Laptop DJing

It's all about the equipment

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Toon Town Dave
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#601 Post by Toon Town Dave » Wed Jun 17, 2009 9:45 am

To be honest, hardware capability has far out-paced software demands over the last several years, a faster/different processor probably won't make much difference. Vista is the notable exception because it is a pig that needs a lot of RAM.

If you are concerned about performance, the one thing I would recommend is choosing a computer with dedicated video memory. That will probably get a bigger bang than processor speed. Most less expensive laptops share the system memory with the video card. Since the video is always accessing the memory, it doesn't leave a lot for the CPU/software which ends up waiting to read/write data instead of processing it. It's not about the size/amount of memory used by video but the frequency of access to the memory. Think of it like a toll-booth, if you give the trucks their own toll-plaza, more cars will get through, quicker.

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kitkat
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#602 Post by kitkat » Wed Jun 17, 2009 12:19 pm

Hey, go me for putting my question as the last of a page. :roll:
Toon Town Dave wrote:To be honest...a faster/different processor probably won't make much difference. Vista is the notable exception because it is a pig that needs a lot of RAM.

If you are concerned about performance, the one thing I would recommend is choosing a computer with dedicated video memory...
Thanks.
Would you say that your summary of processors is true even if someone says, "Eh, the laptop's probably over 4 years old..."? (I'm sure I'll get plenty of that considering what I'm putting into Craigslist.)
(Take a look at this sweet baby¡)

SoundInMotionDJ
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#603 Post by SoundInMotionDJ » Wed Jun 17, 2009 8:55 pm

kitkat wrote:Would you say that your summary of processors is true even if someone says, "Eh, the laptop's probably over 4 years old..."? (I'm sure I'll get plenty of that considering what I'm putting into Craigslist.)
(Take a look at this sweet baby¡)
The laptop you posted would get you most of the way to your goals (if not all the way). I would strongly consider a RAM upgrade to at least 512MB.

As a test, using a laptop with a 1.5GHz processor & 512MB of RAM: I re-named 3000 mp3's an external USB drive with MediaMonkey, while running my DJ software and ripping a full CD to WAV on the local disc. Everything sounded fine through the headphones.
Last edited by SoundInMotionDJ on Fri Jun 26, 2009 6:59 am, edited 1 time in total.

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kitkat
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#604 Post by kitkat » Thu Jun 18, 2009 9:39 am

SoundInMotionDJ wrote:As a test...I re-named 3000 mp3's an external USB drive with MediaMonkey, while running my DJ software and ripping a full CD to WAV on the local disc.
You...are awesome. Thank you.

Toon Town Dave
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#605 Post by Toon Town Dave » Thu Jun 18, 2009 12:14 pm

I'd avoid HP hardware. I've had too many friends encounter issues with HP PCs.

I have a 2-1/2 year old Dell Inspiron that I've been happy with. The power brick died after a year and the one of the hinges broke earlier this year. Both were replaced/repaired under warranty promptly, without question. When the hinge was repaired, they replaced the whole case plus the keyboard and touch-pad which still worked but showed obvious wear from 2 years of use. (Buy the extended warranty, it's worth it.)

We have a couple of Asus netbooks at work. They're handy and functional but I don't like the keyboard and touch-pad for real work. They're also a bit too slow playing video (youtube, etc.) the might be okay for DJ'ing but I haven't tried.

I'd second the recommendation of min 512MB of RAM. More would be better if your database is really big. The O/S will make use of the extra RAM to cache data from the disc that is frequently accessed. That should help improve the speed of your database lookups since it won't have to read everything from the hard drive all the time.

SoundInMotionDJ
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#606 Post by SoundInMotionDJ » Thu Jun 18, 2009 7:37 pm

Toon Town Dave wrote:I'd avoid HP hardware. I've had too many friends encounter issues with HP PCs.
Do not get too caught up in comments like this. There are really only a couple of tiers of laptop quality anyway (since all the guts are common to every laptop to begin with).

There is a big difference in the quality and fit & finish of a consumer grade laptop and business grade laptops. I recommend the business grade laptops - the cases are stronger, the hinges are stronger, and the overall fit & finish is higher. For new laptops, business grade versions come with a 3 year warranty, consumer grade versions come with a 1 year warranty.

The posted link to the Dell laptop was a business grade machine.
Toon Town Dave wrote:I'd second the recommendation of min 512MB of RAM. More would be better if your database is really big.
I am not sure what your definition of ginormous database looks like...but here is a little math to help you along:

The metadata associated with a song in the media Monkey database will have less than 4kb of data associated with it - the ID3 tag, path, size, etc. If the database has 10,000 songs, the metadata will be under 40MB. If you have 20,000 songs, that is still under 80MB of data. (And so on).

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Mr Awesomer
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#607 Post by Mr Awesomer » Fri Jun 19, 2009 12:34 am

Have you considered just getting a little netbook?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6834152093
more detailed specs on the MSI site:
http://www.msimobile.com/level3_product ... id=7&id=85

Just an idea to go new and still stay cheap. I'd think it's only downside would be the small screen.

I personally wouldn't recommending getting a used laptop. You have no idea what's about to break on it, how much life is left to the battery, how it was treated, what's been done to it, what software you'll get with it, etc. etc. It could quickly turn into a money pit that ends up costing you more in the long run.
Reuben Brown
Southern California

penguin
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#608 Post by penguin » Fri Jun 19, 2009 3:22 am

SoundInMotionDJ wrote:
There is a big difference in the quality and fit & finish of a consumer grade laptop and business grade laptops. I recommend the business grade laptops - the cases are stronger, the hinges are stronger, and the overall fit & finish is higher. For new laptops, business grade versions come with a 3 year warranty, consumer grade versions come with a 1 year warranty.
I'll second that - my laptop is a business grade machine and it works great.

EDIT: And it's built like a tank, but not nearly as heavy.
Last edited by penguin on Sat Jun 20, 2009 6:29 am, edited 1 time in total.

SoundInMotionDJ
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#609 Post by SoundInMotionDJ » Fri Jun 19, 2009 5:48 am

penguin wrote:I'll second that - my laptop is a business grade machine and it works great.
Let me clarify...the difference between business grade and consumer grade is not in how well the laptop works - for the "same" processor/memory specs the two laptops will work the "same". The difference is in how durable the overall construction is.

A consumer grade laptop is designed to be used 10-15% of it's life (2-ish hours a day, on average). And the remaining 85-90% of it's life it is built to sit on a table.

A business grade laptop is designed to be used 25-35% of it's life (8-ish hours a day, on average). The remaining 65-75% of the time will be spent stuffed into a bag that is carried to and fro, tossed into a car seat, stuffed into an airplane overhead bin, whacked into doors and walls, and so on. Not abuse...but normal "handling" as the laptop moves around.

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kitkat
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#610 Post by kitkat » Mon Jul 06, 2009 9:42 am

I bought one! An HP dv1420us from another swing DJ who was within days of selling it to a pawn shop instead. Probably not going to last a long time (it's a personal model, not business), but at $50, I'll take "long enough to completely get my music tagged for DJing and do a few gigs successfully with it."
(Which SUCKS. Holy wow is proper re-tagging of thousands of files I never tagged right a big p.i.t.a.)

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Mr Awesomer
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#611 Post by Mr Awesomer » Mon Jul 06, 2009 12:06 pm

kitkat wrote:An HP dv1420us from another swing DJ
If it was well taken care of it should easily last you a couple more years... and that's great you were able to get it from someone you know (and I assume trust, haha.)
Reuben Brown
Southern California

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kitkat
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#612 Post by kitkat » Mon Jul 06, 2009 4:51 pm

Definitely!

Surreal
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#613 Post by Surreal » Tue Jul 07, 2009 1:12 pm

kitkat wrote:(Which SUCKS. Holy wow is proper re-tagging of thousands of files I never tagged right a big p.i.t.a.)
What program are you using to edit tags? Most built in ones from media players aren't so good, though bigger managers like JRiver or MediaMonkey are pretty good. There are also tons of standalone editors that work really well.

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tornredcarpet
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#614 Post by tornredcarpet » Sat Jul 11, 2009 2:01 pm

Mr Awesomer wrote:Have you considered just getting a little netbook?
...
Just an idea to go new and still stay cheap. I'd think it's only downside would be the small screen.
And the TERRIBLE, TERRIBLE on-board sound.
Jesse (Los Angeles, CA/Hampton Roads, VA)

Surreal
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#615 Post by Surreal » Thu Jul 16, 2009 7:18 pm

A good deal for a headphone amp... FiiO E3 http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.14303
Hard to go wrong for six bucks.

edit: big brother, rechargeable... FiiO E5 http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.18350

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