• Music

  • DJ setups/Mixer porn/New toys thread...

NasserAlazzawi you need time to do the vinyl. Time in shops listening. Time at home listening. It’s not a luxury everyone has.

I loved buying when I was a student, now, aligned to cost, seems like I’d need to go part time to invest enough time to justify the outlay.

Chasing that feel digitally requires a lot of discipline, most of us have huge catalogues of tunes we barely, if ever, listen to

    • gcw

      • Post #2926

      NasserAlazzawi thanks for the point about the AZ, I was thinking ‘where has this model come from’.

      The RX3 interests me I think, it’s a good price point comparative to my usage.

      I’ll deffo get to a shop and have a look at some of this kit.

          gcw The RX3 interests me I think

          Test them out - I got rid of my RX and upgraded to the XZ pretty quickly - it’s a little Fisher Price to me - the jog wheels are smaller and only two channels

            7 days later

            Anyone used the AZ yet ? Heard the thing has a nasty habit of turning itself off mid set . Wonder how big of an upgrade it really is vs the XZ

              IndustryStandard

              It is miles better than XZ but a few firmware updates ago it had serious issues. Fixed now.

              (All new hardware generations tend to do this - this CPU is a generation ahead of CDJ-3000, and before any Denon lovers comment - you should have seen the early Prime 4 / SC5000 releases - it was worse than this!)

              Took them a good couple of weeks to fix the problem like. Was uproar in November!

                14 days later

                Friend and I DJed a whole night with a pair of Denon SC5000s with nothing but Tidal. It was one of the Sad Boys-gigs, so no beatmixing. It really is terrific piece of hardware for that. No laptop, just straight from the player. Great soundquality too.

                  Homegrove …considering mine now must be 8yrs old , they still feel contemporary and quick . Just a shame most DJs and venues are locked into Pioneer .

                    I suppose as a newbie to this forum, I could maybe post something about my setup.

                    So here goes:

                    3 x Pioneer XDJ 1000 mk2
                    2 x Technics SL1210 mk2 with new Concorde Digital mk2 carts
                    1 x Pioneer DDJ XP1
                    1 x Allen & Heath Xone 96
                    1 x Xone K2 (for the very rare occasionas I decide to fire up Traktor)

                    Headphones either Allen & Heath XD2-53’s or HD-25’s

                    Monitors are Adam Audio T7V’s

                    Recording either direct from USB into Audacity on desktop, or with my Tascam DR-40X.

                    I do have a relativley simple streaming setup. Where I can use any combination of a C920, C922 & C930e webcams, and a Sony A6400 SLR camera.

                    I guess that’s about it…

                      The dust cap/cone has come off one of my speakers. What glue should I use to refix it back onto it.

                      xs2man 1 x Pioneer DDJ XP1
                      1 x Allen & Heath Xone 96

                      Defo now know who this is now 😉 hello fellow XP1 user!

                        NasserAlazzawi …was tempted for about 5 mins when it came out, glad I didn’t do it tho

                          8 days later

                          One of my old wharfedale speakers has finally blown so in the market for some Passive bookshelf speakers price between £2-300 or a decent used set.
                          Any recommendations

                            • Mmjh

                              • Post #2943

                              I have some Dali Spektor 2. They’re a bit quiet in the bass area, so would need a sub.

                              What I’d really like is some active non-monitor speakers, so I can do away with the amplifier.

                                Looking for some foxy wooden ones, slightly retro with black grilles.

                                Any ideas where to shop?

                                • Amps

                                  • Post #2945

                                  One day I will gift myself a pair of these, proper porno decor

                                  Dubman …used is always a bit of a risk with speakers. Not owned them, but the QAcoustics passive bookshelfs get amazing reviews, apparently sound amazing and the walnut ones look like much more expensive speakers than they are… in your budget too. I think Richer Sounds carry them if you have one anywhere near you.

                                  mjh …massively depends on your budget, but if you aren’t arsed about them being ‘studio’ speakers, I’d give the active KEFs a listen, and I’d be tempted to give the Klipsch ‘The Sevens/Nines’ a go, solid reviews and look amazing IMO

                                        • Dubman

                                          • Post #2947

                                          Unbroken1
                                          Thanks Damo.
                                          I’ll have a look.

                                            Dubman I can’t express enough my love for Bowers & Wilkins 685 speakers. I have several sets here. Should be within budget second hand, if you can find them locally. Excellent speaker. My PC speakers are actually their smaller brothers, the 686’s and they are excellent.

                                              6 days later

                                              303abuser …amazing bit of kit, probs overkill for DJ’ing use tho. Have the same issue with the Zen Delay, sounds incredible but really tricky to tame in a live setting.

                                              The UA LEfx has ¼” TRS INSERT sockets, plus balanced inputs/outputs on XLR and external power, as well as BPM detection, should work (& sound) great with the Isonoe IMO

                                                  Unbroken1 Yeah fair enough, just another option to throw money down the pit lol. I still really want a zen delay too.

                                                    Since I mentioned money pits, I shouldn’t have watched this.

                                                    Unbroken1 Oooooft. That looks sweet. I like the automatic BPM detection too. That was one of the tricky parts I found with the H9 Max. Sounded great for sure. But was a complex beast, and could never get it dialled in just right.

                                                    Also looking forward to reviews.

                                                      10 days later

                                                      Got myself a second hand Denon sc live 4 this weekend. Things have moved a lot since my previous traktor days it would seem. Linked it to SoundCloud so far and impressed I have immediate access to my playlists etc but cue points on first beats are hit and miss and I have no idea what I’m doing….yet. It’s the perfect unit to just noodle on immediately and the built in speakers are surprisingly punchy. Does anyone use Denon engine DJ want to give me a few starters for ten?

                                                      One major thing I need to understand is how I can get back to first beat as hitting cue seems to mark a cue point wherever you are in the track which is not what I want to do at all.

                                                        Millsy on Pioneer, if the track is paused and you hit cue, it marks your cue point there. It snaps back to that cue point if you hit cue whilst the track is playing

                                                            Along_the_Wire on Pioneer, if the track is paused and you hit cue, it marks your cue point there. It snaps back to that cue point if you hit cue whilst the track is playing

                                                            …yeah, try this. Cue manually with the platter then hit cue, see if it works then.

                                                            Have you analysed all your tracks in Engine? The default cue point should be set there I imagine

                                                                Unbroken1 I’ve only tried SoundCloud so far. Need to get an SSD, format it to exFAT and then sort my music collection out. I reckon engine will analyse those tracks with no problem, it’s probably a streaming service thing. I’m also hoping the metadata on the tracks from traktor will carry across but that might be wishful thinking. The thought of having to beatgrid stuff manually again with all my cue points etc gives me chills.

                                                                  On Denon / pioneer you can edit the grids either on the software or on the deck.

                                                                  When you first import a new track in future you should ideally do some / all of these things if you want to be organised

                                                                  1. Rate the Rating out of 5. For energy (1 star being a Beatless intro, 5 stars razing the roof / peak energy)
                                                                  2. Put it in the playlist(s) which apply. Name the playlists whatever works for your brain - there are no right answers
                                                                  3. Write any comments for the keywords that would help you find this in a search later (imagining at some point you have over 5000 tracks). On pioneer instead of writing it you can use TAGS on rekordbox and press FILTER on CDJs to tick which tags you want to see. Again name these whatever works for your brain but try to stick to the same 5 or 10 ish words. Ie. Some of mine are Peak. Intelligent intro. Ethereal. Tribal Percussion. Sentimental. Anthemic. Closing.
                                                                  4. Edit the beat grid either in Engine, or rekordbox.
                                                                  5. If you miss step 4 you can do this on the equipment. I’m sure Denon had a physical button for Beat Grid that you used either with the scrolling menu knob to move the grid, or with the jogwheel itself
                                                                  6. Remember if you edit something on a drive later, to re sync it to your engine / rekordbox so all of your improvements are stored and not overwritten
                                                                  7. Drop hot cue B on the first main part where it peaks (So when DJing and listening in headphones looking for next track you can tell in 2 seconds whether this will be right vibe / direction / whether the key clashes or works well). Use A hot cue in rare cases for “actual first beat” if beats do not appear for a long time.

                                                                  Hope some of that helps.

                                                                    NasserAlazzawi brilliant tips mate, thank you. I’ll do all that. Yeah denon has a manual grid edit with anchor points in engine from the unit itself which is really handy as I can use the jogs instead of having to point and click on a laptop.

                                                                      • Amps

                                                                        • Post #2964

                                                                        Wasily Noice DAW style screen, pity about the size of the thing. I’ve had a fair bit of experience with the Pioneer DJS-1000, and that is tons of fun. I like big buttons and I cannot lie!