Last Updated on October 31, 2024 by IDS Team
Over the past three months, we have been spotlighting VCV Rack, and we’re rounding up with this VCV rack in depth review. VCV Rack is a one of a kind open source eurorack modular synth emulation that sources sounds and plugins from users. At heart, VCV Rack uses a unique concept that comes with a lot of strength even just by itself. However, it also executes it without a hitch, resulting in a dynamic and exciting network of sound innovation that hits the sweet spot between high tech plugin design and a close knit community.
So to close our exploration of one of the internet’s most underrated resources for bedroom producers, this VCV rack in depth review looks at what makes it so appealing,. We’ll also see the few weak spots and blind spots that, like any plugin, it inevitable may have for a few sound designers. So let’s look at vcv rack overall, vcv rack eurorack compatibility, as well as vcv rack compared to the closest other platforms. So, without further ado, let’s start by rounding up what exactly you need to know to start exploring this quirky and entertaining platform.
User Interface and Niche
We’ve already sung the praises of the VCV rack interface, especially when compared to one of the closest products on the market, the Surge XT. Whilst the Surge XT requires a lot of menu diving and can be fiddly and easy to lose your settings if you are not careful, VCV rack is smooth, slick, and intuitive.
However, to help those who are on the fence about jumping ship and investing the time and interest in VCV rack, here are the specific things about it’s user interface which stood out:
- Pyramid of own brand and user generated plugins. How deep you want to go with VCV rack is really up to you. However, if you want to keep things simplistic, it’s own brand of plugins are easy to find and together contain everything you need to get started with a basic signal chain, meaning you don’t need to know all the plugins intimately or have huge amounts of experience to get a basic setup going.
- Scrolling interface. A bit of a novelty, but the scrolling interface that lets you move around a wall of plugins means that the layout of your dream modular synth has only your imagination as a limit. However, we do think that there could be potential for cooking in and out here.
- And last but not least, the ability to control the synth with your qwerty keyboard means that you don’t even need a full home studio to start with.
VCV Rack In Depth Review: Best Characteristics
We looked at a comprehensive breakdown of just a few vcv rack plugins here. But for this final roundup, what are the things that overall make VCV rack a cut above the rest? Apart from the slickness of it’s interface and it’s ease as a gateway into modular synthesis, we have found that:
- Plugins rival major modular and semi modular synth manufacturers in terms of quality and creativity. The screening process ensures that plugins are not substandard and hit the right level of professionalism. However, their widely sourced nature ensures a level of variability that would be impossible to get from a synth modelled and created by a single team or company.
- VCV rack hits the sweet spot between grassroots and professional development Again, the synth, plugin uploading, and community are sincerely well modulated and the whole thing is very professionally developed. It seems to have managed to get the best out of its’s grassroots processes by organising tem efficiently and cleanly and allowing users to make the most of the unique concept.
More VCV Rack Benefits and Bonuses:
- Vcv rack promotes interactive music creation. This one might be more personal and less technical. However, in the age of the bedroom producer, the interactive and educational nature of VCV rack removes some of the barriers to connecting with like minded musicians before gaining all the necessary skills to find your way round a mix.
- VCV Rack learnability. Just a bonus feature and not much to shout about, but worth mentioning nonetheless. Howeving over the relevant inputs and outputs brings up a handy box that breaks them down by full description, making it easier to learn your war around if you’re not used to staring down a wall of patch cables.
- VCV rack polyphony. Lastly, we want to draw attention to one specific feature that VCV Rack (rightfully) advertises, which is it’s polyphonic capabilities. VCV rack cables can carry up to 16 signals, meaning they are capable of polyphony when connected to relevant modules (that are marked as polyphonic). They are really easy to use, smooth and efficient, and we love how the layout lets you easily connect this to a huge variety of sounds.
Furthermore, vcv rack eurorack compatibility means that it can work with a huge variety of your other gear, so you can make up for anything extra you want, too.
Potential Improvements for VCV Rack User Experience
It’s not possible to judge or review all the VCV rack plugins available on the platform and we have to say that we can’t necessarily guarantee all of them are of the same standard. We’ve also looked at VCV rack compared with other similar platforms like the Surge XT and found that each has it’s pros and cons.
However, if we had to look at vcv rack just by itself, you could say a few things err on the side of simplistic. However, with vcv rack compared to Surge XT and other similar platforms, the slickness of it’s mechanism might prove too repetitive for some.
This is especially if you like getting into the nitty gritty of synthesis. In making it’s basic modules accessible and compatible with it’s user – origin plugins, vcv rack does overlook some of the smaller features that a plugin such as surge xt has. There’s nothing major, but if you’re a perfectionist, you may miss fine details such as filter balance, portamento, and other parameters.
It’s not that it’s simplistic per se – and modular is compex enough. But it doesn’t go beyond the basics, as least on a surface level, until you start getting deeper into the modules and playing around with it. So, it might take a bit longer to effectively sculpt the sound you want and there are arguably sometimes less subtle adjustments to do this with, especially on the basic, vcv rack developed plugins. However, this is a small complaint when up next to the diversity of other things it offers.
What’s Next for VCV Rack?
With all this considered, we would love to see VCV rack expand to become a bit more well known – potentially by teaming up with more established plugin manufacturers or as an addition to other synth plugins and emulators.
For example, could the prospect of a major synth manufacturer designing a module for vcv rack be out of the question? Probably at this stage, as vcv rack is still a very grassroots endeavor, and vcv rack plugins are all created by users. However, with the generous praise that this platform has gathered we don’t see it as an impossibility at some point in the future.
Ultimately, what we like about vcv rack is that it has democratised the sound design process. The internet has changed music spectacularly and in some places for the worse. However, it’s also taken the process of invention out of the hands of specialists and encouraged the creativity of at home music fans. VCV rack is a perfect example of this, which is why we would highly recommend it as a way to start designing and developing your own plugins, too, such as via this simple guide it has here.
VCV Rack In Depth Review: Final Thoughts
So, we are now bringing to a close our series on VCV Rack. You can find our other instalments here, here, and here, but overall, we felt that this is an underrated platform that doesn’t have nearly enough focus amongst at home and bedroom producers as it could.
In all honesty – it’s quite hard to do it justice and a lot of this comes down to the strength of the concept in the first place. Plus, there’s the fact the developers execute it as well as possible – given especially the complexity of maintaining a connected community in this way.
Overall, we can’t recommend it enough, but we have to mention that what you get out of it is very personal and that one man’s trash is another man’s treasure, so not every producer will resonate the same way with each of the plugins and with such an open ended model, it’s inevitable that occasionally there may be hiccups in the learning curse that beginners producers find tedious or annoying.
Yet in the end, VCV Rack is a world of deep and diverse opportunities, which is why we’ve wanted to spotlight it for the past couple of months. So, if this has piqued your interest, be sure to check out our other articles as listed above – or compare the Surge XT and other similar platforms with this guide here. What’s more, if you love software – as well as some of the more unusual, lesser known, or underrated bits of production software and VSTs out there, be sure to check out our software section here.Â
