My setup:
* controller (with stand-alone capability)
* laptop 1
* external HD (requests) 1
* 2x CD/Mediaplayer (nothing fancy, gemini/Numark/etc), with floor filler pre-loaded and plenty of CDs/USB-sticks
* small PA mixer (controller attaches to mixer)
* iPhone attached to mixer with pre-loaded floor-filler or killer mix
* Active speakers (optionally incl. subwoofer and monitor speaker)
* Spares:
– iPad controller
– laptop
– external HD
Scenario’s:
1) Laptop locks. Hit play on CD-player 1, open channel 3 on controller. Reboot laptop and continue.
2) Laptop dies. Hit play on CD-player 1, open channel 3 on controller. Replace and startup spare laptop.
3) Controller dies. Hit play on iPhone. Open mixer channel. Damage assesment on controller. Really dead? Replace with spare iPad controller. Not dead? Reboot, check and continue.
4) Mixer dies. Plug speaker XLRs into controller master out. Transfer iPhone to controller aux input. Continue.
5) Speaker dies. Continue on other speaker (possibly reposition). Optionally put monitor speaker in room for backup.
So, while I doubt I will ever live to see all these scenario’s come to pass (fingers crossed), some have happened already. The point is I am pretty much ready for all contingencies. Being a mobile DJ this is of major importance. Can’t do-over a wedding due to technical failure, can you? And you don’t want to be the cause for spoiling someone’s “best day of their live”, right?
Thinking about this in advance and having all the extra ready, makes that you can really switch gears fast, keeping the music flowing (almost) without interruption and you don’t get the stress of “what do I do now?” as you already have your game-plan B ready and just need to calmly execute.
This is just me and it does take some extra gear (most of it accumulated over the years) and if you don’t have (all) extra gear, you will have to think about alternative actions you can take in case any of the scenario’s happen.
Let’s say you have a simpler controller without stand-alone mixer options, you’d do the same but perhaps without the CD players and just an iPad plugged into the PA mixer. This would still give you all the backup you need when laptop/controller dies.
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