What were the chief shortcomings of the LXR-2?
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I can only speak for myself, i‘m thinking something is wrong with my unit. it sometimes stops to play a channel, or forget the outs assigned…… I dunno, I don’t trust it. my original lxr was more trustworthy in those things. Could be my unit, perhaps. It’s unreliable.
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The m8 has already been forgotten 
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Yes, unfortunately the M8 was too small for my middle-aged eyes 
and the interface too fiddly for me to get into a flow. 
However it did remind me of the joys of a tracker interface and I picked up a NerdSeq in a trade which I’m enjoying a lot in the context of my modular adventures!
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For me it was a hit, and that was kind of the problem. Too many hits and not enough music being made haha. Too many different workflows going on.
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Wow! That’s what adulting in the gear world looks like.
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Wow just looked at the price for the rackmount power supply and it’s pretty enticing. How’s it working for you? Any noise floor problems?
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Surprisingly it’s been absolutely fine. I even have all my studio monitors plugged into it (although through an isobar power strip to turn them all on with one switch). Had some for a few years and nothing has broken or melted yet either.
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Hit: Instruo Ts-L Micro Oscillator. I bought this with the idea of more audio rate modulation possibilities for my CS-L, but it sounds lush (West-country UK approval)
Hit: Nymphes +DC-2W | Dimension C: I had borrowed a friends OB-6 for a while, gave it back and wanted a poly-synth. I use a Novation Launch-key 49 and control the difficult menu bits with that - also, Lush!
No misses - I didn’t buy much else - I even re-racked the Disting EX and now use it as a multi fx processor!
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Hit: definitely the AKAI S3000XL. It is very capable and sampling with it is a breeze. Surprisingly for multi-samples it is faster than Ableton, because it does sampling with pre-defined times and starts with a threshold being hit. And of course 32 voices and multiple loop points per sample are no joke.
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adding to my hit list
EP-133: this feels like the hit to end all of my GAS. i got some christmas money from work and family and its been burning a hole in my pocket but i cant actually think of any gear that i really want now. been using the ep-133 to do my normal type of beat making that i do on the sp404 but with the usability of the sequencer and the scene workflow. finally got me a case for it too so now its living out its portable potential. having an absolute blast with it. hoping it has killed my gas for good, im sure ill be drooling over the next one in the EP series but unless it can effectively replace my MC-101 as my main synth sound source, i dont know if it would draw me in as much.
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It’s been a pretty busy year for me… bought way too much. Actually have stuff sitting aside ready for sell(the first time in about 15 years!).
Anyway here my list…
Hits :
Electra One Mk2 - Great controller especially for my purposes as a smaller push 2 replacement. While it doesn’t act as a midi keyboard, the Live script written for it fantastic! while combining it with a launchpad mini using launchpad 95 I have everything and a little more than I get with the push 2.
Elmyra 2 - What a great drone box… great updates aswell. So much more than the original, and so different than the lyra 8. Love using the two together, and really love all the modulation points. Fun build as well.
Freaq FM - Good firmware updates and nice interface/synth. Great build too. Really need to use it more but always love playing around with it.
Razzamatazz - Great tiny box. Really happy with the latest firmware update too as adding midi over usb and allowing me to use the sample engine on all the pads is very nice. So powerful for being so tiny. Really wish it had a internal battery……
Volca Drum - Cheap and powerful. Great tones… what more can I say that hasn’t been said already on this one…
Misses :
Presonus AR16c - Why oh why do they not multitrack without sending it back to the analog mixing channel first…. It works for what I need but sucks when I am looking right at my sound craft MTK mixer….
Minibay V2 - not its fault. Thought I needed it. purchased and never took it out of the box as I never found a use case in my studio. Nice piece of equipment though.
Whale V2 - it was cheap and I will not sell it kind of like was stated in someone else hit and misses, it just didn’t hold my attention. Cool idea though!
Wingie 2 - Like the different firmwares, like the idea, like the hardware… just didn’t like what I did with it. Keeping it but very much collecting dust.
Buzzzy - Fred’s Lab stuff is always good. Just don’t really need its sound in my studio.
Electro-Foustus EF110 - Though it would be cool with a ton of effects on it, but it just doesn’t do it for me. Nice piece of kit though…
Jury is out -
Bernginer Edge - It’s nice and fun to play with… glad I didn’t spend the money on a DFAM as $200 feel about right for the sound coming out of it. Glad I got a razzamatazz so the color isn’t out of place.
Jeannie - Fun build and looks very powerful. Just haven’t had the chance to mess with it since I built it. Should be a great once I find the time…
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Adding to my Hit list :
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Rytm MK II with OS 1.70 : it’s weird but it’s really a new Machine for me. Elektron did a colossal work at tuning it the right way. It does sound better and it is easier to work with. I sold my grey AR MK II last Summer and bought a black one on OS 1.70 launch.
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Chroma Console : a sweet spot FX pedal.
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This seems pretty reasonable. After all, wasn’t the SP promoted with customizable face plates? I wonder how hard it would be to customize via styleflip or Roland’s own design app
Yeah, maybe they expect someone else to do it, but so far I haven’t found anything.
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nice. I have one o them buried away in my parents garage somewhere 
Have you tried the nanoloop? More stripped down, but very jammable vs m8
Hits:
MacBook Air M2: is an absolute solid workhorse, crazy fast and super light. Have used Macs for over 20 years and this is easily my favourite
Cycling 74 RNBO: still only really scratching the surface with RNBO but it’s a great tool to have at your disposal and I feel good having it there. Max in general has been the main positive this year in anything creative I’ve been doing and the more I get into it the more I question whether I really need much else given the potential it gives you to make anything
Yamaha SY22: cheap and cheerful, was an impulse eBay buy for maybe £100 and didn’t even really expect to like it that much. It’s really easy to just switch this on and bash out some nice sounds for sampling purposes without thinking anything through too much, tho programming it is surprisingly deep(ish) if you want to.
Analog 4 mk1: Never been interested in the Analogs but this came up for super cheap and really good condition. Was surprised how much I liked the mark 1 design in the flesh too, as I always thought the mk1’s were pretty fugly looking. Great sound design, and loved the effects. Couldn’t get on with the tiny screen in the end and ultimately sold it as the screen started to put me off using it. Still count it as a hit tho as it changed my overall preconception of the A4
On the fence:
Twisted Electrons Mega FM: I loved some of the places I could get to once I put a bit of work in with this, super unique and fun to program. Some odd behaviours like it not properly saving my patches (like, id recall a patch and it would be similar but not the same as how I had saved it) and also not being able to get the arp to sync to my clock source made me low-level frustrated and in the end I got rid
Elektron Octatrack mk1: This is my 4th or 5th time around the block with the OT so there’s no surprises in how it functions or anything like that, and I have to say I much prefer the mk1 model now that ive used one. I remain fairly ambivalent about the OT overall- it does some things great, some things not so great. I like the midi sequencer. Ive put it up for sale but wonder whether I should keep it. Its just… its ok
Misses- this may be controversial
Elektron Monomachine mk2+: Owned one a few years back and loved it, and deeply regretted selling it. Never had any intention of getting another given how the prices have shot up but had a brief moment of madness/midlife crisis recently and picked one up. I love the grittiness and distortion, love the modularity of the routing choices, the LFO’s, the delays-per-track, the effects track(s), the multiple synthesis options, sound design particularly with slide trigs can get really interesting. Design-wise it’s absolutely beautiful, easily the best looking Elekton machine. But… I’m utterly stymied by the lack of trig conditions and per-track pattern length scaling. I thought id be ok with these but they are really missed, as that’s just how I prefer to do things now on an Elektron sequencer. Also find it irksome that you can’t just save sounds or kits in some sort of central location for use in other projects, you have to copy things across if they are located in a different project/snapshot. Will continue to use it over the festive period as ive started some nice sounding bits and bobs on it but I think ultimately it will go in the new year
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Where can I hear some of your jams? I enjoyed the ones you posted with the M8 and SP 
I still use my S2800 and for me it still gives me so much creativity and inspiration that many modern machines/software struggle. They are just so fun to use and sound so good.