Ah, these were the days! It's 1996 and this was one of my first rack-mounted synths for use in TV productions.

I expanded this module with the much sought after 'Urban Dance' ROM expansion. Ensoniq were producing some very good gear during this period and this was no exception. I didn't realise these have recently had a lot of interest from collectors.

Having not switched it on in many years the Low Battery warning came on, and it turns out the coin memory batteries in these were soldered to the board. So I have just paid to have a battery holder professionally installed for your future convenience.

Sound On Sound's summary was positive:

"The MR Rack is a very tasty unit. It's well‑thought out, generally easy to use, sounds terrific, and has enough innovative features to make it exciting both to play and listen to. I did encounter some oddities in GM mode: parts disappeared on some sequences, and the pitch bend ranges went squiffy on others. GM is not an exact science, and I also fired in some GM SMFs that were real killers.

Roland's JV1080 is probably the closest the MR rack has to head‑to‑head competition, and has the obvious GM advantage of being made by Roland. Nevertheless, the MR Rack has, I feel, more interesting sounds than the Roland, while Korg's are suffering from a degree of over‑exposure. Buying an Ensoniq is not the risk it was a few years ago, and now could be just the moment to jump in."

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Description:

The Ensoniq MR-Rack is a 1U, 19-inch rackmount 64-voice sound module released in 1996 with 12MB of internal ROM and expandable architecture.

• Polyphony: 64 voices
• Multitimbral: 16 parts
• Sound ROM: 12 MB (expandable via three internal EXP series slots and a front-panel PCMCIA card slot)
• Presets: Over 800 onboard ROM sounds, including General MIDI and drum kits
• Sound Engine: ROMpler and wavetable synthesis featuring 35 second-generation transwaves
• Filters & Envelopes: Two oscillators, two multi-mode filters (including 24 dB/octave lowpass and highpass), and two programmable envelopes per voice
• Effects: Built-in 24-bit digital effects processor with master reverb, chorus, and insert effects
• Audio Connections: Multiple quarter-inch audio outputs (stereo main plus auxiliary outs) and a front headphone jack
• MIDI: In, Out, Through