Considering beta-testing Serato 1.9. Any advice or horror stories?

I can’t comment on Serato, but will say that you should edit your post (if you still can) to switch it from an all caps title – that is against the rules ’round here.

On-topic:

Beta-testing is usually fine, outside a production environment. As opposed to alpha-testing your input will most likely not change any of the design specs (i.e. features, lay-out, look and such), but your “job” as a beta-tester is to try all features and find any and all bugs. In this way you help the manufacturer and ultimately yourself and fellow DJ’s to have an as much bug-free product at launch as possible.

So, keep it TOTALLY separate from your gigging setup (make a copy of – part of – your collection to use and don’t use the same collection you use to play out with!) and use it only in the privacy of your practice space.

Heed that advice at your own peril. There is always a risk involved using computers and software while playing a gig, but with beta it’s not so much if it will crash, but when.

All I can say is: 1.8.2 -> no issues, extremely stable.
Beta 1.9: has some crashes here and there and sound issues. It is beta software and not meant to be used live.

My guess is 1.9 final will be there in under 3 months. It was about the same with previous Serato beta programs.

ALL CAPS goes back to the days of text only chat rooms like IRC and such. Very impolite then and we carry it forward.

You actually kinda confirmed it yourself “in hopes of getting quicker responses” = drawing more attention = is what you would use shouting for irl 😀

As for Deathy, don’t worry … he trolls all the forums. He’s like an unofficial deputy moderator.