I've always thought i'd be an excellent DJ, as do all men who enjoy house music but I never had the hardware. I have two record players and a mixer, but no amp to use them, or the space.
I think it'd be interesting if I could do some live mp3 mixing for house parties I go to as I tend to supply the playlist anyway.

So my questions to those of you who do it yourselves:

• What hardware do I require?
• What software do you recommend?
• Can it be done dirt cheap?
• Do you have any tips?
• Does my butt look big in this?

Some bonus info:
I have an 8 year old Dell Laptop, USB 1.0, mic in and headphone out. I like the Ableton Live setup. ChemicalFan recommended the "Kork NanoKontrol". I didn't realise it'd need an external mixer but he believes it'd be much more beneficial and it's only £50.


I wanna be as good as Tiesto!

use itunes dj.. cross-fade the songs and you are set.

Don't start DJing with ableton. You have to warp all your tracks ahead of time and it's a huge pain in the fucking ass.

Look into playing around with Traktor.

What are the technical specs on your computer? (age may not be relevant if you have been upgrading it over the years)

You may need to upgrade your mothership--in order to properly port out to external speakers you are going to need an audio interface, and USB-enabled audio interfaces likely use an updated USB configuration.

Getting yourself an external mixer is likely going to be essential for you to be able to do the proper knob-fiddling while working with live tracks. Doing all of it point-and-click style with a mouse will be cumbersome and likely imprecise.

Hope that helps as a starting point. If I think of anything else I'll let you know. I've been DJing with Ableton for the past 2 years off and on. I also have an Akai MPC 40. It serves as my external mixer. Not the greatest to work with for DJing, but not bad. The best part is being able to load samples on the fly to supplement in some beats, create some seamless segues between tracks and manipulate filters on your tracks. Unfortunately, you have to preset your assigned knobs to different filters if you want to do work with more than one filter/effect at once. It can get a little confusing and cumbersome at times.

Nooge.

MadPooter, on 06 December 2011 - 10:57 PM, said:

Thanks for the reply
Traktor over Ableton then, I don't want to spend ages messing with songs, playlists and organisation is going to take long enough as it is. As it's just for friends, it really doesn't matter.

Laptop specs:

• Intel Mobile Pentium 4m
• 256MB RAM (lolz my phone has more than this! upgradable)
• USB 2.0
• Graphics: ATI M9 32MB
• Audio: Intel AC'97
• Dead battery
• Dead CD-Drive

wow, I paid £1500 for it, and it was top of the range once....

Yeah, point and click on a mouse pad sounds like hell. Why do a lot of digital DJ's use Macbooks instead of Windows based laptops?

I don't have much money so a new laptop is out of the question, but I imagine with my specs I wont be able to live the dream of being live in front of 6 people who are not paying any attention and would rather play Playstation. I might be able to borrow one from whoever is down with me, but I know how people feel about sharing their computers.

I would also need an external hard drive wouldn't I?

Kind of at work so i'll shoot quickly! get some dirt cheap pc speakers -connect to pc via audio card,get Torq or Virtual DJ! DL driver on Korg hompage!

u were actually serious..

iguanapunk, on 06 December 2011 - 3:59 PM, said:

I don't see any difference! It's just preference to me! But I've been eyeing on a Macbook Pro for xmas!

KNE, on 07 December 2011 - 1:28 AM, said:

For a change, yes. I am confused by your responses.

Cheers Inchem, I am part of the anti-apple brigade so a Macbook is not for me (though it is indeed damn sexual). I will look into those bits of software as well.

^I'm not anti-apple or anti-pc, but you shouldn't have to pay top dollar to run a Traktor/serato/virtualdj/ on a laptop! I have an asus brand laptop (which is worth about 250 right now, but paid 800 for it) to run traktor, and its suitable for the time being!

Good luck to you on becoming the 4th member of SHM!

What are your thoughts on this? http://www.amazon.co...550314&sr=1-144

for real "DJing", Traktor would be better than Ableton. It will let you be more spontaneous, as you really have to prepare a lot of stuff on Ableton to mix with it.

So my advice would be : get Traktor Pro 2, get a decent soundcard (Native Instruments Audio 2 DJ for example, only 89€ or so), and either an external mixer (then hooking each of the 2 outs of the Audio 2 DJ on a track of the mixer) and you'd have to cue and launch your tracks either with the keyboard or the mouse, or get a cheap midi controller. The M-Audio X-Session Pro is cheap and good for DJ applications, but any controller with a few knobs will do.

The only drawback is that it's a pain in the ass to parameter midi in Traktor, when it's not a pre-mapped Native Instruments controller.



to summarize :
NI Audio 2 DJ : 89€
M-Audio X-Session Pro : 88€

That makes something like 180€ and you'll be good to start.
I think right now there's an offer where you get Traktor Pro Duo with the Audio 2 DJ, so you won't even have to crack it (otherwise, just crack it)

Anyway, Traktor is the best DJing software you can get. It's very flexible, it's got a great audio quality, great effects, and lets you organise your music.

As for Hercules DJ Console, they're pretty cheap, both in price and quality. If you want that kind of controller, save money for a Traktor Control S2 or some other good quality controller.

Plus, jogwheels are totally not useful in my opinion. Especially if you want to mix electronic music. You can just assign two "nudge" buttons on a controller to adjust a track.

If its just playing for friends (or just your amusement) then go for it! But if you develop some sort of passion and start getting in the hang of things, and all of sudden you like djing, then you'll grow out of that controller very quickly! btw....upgrade your ram if your gonna buy it! Controller requires 512!

....or save your money and follow Ben's idea!

Cheers for the info Ben_J, not likely that I can afford that set up though. Would this be alright for an external soundcard? http://www.amazon.co...23547896&sr=8-1

Just out of curiosity, when you say Ableton users have to prep their audio files, in what way do you mean?

I understand how beat matching on vinyl works, you just use your fingers to speed up and slow it down for a second, but how do you beat match with MP3's?

Yep, I've used one for a couple of gigs, it's the least you can get, because your internal soundcard will just not be enough. With that, you'll be able to use this soundcard for the main out and your laptop soundcard for the cue.

Just like Pooter said, you have to warp your files before, and it takes a little while (especially with your laptop) and it takes to be able to hear the track, so you can't do it on the fly.

As for beat match, in Traktor you have your mp3s bpm detected almost right away, then you set the pitch (manually or with an auto beat match) just press play at the right time, then you can nudge the track to slow it or speed it a little just like you would on vinyl

I don't imagine people who DJ use auto beat match, it's cheating a bit isn't it?

I don't know what the fuck 'cue' is. I had a look around Traktor earlier today and it looked quite good, but I can't imagine using it without an external mixer!

iguanapunk, on 12 December 2011 - 6:57 PM, said:

It's not cheating. digital DJing offers you the possibility to use the time you'd have spent matching the bpm for something more creative. Playing samples, playing with the effects, etc...
If you see a tunnel through a mountain, will you take the tunnel and use the time you won doing something clever or go all the way up the mountain to pass it ?

To cue means to search the right bpm to mix the record, a cue point in most softwares and digital turntables is a point you save that you can recall on a track. The cue level is the level of what you hear in the headphones when you're cue-ing a track.

I am looking at possibly getting this http://uk.asus.com/N...#specifications
It has a seperate plug for a subwoofer that comes with it

Full connectivity spec:
1 x Microphone-in jack
1 x Headphone-out jack (SPDIF)
1 x VGA port/Mini D-sub 15-pin for external monitor
2 x USB 3.0 port(s)
2 x USB 2.0 port(s)
1 x RJ45 LAN Jack for LAN insert
1 x HDMI

So with this, would I still need an external soundcard if I got that cheap0 Hercules controller (which doesn't have an internal soundcard)?

Also, I suppose if I spend more money on a controller I will have the integrated soundcard (unlike the Hercules I posted). What do you think of this one? http://www.amazon.co...4744520&sr=1-13

Quote

Search for Numark Omni Control!

linux, on 24 December 2011 - 9:24 PM, said:

Do you have one yourself? It's a lot of money, sell it to me.

I didn't get that Asus N55 with Bang & Olufsen audio in the end as I went into PC World to have a hands on look and I wasn't very impressed. The keyboard felt really cheap, and it wasn't a fair test because I was in a large noisy environment but the audio didn't sound that impressive so I went back the drawing board. I also read Asus laptops have quite a high failure rate which disappointed me. So instead, I ordered this last night:


Dell XPS 15:

• Intel i7 Core
• 6GB RAM
• 750GB HDD
• 2GB Nvidia graphics
• JBL audio with intergrated subwoofer (1xHeaphone, 1xS/PDIF, 1xMic)
• Brushed aluminium
• Backlit keyboard
• 15.6" Screen
• 3xUSB 3.0

It is worth £1,263 and using the sales, limited special offers and voucher codes I managed to get it down to £649! and I just got an email where I got £20 cash back. Bargain of the century! I did that thing where you have no money, but you want it so bad that you get it anyway and then think "oh fuck, I can't afford to eat for the rest of the year" while you run your fingers over the backlit keyboard which you paid extra for.