Terry_42
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July 13, 2012 at 7:58 am in reply to: Is counting to 8 instead of 4 in your beat counting wrong? #1007620
Terry_42
KeymasterDo whatever you like if your beats match, they match.
KeymasterNS6: Good choice excellent controller, plus Itch 🙂
B215D: Terribad speakers. They are loud (if that is your thing) but the sound quality IMHO is crap. If you play any kind of music that involves a melody and singing/rapping they will sound bad.
Numark Red Waves: Some swear by them, some don’t. I never actually liked Numark headphones, I am missing something in the response of them and I have a really large head… so they are not so comfy. You can go with kinda cheap headphones you might want to look into either the Zomo HD-1200 or Technics 1210s.
The Numark is NOT a power mixer. It is a DJ controller that needs a power plug to operate, it will in NO WAY power passive speakers.
So you have 2 Options: Buy active speakers or buy passive speakers with a separate amplifier. As for the easy setup I would prolly go with active speakers. I would look into a combo with a sub if you play anything in the house, deep house, techno direction. There is a lot of used gear available, if you have someone who can decide how the gear is holding up, then you might be in for a bargain, as it is often sold very cheap from rental companies that need to show off new gear, while their used gear has still many years of live in them.However the question of PA systems comes up quite often on this board and I have to say:
There is no cheap PA that will sound good. It may sound good if you are alone in a store and someone cranks it up. Your brain will melt from volume alone… put 40 people in front of this PA and it might be as silent as a fart infront of a jetplane and as muddy as the florida swamps. You will play for people and people in front of speakers are sound and volume killers. Only good PA systems will mitigate this and still deliver music in a good sound quality at good volumes.
Simply put: I have yet to hear a PA system below 1000 bucks that I would even use for 20 people parties. I have sold all my cheap PA crap that I thought would be cool over the years.
Nowadays I play A LOT of mobile gigs (weddings, business parties,…) and I have simply hooked up with a rental company. They rent highend gear for decent money, I put that in my contract that this is to be paid by the client and thats it. Yes I might over time make a better cut if I would buy a PA, but this way I have satisfied clients, my back is intact as I do not carry the PA, the rental guys come and set it up (together with an excellent lightshow if needed) and thats it.KeymasterPersonally, I feel that the DDJ Ergo is an overpriced lightshow in a cheap plastic case with really bad jogwheels.
The stanton looks to be decent, never had one.KeymasterVery good summary from Rick. As for PA speakers: There are many mobile DJs or rental companies that sell older gear that might not look as good as new, but still lives up and comes from high quality companies (HK, Mackie, JBL, Yamaha,…) that sound even old a lot better than any cheap Behringer. You can easily make them look new again, with a 25 bucks “reflock” where they spray this flock coating on them again. I find this gear far more usable than cheap speakers…. or you can always just rent gear and put that in your contract.
KeymasterNo. You can decide to use the DDJ Ergo Soundcard or your laptop’s soundcard from your software. You cannot use both at the same time for the same audio. Since the headphones out works through the DDJ Ergo Soundcard it wont work if you have the internal speakers selected.
If you want to chill in the street, why attack people with crappy sounding speakers of your laptop? Just use the headphone out of the DDJ Ergo all the time with decent headphones. It is not like your laptop speakers would be suitable to do a real mix…KeymasterProfessional = Earns money with what he does.
Has nothing to do with knowledge or skills and many professionals have neither.Expert = Has high skills and/or knowledge in a topic
Has nothing to do with earning money from it and many experts do not…They have nothing in common. However rumor has it that you can be a professional and an expert at the same time. 😉
You can also be an expert at being professional of course :O and some people are professional experts in everything 😛KeymasterThis is like asking: Is coke better or should I order orange juice.
The VCI-380 is the highend Itch controller for 2-channels. You have to love Itch to invest in it and you have to get along with 2 channels then it is the clear winner. Your setup time will be minimal as Itch is pre-mapped.
The VCI 400 is suited for every software (so they say) and has 4-channels. However it is a setup controller. If you want to get the most out of it, you will have to map it yourself. You will have to invest A LOT of time to figure everything out and tune it to your liking. It may be a multi software controller, but it will NEVER run Itch in its current form. The DJ Intro it comes with, also is not suited for this controller. You will need to get at least Traktor Pro or VDJ Pro and then map everything from scratch. However if you are a controllerist and this is your thing -> Winner.
Those 2 controllers are in no way comparable to each other and both cater to 2 totally different DJing styles.
KeymasterYou have to set this up through the routing of the software. Go in the options there and set the sound output to your laptop.
Why on earth you shelf out 400 bucks (or more) for a DDJ Ergo and then seemingly have no money for decent speakers is beyond me however…. I mean some decent M-Audio AV 40 speakers are like 100 bucks or less.
Money you could have easily saved buying a decent beginner controller instead of a lightshow.KeymasterYou can use anything, however I do not think that any of those you listed are decent for DJing.
My favorite choices of headphones if you are on a budget:
Zomo HD-1200In my experience you will not find any decent headphones below USD 50 that can provide the clarity and volume needed to DJ in a live environment.
KeymasterAt this price point you will in NO WAY get decent PA speakers new.
So my guess is look into the used market and go for something that has Mackie or Peavey written on it. At your budget the things might be old, but they hold up. Do not expect to much at that price…KeymasterHonestly I think the RMX2 is not worth the price. I am someone who thinks you should get at least decent jog wheels on a controller you start with.
I also think it is unnecessary for you to stretch your budget to the limit. For a beginner in your shoes you might want to either try the “choice of beginners” the Numark Mixtrack Pro, or if you really tend towards VDJ the Reloop Beatmix is also a decent choice. Both are well below your budget and I will tell you why:
Start out. Shelf out the rest of the budget to invest into Phil’s Video course (Learn to Digital DJ fast) and get to know everything well. After that and after your first gigs and possibly a year from now you WILL with 99.9% certainty have found your style and way of DJing and you will want to upgrade into a new controller, fitting your style. So unless you know exactly what you want, buying the most expensive thing your budget will allow, might be a mistake.KeymasterIndeed the EQ is the only real downside atm. On Mac that is… keeping my fingers crossed for a soon release of VDJ 8.
KeymasterI can only tell you the following:
I own a Terminal Mix 4 and really love it.
I have tried it with Traktor and hugely disliked the playstyle. I since have converted back to VDJ and integration is perfect now for me (synthetic your script works flawlessly!). You can customize everything to your liking and I really dig the unit and the jog wheels. (There is a post where I told how to get the jogwheels tight for scratching.)
So if you want to go into the direction of VDJ then the change might be worth it, but if you want to be with Traktor, I would stay with the DJ 3 as it is a Traktor controller and integration is much better.KeymasterGo to youtube, search for: Ean Golden Beatgridding Tutorial
and you will be answered.July 9, 2012 at 12:22 pm in reply to: Creating a Cross Platform between two Dj's: Whats the best way? #1007367KeymasterI would buy 2 big controllers. Big enough that you both can work on one, but you have a second controller / laptop, for full flexibility. E.g. Terminal Mix 4 if you are on a budget or VCI 400 for full customizeability.
I would add a small mixer so you can mix the 2 controllers together. This can be any small 200 bucks mini-PA mixer, that you can also use to mix monitors independently if you grow to become a bigger act.
Then for transitioning and jumping around add 2 Midi Fighter Pro’s or even 3Ds and custom map them to the software. You can then map the midi fighter banks to sample shots, drum patterns, loops or hotcues or more decks.
As a 2 men act has to custom map almost everything to blend the styles midi-fighters etc. I would largely recommend VDJ Pro and custom map everything. (Which will get much easier in VDJ 8 later this year.) This way you can get multiple decks, sample decks etc.
Some will tell you to go Ableton, but if you want to include more standard workflows this will be hard. If you decide to go Ableton, just go with launchpads for each DJ and preparation will be a b*** and IMHO the sets will be more preparation than innovation or improvisation.
Excluding laptops you can prolly get away with 1000-1500 bucks if you go for the Terminal Mix 4 + Midi Fighter Option (which IMHO is more versatile than the VCI 400 alone).This is how I would do it.
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