Your preferred digital DJ system and why

[Dusty]

sometimes its better to buy things that are purpose built

Ah right, sorry, I did misunderstand you. And yes it is tedious to create your own midi maps - although most popular kit (like the Vestax VCI) has plenty of them on the internet to download... if you are using a more obscure midi device then do-it-yourself is the best or only option.

 

[nomos]

I think the way to do rewinds is: record / source a bunch of rewinds. 4 or something. Have these at the top of your column in Live. When you want to take something back, hit the play button on the clip of the rewind. Voila: instant vinyl-like rewind!

How do you select tracks without a mouse though?

Yeah I was thinking of doing something like that - maybe a couple of scenes with spinbacks on them mapped to mixers buttons for when I want to stop play, then maybe 2-3 more in Simpler on a MIDI track mapped to keyboard keys for when I want the sound without stopping play. A bit contrived but it would sound right.

re: selecting - You can use the 4 left/right buttons on the X-Session mixer to navigate between tracks (L/R) and scenes (up/down), then hit the Play button on the selected scene to trigger it. I don't tend to work that way though so I use the trackpad.

 

[DJ PIMP]

I'd like to play more with the VCI-300. Very nifty controller... nice feature set, good layout. Having that directional pad so you can browse a folder structure easily is a huge boon if you're trying to get hands-off the laptop.

 

[Tactics]

saying that

I'd like to play more with the VCI-300. Very nifty controller... nice feature set, good layout. Having that directional pad so you can browse a folder structure easily is a huge boon if you're trying to get hands-off the laptop.

the Xponent has a touchpad which works as a laptop touchpad with two click buttons....and a Kaoss style pad

something to consider eh?

 

[Grievous Angel]

the 4 left/right buttons on the X-Session mixer to navigate between tracks (L/R) and scenes (up/down), then hit the Play button on the selected scene to trigger it. I don't tend to work that way though so I use the trackpad.

So you still need a mouse to make the selected scene play?

And I don't want to select a whole scene, just one track in it!

(Probably showing my ableton djing ignorance now!!)

 

[nomos]

So you still need a mouse to make the selected scene play?

And I don't want to select a whole scene, just one track in it!

(Probably showing my ableton djing ignorance now!!)

Actually, I think I led you astray there. I've been using my mouse to select and start clips and I'd forgotten a couple of details. IIRC you can in fact trigger individual clips from a controller. I'd have to check on how scenes fit in the equation.

Using Live with Xsession Pro for example, you can set one pair of left/right buttons to toggle between channels, and the other to navigate though the selected channel's clips. Then use that channel's play button to trigger the individual clips and then the stop button to kill them. I think that's the way it works. But I found it more clunky than using the trackpad.

Try mousing over the first image here to see what I'm talking about: http://createdigitalmusic.com/2006/...m-audio-x-session-pro-usb-midi-dj-controller/

 

[nomos]

http://www.platinumnotes.com/

I'm a bit skeptical but this software bills itself as pro-level (re)mastering for digital DJs.

"improves your files and gives them warmth, perfect volume, and correct pitch. It removes distortion and clipped peaks. "

Sounds nice given the maxed-out mastering on a lot of what I've been buying, but it's the pitch correction that I find a bit peculiar

 

[zhao]

anyone ever used Futuredecks Pro?

- classic DJ setup with 2 decks, pro mixer and playlists
- fully manual or automatic mixing (one-click beat-matching)
- video mixing (including pitch, break, reverse, scratch on video)
- timecoded vinyls/CD support
- seamless intelligent looping and "skipbeat"
- automatic BPM detection (grid like) with batch-mode function
- vinyl simulation including scratch, pitch, reverse play, brake
- separate headphones output and song pre-listening
- support for VST effects and AudioUnits, eqs, filters
- analog input for microphone/turntables/CD-players, Talk-Over
- controllers supported natively (zero-configure): Behringer BCD2000/3000, M-Audio Xponent, all Hercules controllers
- additional MIDI IN with LEARN - assign knobs/switches to fx parameters
- advanced support for external mixers
- perceptual automatic gain
- sample player (sampler)
- record your mixes to WAV or AIFF
- KeyLock (MasterTempo) with on/off selector, gradual pitch bend
- ASIO/CoreAudio low-latency support
- browsing system with unlimited lists, disk explorer and database
- load the whole song in RAM memory for instant access
- audio-cd support on Win/Mac (intelligent cd detection/loading)
- can read mp3, m4a, wav, aiff, ogg, cda, mpeg and many more files

sounds like a doable on the fly sort of thing. (and poor people you can find this for free download pretty easily)

 

[urbanite]

http://www.platinumnotes.com/

I'm a bit skeptical but this software bills itself as pro-level (re)mastering for digital DJs.

"improves your files and gives them warmth, perfect volume, and correct pitch. It removes distortion and clipped peaks. "

Sounds nice given the maxed-out mastering on a lot of what I've been buying, but it's the pitch correction that I find a bit peculiar

I think they are connected with the whole Inkey mixing thing, thus the software, to nudge things in place. Did try to master some tracks with it, just to see if it actually works. It sounded a lot like when I overdo things in Ozone myself... i.e. not very good.

 

[Elijah]

right now im using 2 cdj800s.

now i can operate dem blindfolded, i wish i got 1210s and serato 2bh.

 

[gabriel]

you know you can use serato with cdjs too...

 

[Elijah]

you know you can use serato with cdjs too...

yer but i wont be able 2 play all dese 12 inchs i got on my cdjs lol

 

[gabriel]

LOL

maybe if you put them under the grill and shrink them?

 

[routes]

http://www.twoyoutubevideosandamotherfuckingcrossfader.com/

 

[vimothy]

So finally getting round to trying out Ableton Live--I'm just messing about with (320) mp3s (whole tracks) loaded into the session view section, but everything clips horribly and immediately, even when I've only got one track running. Is it normally this unstable or is there something you have to do to Ableton before you can use it for djing?

 

[Dusty]

Tried lowering your soundcard latency?

 

[alex]

Hey digital DJ's, your opinion please. What laptop/notebook would you go with to run Serato? Something no-frills, or maybe you have a specific reccomendation? Anything would be good really, would like to hear what you guys think!

 

[boyalive]

I got serato and while it is brilliant I could not handle turning up at a club and worrying about having to pull cables out and rewire the mixer and depend on a computer, the software has never crashed or failed on me, and it is exactly the same as vinyl, but I went back to burning cds and using vinyl and cdjs. Gonna get some 800s. Only thing youve got to worry about is when the asshole before you leaves his serato box plugged in or something so you still have to fuck about with cables. When it gets to the point that clubs have a built in serato box or mixer so you can just plug yr laptop in and go I will go back to serato. People like Karizma are pretty adept with CDJs tho:

 

[alec.tron]

Yep, the setting up is really really annoying...
I bought serato, used it for nearly 2 years, but got ever more frustrated with the whole apple-philosophy/closed-software approach and certain other software politics from Serato ( the main one being non-flac support although bein heavily requested = http://serato.com/forum/discussion/161#3230895 ), so I bought Traktor Pro Scratch & sold the Serato & box again.
Happy ever after... apart from the seting up bit.
Then again, CDJs aren't an option for either me as I simply can't stand the haptics/handling... But I think I'm starting to count the encounters of DJs being confronted with turntable-less DJ booths now... which I think is way scary/shit/dissapointing. And I'm not even gonna mention how many turntables are in serious need of maintenance... damn.
c.

 

[Benny Bunter]

I've got Torq/conectiv and then switched to Deckadance. I find both to be ok, but not brilliant. Not really keen on how it feels to cue records in and I'm not entirely convinced by how well they keep tunes in time either. Sometimes I find that I'll get a record in time perfectly, then when I take it back to the start and bring it in again its at a slightly different tempo. I've got better results when I put the latency at the very lowest setting, but then I get clicks and distortion if I move the mouse so I cant really get away with it. Got hold of a copy of futuredecks pro so I'll try that next, but at the minute I just keep returning to Vinyl.

Anyway, my question is, Is the Serato software considerably better than the competition, or do serato users still get similar problems. Got a pretty decent laptop so I don't think thats really the problem.