deathy

It’s funny, now that I’ve started to scratch (and in Traktor too, as the Synner 3 prototype doesn’t support scratching at this time, using a Terminal Mix 8), I started to wonder when this latency issue was going to start to affect me.

Over on DJTT recently, we were having a discussion about it, and after doing the math, it was pointed out that the average guitarist performing on stage has to deal with more latency than most DJ controllers – it’s just a fact of life when performing with most non-acoustic gear. Heck, the latency I was used to from a decade and change playing keyboards with MIDI was, as you might expect, pretty much the exact same as the latency when playing a DJ controller… via MIDI. Makes sense.

So, while I am sure there are some people for whom that latency is going to be a big deal in their scratch performances, I think in a whole lot of cases we’re also seeing the same thing as the people who insist the music is much better when recorded at 24 bit and 96KHz… the latency from DVS is going to be a whole lot worse.

That said, I am by no means an expert, so take all this with a grain of salt.

At the last show I played, I ran into something like that… I ended up having to recompile my DJ software from source, I was down for 10 minutes. But, when I was done, the show went on.

There were no CDJs available, all I had was my controller. While I haven’t played truly big places, I did play almost every single Friday for almost 2 years, and played a number of moderate sized shows, and the only time I ever saw something CDJ like, it was Chuck’s backup setup. (Or was it the backup to the backup?)

I’m not sayin’ don’t learn CDJs, but honestly, don’t expect there to be any guarantee that they’ll be available to you. You really want solid backup, bring two laptops and two controllers.

You have to own “Serato Video” to play videos in Serato, an extra $150.

https://store.serato.com/us/software/dj-vj/video

Having recently moved from the Netherlands to the US, I had no idea how BAD Mixcloud was in the US. Freakin’ American recording industry and their stupid rules whose only intent is to try to get the genie back in the bottle. Grrrrrr!

Yeah, I can confirm that you can use multiple controllers that are completely unlike each other with Traktor at the same time.

Honestly, the controller you have is just fine for learning. Take your time with it and learn the basics… by the time you have learned enough to get by, then you won’t have to ask what controller you should buy, you’ll already have a pretty good idea what features you want to have.

At least, that was my experience with starting with a Hercules DJ Control Instinct, which is almost identical to what you have except for an on-board sound card. I was playing parties with it, too.

Yeah, totally. I could see a compromise where a DJ software might have an “Expert Mode” where it allows you to get a lot more down and dirty with it, but the target audience for that could certainly be small enough that it may not be worth the trouble to invest in developing.

It can be difficult sometimes for me to really have a good perspective on things from the more typical new DJ’s position since I composed music for a few decades before I started DJing.