Xaoc Devices Berlin: the oscillator that opens up the Leibniz Binary Subsystem

Berlin is the latest module in the Leibniz Binary Subsystem from Xaoc Devices. On the surface, it’s a straightforward compact oscillator with FM, hard sync, and square and saw outputs. But round the back are connectors that let you run its 8-bit saw wave through other modules in the Leibniz Binary Subsystem.
And that’s where the fun really starts. It’s a great pairing for Jena or Rostock in particular, and in this video, I explore various patches using Berlin in combination with these modules.
More info: xaocdevices.com/main/berlin/
Order at Signal Sounds: www.signalsounds.com/Xaoc-Dev...
Some of my other Xaoc Devices videos:
Rostock & Drezno II: • Xaoc Devices Rostock &...
Erfurt & Lipsk: • Xaoc Devices Erfurt & ...
Batumi II: • Xaoc Devices Batumi II...
More stuff from me:
tomchurchill.bandcamp.com/
/ tomchurchill
/ tomchurchill
Chapters:
00:00 Intro & patch previews
02:01 What is the Leibniz Binary Subsystem?
03:43 Berlin overview
06:08 Driving Jena as a wavetable oscillator
11:10 Exploring phase modulation
15:58 Complex LFOs and modulation
19:37 Digital drum patterns
22:59 8-bit data hacking
30:25 Fun with frequency division

[@TMeier]

So many creative options now that the system has its own oscillator. Really love those subharmonic sounds at the end, something I’d love to explore more. It’d be interesting to understand how to control subharmonics in a predictable way for creating pitch sequences.

[@dr.feelicks2051]

“Looking forward to a deeper dive” yes, yes we are✌️

[@Probbie]

I really didn't get Liebniz until now.. Fascinating 👌 😊

[@michaelt_tamtam]

That Xaoc system looks so beautiful! This binary system seems like a lot of fun to explore and experiment with. You're giving me gas, man.

[@ishkaiam6532]

have you been sleeping with these modules tom...the best tutorials ever and hands down the best understanding of eurorack out there

[@TomChurchill]

I've definitely been dreaming in binary recently! :) Thanks, glad you're enjoying them!

[@lefunghi6151]

And just like this, the Leibniz wishlist grows... Spotted it yesterday on Modulargrid and got really curious. Thanks for the amazing video! Running it through Poczdam and Rostock with some external modulation sounds like infinite fun.

[@AH-Okay]

Great demo. Thanks, Tom. This is probably going to be the module that shoves me into adding a small Leibniz setup to my existing Xaoc modules.

[@chrisdaniels4420]

Fantastic demo. You’ve convinced me to start a Leibniz subsystem

[@iamsushi1056]

Well, I’ve been meaning for a while to replace my Dixie2+ for a while now. A power surge damaged the FM input and introduced some horrendous pitch drift. This would represent a few HP that would need freeing up from my plan, but it’s really compelling. Thanks for the demo vid!

[@walrtbstudios5430]

Hmm… I didn’t think I’d get along in the Buchla/TipTop universe, yet I did- and now I find myself leaning towards Leibniz. Perhaps a little dip of the toe into Berlin and Jena…

[@XiXora]

Lovely understandable videos as always!

[@geusensdriesmusic]

Amazing stuff and demo. Thanks 🙏

[@TomChurchill]

My pleasure sir!

[@MagnusJonth]

I really like Xaoc modules in general, but most of all, I love your tutorials! Just thank you!

[@iamsushi1056]

I’ve always wanted to just get a Jena and drive it with the phase cv input, but never had a way to deal with the outputs without a Drezno. But this, this excites me.

[@Matkins85]

Really enjoying your content. I'm just getting back into modular after years away, and I recall this Leibniz subsystem being something that caught my interest, I'm certainly going to buy into it at some point. What keeps coming to mind is bytebeat music, if you're familiar with that concept. It seems to me that that kind of demoscene-esque procedural evolving music would be achievable even with just a drezno, a counter and some operations on the bits. But I've not come across anyone getting results quite like it yet.

[@boydw1]

That phase mod patch was doing it for me (love a bit of instant techno!)

[@Robert_Babicz]

this is realllllllly cool

[@ArtFluids]

I wonder if they will add a module to the system with enough of a memory buffer to hold 8-bit user sample data. For doing Fairlight CMI type sounds driven by Berlin as a variable rate clock.

[@JahaJaho]

Love the sequence at 25 minutes. So Krafwerky :) What are they orange clips you have in the rack to hold the cables btw?

[@TomChurchill]

Thanks! The clips are these… www.signalsounds.com/Gammalite-Systems-Nest-Tamers-Eurorack-patch-cable-clips

[@JahaJaho]

@@TomChurchill Clever little solution.

[@mheumann]

Great video! I can't wait to get this module into my Leibniz system. Out of curiosity, in the video, do you have Lipsk and Erfurt patched into Poczdam, or are they connected to each other separately?

[@TomChurchill]

Thanks! Lipsk and Erfurt aren’t connected to the Berlin/Jena/Poczdam/Rostock cluster in this video; I’m running them as a separate standalone pairing. (The two inputs on Poczdam are Drezno II’s ADC and Berlin; the outputs go back to Drezno’s DAC and, via Rostock, back to Berlin.)

[@chonbaquer]

Just to clarify, you have Out 2 of Poczdam going into Rostock and then Berlin, allowing you to disable any input to Berlin by toggling off the Poczdam Link?

[@TomChurchill]

@@chonbaquercorrect!

[@chonbaquer]

@@TomChurchill thank you as always!

[@slarteybartfast]

Hi Tom, I would like to get into the Berlin but I am not sure what I need as a minimum to work with this. Would it be Jena or do I need a different combination of modules?

[@TomChurchill]

Jena is the perfect partner for Berlin to get you started, I’d say - then you’ll basically have a great wavetable VCO/LFO that should keep you busy for a while. After that you can consider Rostock, Lipsk etc if you want to do more advanced digital processing.

[@LeonTrimble]

Oh boy!

[@jasoneskridge6453]

so were you unracking and recabling the connections behind each module between demos? or some other connection method?

[@TomChurchill]

No, the connections were the same throughout this video: Berlin into Jena through Poczdam into Rostock and back into Berlin. Poczdam and Rostock had no effect on the first patches and Jena was bypassed (by deactivating Link) for the later patches.

[@nystada]

32:06 the routing between Berlin and Erfurt is only because of the patch cable but should be possible to routing from Berlin to Erfurt via the Leibniz bus?

[@TomChurchill]

No, that wouldn't really work in this patch. If I connected the output of Berlin to Erfurt via the Leibniz bus, then Berlin's data value would affect the count increment on Erfurt. I only want to take the Leibniz *clock* from Berlin and control the Erfurt count increment exclusively via Lipsk. (I have Lipsk and Erfurt set up as a completely separate Leibniz pairing.)

[@ishkaiam6532]

your patches are the shit just do heaps more of them

[@nystada]

23:47 is the shaping only coming from Podsdam? I thought that podzdam is only for routing between 2 shaping modules but not for shaping itself?

[@TomChurchill]

Output 2 on Poczdam gives you access to the individual bits on the front panel. With Link engaged, these are normalled to each other, so the data flows straight through. But you can interrupt that routing by inserting patch cables (or turn off the normalling altogether by disengaging Link) - this lets you switch bits around, which is what I'm doing here, which changes the wave shape. (Take a look at the block diagram in the Poczdam manual for more details of the signal flow through Poczdam.)

[@chonbaquer]

🫡 Hell yes.

[@termx9144]

Is the delay and reverb in the video also from Xaoc?

[@TomChurchill]

The delay is mostly from Xaoc Sarajewo; the reverb is either from ALM MFX or a plug-in in post-production (e.g. Valhalla Supermassive or Soundtoys Little Plate).

[@LeeBlaske]

What about your Erfurt and Lipsk? Are they connected/routed to any other modules internally?

[@TomChurchill]

No, in this video they’re just operating as a separate pair (Lipsk out is connected to Erfurt in, but neither are connected to the Berlin/Jena/Poczdam/Rostock cluster)

[@LeeBlaske]

@@TomChurchill Thanks for the info. I'll be watching all of your other videos on the Leibniz system, because I bought a number of these modules, and have yet to really figure them out (I've got an Extra Class Ham Radio license, so I should be able to do it ;) ). Making the decision of how to connect the modules internally really leaves me in a quandary. I don't want to be continually taking them in and out of the case to switch connectors around. I know Poczdam (which I don't have yet) does some switching between two streams. I've also seen videos of someone who has terminal blocks mounted on the front of their cabinet to be able to switch the ribbon connectors. It seems to me, with all of the development Xaoc is putting into Leibniz, I wouldn't be surprised if at some point they come out with a big module that centralizes patching of all of these individual modules.

[@AcidTonic]

Can anyone point me to where those nice black cable management clips are sold? Visible at 6:48, I have looked everywhere for something like that. Please help!

[@TomChurchill]

They’re Nest Tamers, available here: www.signalsounds.com/Gammalite-Systems-Nest-Tamers-Eurorack-patch-cable-clips

[@AcidTonic]

@@TomChurchill thank you!

[@GeorgeLocke]

The only thing I really want out of Leibniz is the ADC for generative sequencing purposes. Getting this plus Jena would probably do that job with the wavetable stuff as a bonus.

[@Dogboy73]

"If you think you've understood Leibniz Binary Subsystem then you haven't understood Leibniz Binary Subsystem" Quantum mechanics is only SLIGHTLY more hard to grasp. Ain't nobody got time for that!! 😕 I kind of feel like only Xaoc, yourself and Richard Devine know WTF is going on here!!

[@talimn]

To be fair, I’ve been running the full Leibniz system for the past two years, adding the new modules as they come out - as long as you actually put in the time to learn what each module does, they’re really not all that complicated - and you certainly don’t *need* all or most of them to make some interesting patches you can’t make any other way. Extremely versatile system, and this module makes it even easier.

[@xavierxeon]

I disagree

[@talimn]

@@xavierxeon okay? Congrats?

[@xavierxeon]

@@talimn not with your post

[@talimn]

@@xavierxeon lol my bad! I see what you mean

[@coco805]

Crazy digital noise... aka aliasing.

[@pe00000001]

There is no aliasing in this.

[@coco805]

@@pe00000001 how? It is not analog. It's digital with very sharp jumps in voltage. I think you don't understand what aliasing is.

[@TomChurchill]

Well, there is certainly no aliasing in the basic saw wave that's generated by the ramp generator in Berlin itself - as the manual explains: "While this is not a perfectly smooth wave, no samples are dropped regardless of the pitch. Hence, there are no alien spectral components resulting from interference with the sampling frequency, also known as aliasing. The only side effects are perfect additional harmonics eight octaves above the fundamental frequency. Note that for pitch frequencies above 62.5Hz these harmonics are beyond the range of human hearing." It's a different story once you start processing it with other Leibniz modules though I guess!

[@pe00000001]

@@coco805 I’m sure you don’t. Aliasing has nothing to do with sharp discontinuities. Aliasing is a result of interference between spectral components of a signal with the frequency of the sampling pattern. It doesn’t happen here because everything is synchronous with the clock which is scaling with the pitch of the VCO. The spectrum is pure overtones, no alien reflected components

[@coco805]

@@pe00000001I think it's perhaps the point of the module, to generate digital harsh timbres. I am pretty sure i hear aliasing. Anyways if you like it use it.