Noise Engineering Manis Iteritas User manual

Type VCO
Size 10HP Eurorack
Depth 1.5 Inches
Power 2x8 Eurorack
+12 mA 150 / 80 (if 5v on)
-12 mA 5 / 5
+5 mA 0 / 90 (optional)
Noise Engineering
Manis Iteritas
Gross, gritty, and dark industrial-Strength Voice
“Tastes like paper.” - Portrait XO
Manis Iteritas is a 10HP voice based on the architecture of Basimilus Iteritas,
but designed to be more gritty and aggressive. It accomplishes this by using
only sawtooth waves that are manipulated, modulated, and distorted through a
rethought interface. Manis is suitable for leads, bass lines, drums, darkness,
detuned madness, or pure mayhem.
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Interface
Pitch
e Pitch encoder knob and CV input adjusts the pitch of the fundamental
oscillator. Default is ne mode: steps are sub-perception so MI is difficult to
bump out of tune. Push and turn for coarse adjustment: each step is a semitone.
CV input is a 1v/8va standard input. e knob sums with the CV input.
LPF
e low-pass lter tracks pitch; fully CCW only very low frequencies pass
through. Turn fully CW to disable. MI uses two 2-pole non-resonant lters.
Envelope
A simple AD envelope control that shapes the amplitude of the signal. Fully
CCW, the signal is a short pop. As the knob is turned CW, the decay increases. At
about two o’clock the attack time will increase slightly as well. When fully CW,
the envelope no longer affects the amplitude (free-running mode). In this mode,
a trigger in or manual trigger will hard-reset the oscillator.
Saw Mod
Sounds similar to PWM or sync mod. e operation performed is
frac((2*s+1)*x) where s is the knob+jack and x is the current oscillator
amplitude.
Profundity
As the Profundity knob is turned CW, 1. MI adds additional,
out-of-phase oscillators for a chorus effect; and 2. MI detunes the voice. is
is achieved by randomly modulating the sample rate, which results in
the perceived pitch becoming blurry.
Smash
A gnarly wave-folder replacement, Smash is a modulus-function wave destroyer.
e knob sets the level of destruction.
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Noise Engineering
Manis Iteritas
Gross, gritty, and dark industrial-Strength Voice

Interface
Bash
Routes the envelope to Smash, Profundity, and LPF. is knob acts as an
attenuverter where 12:00 is off, right of center is positive send, le of center is a
negative send.
Mode: S/L/M
Selects the mode:
S (le): Six-oscillator additive
L (middle): Six-oscillator additive with pitch envelope
M (right): Two 3-operator phase-modulated oscillators
See Tone Generation for more information.
Range: B/A/T
e range switch sets the lowest note. Each position is two octaves above its le
neighbor.(Bass, Alto, and Treble).
Trig
Triggers the start of the sound. It responds to the rising edge of a trigger and has
a threshold of around 3V.
Hit
Momentary switch to manually trigger MI.
Out
e out is a low-impedance audio source. e output varies based on parameters
as MI compensates for loudness.
CV Inputs
All parameters are CV-able. Knobs act as offsets unless stated otherwise. MI
expects an incoming voltage of 0-5 v for non-pitch parameters and 0-8 v for
pitch.
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Noise Engineering
Manis Iteritas
Gross, gritty, and dark industrial-Strength Voice

Basic Patch:
Send a trigger source (such as Noise Engineering’s Numeric Repetitor) to
the Trigger in. Patch Out to your mixer. Play with knobs to hear the range
of sounds you can get out of MI.
Second Patch:
With the trigger in and audio out still patched, add LFOs, gates/triggers, or
whatever CV source you have to the CV inputs. Some fun options include
Noise Engineering’s Sinc Iter and Integra Solum, WMD’s PDO, Mannequins
Just Friends, and Malekko Voltage Block.
Patch Tutorial
4
Noise Engineering
Manis Iteritas
Gross, gritty, and dark industrial-Strength Voice

At rst glance is very similar to the basimilus. In Skin and Liquid mode there are six oscillator/envelope
pairs that are added together. In Metal mode there are phase modulated oscillator/envelope chains. Metal
mode differs in Manis Iteritas by having two sets of three sequentially modulated oscillators rather that
one set of six. Metal mode also waveshapes the output of the oscillators by summing two sawtooths of the
same frequency to give a waveform somewhere between a sawtooth and a square.
Tone Generation
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Noise Engineering
Manis Iteritas
Gross, gritty, and dark industrial-Strength Voice

Calibration of Tuning
Manis Iteritas uses a sample rate that is a multiple of the fundamental (lowest) oscillator
frequency. is moves alias power that is a multiple of the fundamental to be mapped to a
multiple of this tone, therefore making the aliasing align with the harmonics of the tone.
is works well for settings with a strong harmonic structure (spread fully CW or fully
CCW) and adds unique aliasing character for other tones.
Variable Sample Rate
Manis Iteritas can run its processor on the 5V eurorack power rail to reduce noise and load on the 12V
bus. Gently push the switch tab in the direction of the desired rail to use.
Voltage Supply
Manis Iteritas comes pre-calibrated but over time it may change and need a touch up. Pitch
calibration is controlled by an linear resistor-divider network. To calibrate the tuning, attach a
volt meter (preferably 4+ digit) to the test points TPCV and TPGND on the rear panel and
adjust the trim pot.
e voltage measured should be 5/16 (.3125) times the input voltage applied to the CV input. A
reasonable way to tune the scale is to use an adjustable voltage source to generate 4 volts then
adjust the tuning trim until the test points read 1.2500V. Manis Iteritas can also be tuned using
a reference supply capable of generating a 1-volt difference and using a stroboscope such as the
Peterson 490 to tune to an octave interval. is is method is preferred to the meter-only
method.
6
Noise Engineering
Manis Iteritas
Gross, gritty, and dark industrial-Strength Voice

Genesis and Design Notes
Manis Iteritas came of a suggestion by two friends of Noise Engineering: Matt Lange and Anthony
Baldino. e original idea was for an alternate rmware for the original Basimilus Iteritas that would
be unapologetically aggressive. is sounded like a fun idea and a couple days aer our rst chat we
had enough ideas to give it a try. e rst changes were simple. Move to saw tooth only, make the
fold into something far more harsh, allow routing of the amplitude envelope to the tone parameters,
and sample-rate modulation for a detuned sound. Another early add-on was a second distortion-like
thing that would eventually become sawmod. We ashed Matt’s Basimilus and gave it a spin.
is version met the goal of being aggressive but lacked a lot of subtlety. Anthony made the
suggestion that a lter might be a good addition to help tame the sound. We weren’t convinced, but
once Stephen worked through the technical details, he was was able to implement our rst variable
sample-rate lter.
We knew we were closer, but we weren’t there yet, and so we spent considerable time working on
expanding the tone space to have more variety of sounds that were more easily controlled from the
knobs. e addition of the AD envelope was great fun, and based on NE user feedback, we tested out
the option of removing the envelope from the amplitude. at was one of the last features we
developed, but we were pretty happy with the sound (shout out to Patrik Andersson).
No pangolins were harmed in the creation of this module.
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Genesis and Design Notes
Noise Engineering
Manis Iteritas
Gross, gritty, and dark industrial-Strength Voice

Special Thanks
Matt Lange
Anthony Baldino
Patrik Andersson
Patrick O’Brien
William Mathewson
Mickey Bakas
Tyler Thompson
Alex Anderson
Manis logo created by
Cynthia Hitchcock
(https://fineartamerica.com/
profiles/cindy-
hitchcock.html)
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Manis is Latin for ghosts of the dead, which is a pretty good descriptor for the sounds we get out of
that beast...but it is also part of the scientic name for a critically endangered scaly mammal from
Asia called a pangolin. Pangolins are threatened by wildlife poachers and traffickers. We decided
this was an easy connection for us to make in our quest to support science and conservation.
Noise E is proud to be a founding business partner with Save Pangolins, a globally recognized
pangolin conservation organization. We've committed to donate a portion of the proceeds from
every MI sold to pangolin conservation. at means you can pat yourself on the back for buying a
Manis, knowing you’re doing some good in the world! Want to know more about what you can do?
Check out the Save Pangolins website: www.savepangolins.org
Manis Conservation
Noise Engineering
Manis Iteritas
Gross, gritty, and dark industrial-Strength Voice