Just sold my NS6 and have purchased (awaiting delivery) a Pioneer DDJ-S1.
I found the NS6 was highly unreliable when moved to a new venue to play on. The jogs are so sensitive that they will not perform properly unless you get the environment conditions pefect for them, and this is as well as doing a minor or even major jog wheel calibration once they are set up at the new venue.
On two oocassions I took my NS6 to a party to play and found that scratch mode stopped working and the jogs become wholly unresponsive. I tried to callibrate over and over again at each venue to no avail.
As someone who only plays out periodically at parties or small gigs I can’t use a bit of gear I can’t rely on to be easy to set up and play with. I’ve read up on the Pioneer S1 and it seems free of any such issues, and having tried it out I’d say its a very capable controller that does emulate the CDJ experience a bit, for those who are concerned by that progression.
Will be good to have VU meters for the channels again too! Can’t say I’d really got into using the 4 channel option of the NS6 anyway, but the lack of individual meters wasn’t helpful, so no great loss there either.
The most painful part of the story is I sold the NS6 for several hundred dollars less than I paid for it. A good lesson in not going for kit you’re not well suited to I’m afraid. Looking forward to getting my S1 and having some fun with it. Have my next official gig in early August so will be familiar and practised on it by then, and the good news is the price was far lower than it was at release too.
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