SwingDJs

Is there any possible way to smoke your laptop by plugging into a DJ board? somebody posted on Yehoodi that this happened to him....he hasn't answered back yet.

It doesn't seem possible to me...

Sure, of course. It's possible to fry your laptop plugging in to a lot of things. I saw one go up in smoke when plugged into a video projector. It all depends what's going down those wires. In this case, it was a particular plug that carries power normally. Hard to believe that it would be wired in a way that would plug in perfectly and carry a dangerous voltage as well, but that's the way it is.

But I can't see why any normal DJ set up would fry a laptop.

Zot wrote:Sure, of course. It's possible to fry your laptop plugging in to a lot of things. I saw one go up in smoke when plugged into a video projector. It all depends what's going down those wires. In this case, it was a particular plug that carries power normally. Hard to believe that it would be wired in a way that would plug in perfectly and carry a dangerous voltage as well, but that's the way it is.

But I can't see why any normal DJ set up would fry a laptop.

I can understand obtaining damage in some cases...

But if you can fry a lap top by plugging into something using your Audio Out (headphone) or Video outs, how do you protect your Lap top from getting jacked?

I guess the same question could be raised on the Mic input as well...on how not to jack it up and what precautions are there?

i love my mac

falty411 wrote:i love my mac

Me too, I wish they where more compatible....

Okay I'm a computer lamewad so I need help. Now that I have my Extigy card installed, how do I configure it to be able to preview songs? I guess the question is how do I go about sending audio to different places. I'm using Windows XP.

yedancer wrote:Okay I'm a computer lamewad so I need help. Now that I have my Extigy card installed, how do I configure it to be able to preview songs? I guess the question is how do I go about sending audio to different places. I'm using Windows XP.

Depends on the software. IN BPM studio you go to audio setup, and set the different channels to different decks or to the monitor.

The extigy is seen as three separate sound devices to such an application.

I'm in the Mac camp. I run OSX and use multiple XMMS (under X11) instances. I rip all my CDs at 256kbps CBR MP3 using LAME or iTunes (Frauenhoffer?). I've found mp3 sound quality is fine for any music except pieces recorded with decent fidelity and featuring ride cymbals. They're barely tolerable at 256kbps. I haven't experimented with AAC yet, and don't relish re-ripping everything.

While the stock audio hardware in a Tibook is fairly decent, I'm just not seeing the output levels I'd like nor the sound quality I get from even a plain-jane DAC on a standalone CD/DVD player.

I've got a pre-order in for one of the new Echo Indigo PCMCIA cards, the DJ model with two independent 1/8" outputs. Evidently the drivers provide 8 output channels (for those using 8-track sequencer stuff) that can be filtered down to the two physical outputs. Retails for $149 CAD.

http://www.echoaudio.com/Products/IndigoDJ/index.php

I'll be testing the Indigo vs. stock tibook hardware on my H/K 325 amp and pair of JBL ND310II PA.. will let everyone know how my fairly subjective tests go. (Who needs 5.1+ for djing??)

Anybody have a similar setup/experience with the Indigo line of PCMCIA cards? Or other cards, even..

When I was looking, I couldn't find any PCMCI cards... so that's a new one for me. Windows supported?

I know that I sound like a broken record, but why are so many people not hip to the benefits of VBR High with LAME? It has better sound quality than 256k CBR, but uses less disk space.

Pretty much all players can handle VBR, the Lame Encoder is free, does VBR the best, and is available on all platforms.

Next time you encode, try it... see if i'm right.

GemZombie wrote:I know that I sound like a broken record, but why are so many people not hip to the benefits of VBR High with LAME? It has better sound quality than 256k CBR, but uses less disk space.

That post only confirms that Jesse G. knows way more about laptop DJing that I could ever hope to know.

GemZombie wrote:When I was looking, I couldn't find any PCMCI cards... so that's a new one for me. Windows supported?

I know that I sound like a broken record, but why are so many people not hip to the benefits of VBR High with LAME? It has better sound quality than 256k CBR, but uses less disk space.

Pretty much all players can handle VBR, the Lame Encoder is free, does VBR the best, and is available on all platforms.

Next time you encode, try it... see if i'm right.

he's on the mac (re PCMCI), although there is now a LAME plug-in for iTunes.
Supposedly AAC is VBR too, but i'm not sure about the comparisons
between AAC and VBR with LAME. Any clues?

yedancer wrote:Okay I'm a computer lamewad so I need help. Now that I have my Extigy card installed, how do I configure it to be able to preview songs? I guess the question is how do I go about sending audio to different places. I'm using Windows XP.

Did you ever get your Extigy to work with previewing without having to buy the expensive BPM Pro software? I'd be interested on info about this as well. Thanks.

JohnDyer wrote: Did you ever get your Extigy to work with previewing without having to buy the expensive BPM Pro software? I'd be interested on info about this as well. Thanks.

You can run two copies of winamp at the same time set to output to different sound devices.

See, I don't even have WinAmp. I guess I should get that.

Thanks for the tip about Winamp. I'm now able preview using the internal soundcard with the headphone jack on the laptop and play from Music Match through the Extigy.

With the Extigy card I have a couple of questions/concerns:

1. When playing from a CD through the Extigy I'm getting interference. It appears to be from the hard drive because I notice the HD light flickering when I get the interference. I'm not running any other applications save for Windows XP Pro.

2. With Winamp previewing through the internal soundcard/drivers, I can't seem to adjust the external (to Winamp) volume because the Extigy seems to have taken it over. Is there a way to get around this? Basically I can't get enough volume going to the headphones.