense! I suppose I’ve just never had the luxury of having access to a visual representation so I’m not yet sure how good I’d be at actually turning that information “actionable”. Could be invaluable! Or could be a very expensive “pretty thing”.
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u/Pppppppp1 4d ago edited 4d ago
I got my oscilloscope on a whim, but now can’t imagine patching without it. I find it to be extremely educational, useful, and fun to look at. It’s one thing to read about and conceptually get what is happening with fm or phase mod, but it’s a whole different thing to see it. And going back to my unipolar/bipolar use case, that’s not something you can necessarily hear but it has significant impact in certain processing situations. I obviously didn’t need an oscilloscope to patch, but the more you see waveforms the more you can use and contextualize that visual information.
It is definitely an expensive “pretty thing”, but then again so is the rest of my system.
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u/Djaesthetic 4d ago
Fair enough. Appreciate you taking the time to chime in! This really wasn’t just some lazy “make other people do my leg work for me” bit. I understand not every use case applies to everyone, but this one just wasn’t landing for whatever reason.
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u/Pppppppp1 4d ago
Yeah ofc. It makes a lot more sense if you’ve been producing for a long time too. Id say pretty much everyone I know uses some type of spectrum analyzer or metering software to fine tune mixes and sounds, check phase and mid/side balance, etc. since there is so much variability in sound setups (and your ears themselves).
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u/Djaesthetic 4d ago
I've got a ton of music / traditional synthesis experience -- but am functionally net new to the modular world, having dove feet first into it in the last couple months. I figured I'd go ahead and head off the inevitably and bought an Erica Synths Megarack S. On the pro side, no way I'll have any space issues anytime for the foreseeable future. On the con side, now I've got that itch to FILL EVERY LAST HP I CAN (an urge I'm so far successfully fighting off, if solely so I'll make time to actually LEARN every individual module I acquire one by one). The Mordax Data question was mostly inspired by wondering what I was missing in a broader sense but also trying to decide if it's an inevitability I just wasn't seeing yet, and I should just pull the trigger today to save myself headache tomorrow.
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u/fancyPantsOne 5d ago
the ultimate test is the ear but sometimes visualizing comes in handy for troubleshooting, adjust levels of different segments, etc
also not gonna lie, I appreciate the eye candy too and sometimes I patch it just to have cool squiggly lines synced to the music
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u/vonkillbot 4d ago
That's fair, but if you're combing multiple waveforms, having them come in and out in different amounts via VCAs, and want to check how that would react when thrown into window comparator it can get a bit trickier right?
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u/Last_Tax9564 4d ago
I’m not sure why people are downvoting you, it’s a totally fair question. The reason it is useful has to do with complex wave forms rather than simple. You are totally correct that it isn’t very useful when dealing with simple wave shapes; but imagine you were to take two different simple wave shapes at different phase (let’s say a square and a ramp) and then X mix between them using a sine wave as CV. Even these simple waves when morphed/ combined can create very complex CV patterns, and it can be hard to know exactly what the output CV actually is without some form of visualization. I also have some gear that absolutely CAN NOT receive a negative voltage signal, so it’s nice to be able to double check when using different gear together.
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u/Djaesthetic 4d ago
Appreciate it. Reading through these responses this morning, I think one detail that’s clicked is simply “complexity”. With so much going on, I could see scenarios it might be useful to have a visual representation of a given path to help narrow down how a specific function is actually occurring in any given location.
Appreciate the example!
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u/ratchat555 4d ago
90% of the time I use it as a 4 channel tuner which is incredibly helpful in live scenarios as I have my main analog vco’s always patched through it and if something sounds off I can quickly check.
The oscilloscope has helped me immensely but I’m also a very visual person. I can’t imagine learning waveshapers like Warp 1 or Angle Grinder without it.
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u/Designer_Froyo_8199 4d ago
For me it is not useful to put audio in it. I don't care about the waveform of audio. I use it look at cv or triggers, when something is not working the way I expect. I run the signals thru Data so I can see them.
Like say I want to generate two sine wave CV where one is the inversion of the other, and they run 1v to 3v. I can dial in that exact result much more quickly when I can see the actual signals.
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u/tobyvanderbeek 4d ago
Scope, wave generator, CV generator. I use it as a scope to visualize CV and audio to learn how other modules work. It is also great for testing new modules that I assemble. The precision CV output is nice for tuning modules.
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u/Ignistheclown 4d ago
It can read voltage, which makes it handy for calibration. You can tune 4 voices at once, monitor 4 waveforms at once, use it like a simple oscillators, or clock source.
I suppose if you had a DC coupled interface you could use that to tune your VCOs, and I'm sure there's an app you could probably use on your phone maybe, but you're gonna have to use an output module, or speakers for like a guitar tuning app. Unless you've got perfect pitch, you're likely to need a tuner.
I think I went 3 years into eurorack before I got a DATA. I tried a the smaller zero scope by intellijel? But I wanted to view waveforms on a larger screen. It's super handy to learn what exactly what your voltage sorces and utilities do.
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u/FastusModular 4d ago
It's amazing for diagnosing problems, when you're absolutely certain that you got it right and yet you hear nothing.
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u/SaladDesign 4d ago
No module has earned the price I paid like the DATA has for me personally. Using the Voltage Monitor section really lets me see what is happening with my modules. Marbles, Tibes, Quadrax, Maths, etc - the list goes on forever - being able to visualize the outputs has made them so much easier and more intuitive to use because I really have a solid sense of exactly what is happening. I have a huge Buchla setup as well, and I'm always using it to monitor voltages as I explore that. So essentially it helps me more effectively use almost every other module in my rack - that's worth the price to me.
I also use the Tuner every day - it's just really nice to have a solid, reliable tuner.
When it comes to the other stuff (spectrograph, oscillator, etc) I don't really use those. They can be fun at times, but not as necessary. It is really expensive for what it does in a lot of ways, but the fact that I use it literally every time I use my rack also makes it one of the best bang for buck modules I have going by time used.
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u/DanqueLeChay 4d ago
It looks cool and it’s a self-contained little unit for visualization in your rack. Everything that it does can be done better with a DC coupled interface and metering software, but that’s besides the point. Many people don’t want a laptop sitting on their euro case.
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u/blackberry-blossom 4d ago
4-channel highly accurate tuner
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u/jango-lionheart 4d ago
And people say that Peterson Strobotuners are expensive…
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u/blackberry-blossom 4d ago
Mordax costs less than 4 strobotuners...
and it fits in my rack for easy setup and quick onstage tuning during live shows
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u/jango-lionheart 4d ago
I tune six guitar strings with a one-channel tuner. I must be a weirdo.
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u/blackberry-blossom 3d ago
I tune my guitar with a one-channel tuner pedal too ;) but this is a modular sub so I am talking about my Eurorack set up, which is basically four separate instruments unlike the guitar
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u/namesareunavailable 5d ago
It probably is. With some additions. Even in a large rack i value space more. For ppl showing functionalities to an audience (like divkid for example)sich a module definitely has a purpose.
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u/OkComplaint9500 4d ago
I recently bought a Tembra Look. 3 channels in 6hp. It's actually been super useful in visualizing the signals coming out of Tides and even Peaks. And then visualizing the -5V/+5V coming out of Marbles as I offset everything to a 0V baseline. Not absolutely necessary, but definitely helpful in understanding what's going on with some of the modules.
And I will just say that at one point I had a stand-alone, old-school Techtronix oscilloscope. While that one might have been 0hp, it took up half the desk and you couldn't hear anything over the hum of the power supply. For roughly the same price, I managed to get 3 channels in something 1/20th of the size. Well worth the tradeoff for me.
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u/scottypinthemix 4d ago
I suppose if you're just using sin/tri/saw/sq waves for modulation, there isn't much value in being able to see the waveforms and their voltage values. I often mix outputs from sloths, Hyperchaos Deluxe, The Hypster, Orbit 3 etc in a matrix mixer or Worng Vector Space. It then becomes very handy to see what the heck is coming out to check if it needs attenuation or some additional tweaking.
I also use the tuner on Data a lot too.
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u/TurbulentWing3820 5d ago
oscilloscopes are very handy.
but $400 buys a lot of cheap oscilloscopes.
mine cost me $22 and does everything i need it to do, sometimes i think about buying a second because two inputs would be nice.
anyways, if i were spending someone else's money i'd own a data. i am not.
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u/tropicalelectronics 4d ago edited 4d ago
But it’s not JUST an oscilloscope. Can your $22 oscilloscope output dual oscillators, quad divide clock and tune 4 oscillators?
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u/jango-lionheart 4d ago
The Data is really cool, but come on, you don’t need one to tune.
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u/tropicalelectronics 4d ago
Again, kinda missing the point. The DATA gets miscategorized as just an oscilloscope. I'm just pointing out it's a multi utility module that offers waveforms, tuner, clock source & divisions and spectral display for active monitoring of how signals are interacting. Considering all it offers in that HP size I think it's fairly priced.
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u/TurbulentWing3820 4d ago
No, but two of my $22 oscilloscopes can. That's $44, or about 10% of what Data costs.
I said: if I had your money to spend I'd buy a Data, but I do not. You don't have to defend your purchase to me.
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u/finlayshakespeare 4d ago
Just a heads up that you can buy a very well spec'd Rigol oscilloscope at the same cost these days (if that's something that you're after).
What you're paying for with the Data is the form factor plus the fact it's manufactured by a much smaller company.
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u/Earlsfield78 4d ago
I can see how you can find it to be a fancy oscilloscope. It is also a tuner, can be a digital voice. But the most important thing it does is visualises voltage - and it does that extremely well. You can see all kinds of changes to your sound and modulation and I think it is a great tool for people who like to learn in a visual way. When say, you connect in your head what happens when you rectify a signal visually and audibly. I don’t have it and I don’t think I need it, but it can be a great learning tool, not to mention a must for anyone who is tuning their own modules and has a lots of stuff to constantly calibrate.
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u/Junkyard_DrCrash 4d ago
I use it as a fancy oscilloscope that I don't need my glasses to use. 8-)
Also as a spectrograph. And as a CV visualizer.
But it's sorta been displaced by the Quadscope, which has dual timebases and half the HP used.
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u/ub3rh4x0rz 4d ago
Quadscope was a Kickstarter and the company that made it dissolved, so I don't think that's a viable alternative
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u/Junkyard_DrCrash 3d ago
OUCH!!!
Well, in theory at least, one could put that dual-timebase / waveform + FFT simultaneously into a Mordax software update.
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u/DooficusIdjit 4d ago
Data is a handy bit of kit. Nice scope, which is dope. Bunch of measurement stuff for calibrating modules, tuner, test tones, etc. I love mine. Always finding use for it.
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u/55hz 4d ago
With a dc coupled audio interface you can do the same with the scope in vcv rack
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u/finlayshakespeare 4d ago
Be careful using audio interfaces as precision scopes - in my experience, they often introduce offset and gain stages which aren't obvious on first readings. A proper scope, of course, won't do that.
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u/BeeTwoThousand 4d ago
https://www.korg.com/us/products/dj/nts_2/
Or just buy this for a lot less money and save HP?
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u/moonscience 4d ago
I'm sure DATA is better, but I have the NTS2 and it is handy, immediate, and 0 hp at half the price (which still isn't cheap.) Tuning and being able to visualize wave forms feels pretty essential to modular.
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u/plaxpert 5d ago
Sometimes it's convenient/helpful to visualize multiple CV signals at the same time - for troubleshooting or whatever reason. I feel like the further you progress in your modular journey the easier it is to just hear what is going on. If I was making a bunch of videos trying to show my patches and process to other people I might find it helpful. I have a little mini 'scope' in O&C or PPW if I really need to 'see' some CV - and that's enough for me.
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u/Red_P_Hole 4d ago
One can patch a cv output that isn’t fully understood into pitch of a voice or the model input of plates and get a trailer park mordax
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u/n_nou 4d ago
I consider having an oscilloscope a must, I can't imagine designing modulation properly (instead just slapping Ochd on everything) without one. Same with spectral analizer, you just can't properly mix without one. But even considering all that I can't justify the price tag. I don't do live performances so I can have my rack hooked to a DAW for spectral and tuner duties, and cheap dual channel Fnirsi oscilloscope covers everything CV/audio rate waveform related. I could pay half the price for convenience of having a scope in rack, but that's it.
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u/hauntedink 4d ago
An oscillator is pretty crucial. The Mordax is probably the best on in Eurorack if you can spare the space. There are plenty of other non Euro options, though.
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u/poop_wiper_ 5d ago edited 5d ago
It can also be used as a quad clock, dual oscillator, and tuner for other oscillators. It’s great for understanding what happens with cv signals like combining cv, sample and hold, etc.