DJing software for Mac OSX

It's all about the equipment

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Haydn
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#16 Post by Haydn » Fri Feb 05, 2010 9:37 am

Rob wrote:
Haydn wrote:
Which version of iTunes are you using?
9.0.3[/quote]
Thanks - After have a few problems with iTunes 8 when it was announced, I'm still on iTunes 7. Maybe it's time to upgrade?

laffs4sale
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#17 Post by laffs4sale » Fri Feb 05, 2010 9:43 am

Thank you all for those replies. I really appreciate it. I checked out DJ-1800 and it's in my price range. I'll also look into a couple others. Thanks again.

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Cyrano de Maniac
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#18 Post by Cyrano de Maniac » Mon Feb 08, 2010 7:47 pm

SoundInMotionDJ wrote:I am a little unsure about multi channel sound card support with Disco XT - I prefer to have a monitor channel, and separate channels for Player A and Player B. MegaSeg does support this.
I'm still on the last major version of Disco XT (4.8.1), but the preferences do have an option to use an external mixer. If you set it up this way (as opposed to the default of a room mix plus a seperate headphone mix), then the decks appear to be routed independently of eachother.

I don't know if this has changed in the 5.x series, but I can't imagine it would have gone away.

Brent

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dogpossum
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#19 Post by dogpossum » Wed Feb 10, 2010 3:52 pm

I use a mac for DJing and I've tried a few options.
I've used DJ1800 and Disco XT, but found them just too complicated for what I was doing. I tended to get distracted by the doodads instead of concentrating on the actual _songs_. This is, no doubt, a personal foible.

Eventually, I just ditched all that action and returned to using itunes. But I like to preview songs while DJing, so I added cog, a tiny, light application that really just plays music. I preview with that and 'DJ' on itunes. I guess I prefer itunes because it devotes so much screen space to my library - to lists of songs - and my focus is on which song I'll play next. I rely on the sound gear at venues to be decent enough for me to fiddle with the sound quality there. Which is actually a bit crap at one gig I do regularly.


My set up now is a macbook pro, a griffin imic, sennheiser headphones, a couple of cords and adaptors, itunes and cog. I'm really finding the simplest solution the easiest.

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trev
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#20 Post by trev » Fri Mar 26, 2010 1:31 am

I've played around with a few of these now and I'm thinking about getting Disco XT.

Things I like:
  • The interface is highly customizable, so I'll be able to just keep the bits I need and use.
    Highly editable crossfade where I can see the waveforms live.
    Tempo shift
    iTunes playlist friendly
    Reasonable price
DJay was another option but it just felt a bit too gimmicky and emphasized features I'm never likely to use (like scratching)

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chrisbe
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#21 Post by chrisbe » Sat Mar 27, 2010 8:54 pm

I also use a Mac and I bought DJ1800 a while ago because some DJs recommended it to me.

DJ1800 is good because you can link it with your iTunes library but you can't build up a playlist. So I decided to use it as my prelistening tool in combination with a Griffin iMic.

iTunes DJ was my favourite choice for a certain period but I realised that it won't keep a song in your list of played songs unless you play it at the very end. But sometimes I like to fade out a song because e.g. there is an audience applause in a live recording (and I don't wanna crop the song to avoid a sudden ending). That's why I don't use it anymore.

My current setup:
I have two open windows, the upper quarter of the screen is DJ1800, the lower part is reserved for iTunes, so I can easily drag a song from iTunes into DJ1800 to prelisten the song. In iTunes I create a new playlist at the beginning of my set and then build up or change the set on-the-go while DJing.

Haydn
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#22 Post by Haydn » Sun Mar 28, 2010 7:34 am

chrisbe wrote:I also use a Mac and I bought DJ1800 a while ago because some DJs recommended it to me.

DJ1800 is good because you can link it with your iTunes library but you can't build up a playlist. So I decided to use it as my prelistening tool in combination with a Griffin iMic.

My current setup:
I have two open windows, the upper quarter of the screen is DJ1800, the lower part is reserved for iTunes, so I can easily drag a song from iTunes into DJ1800 to prelisten the song. In iTunes I create a new playlist at the beginning of my set and then build up or change the set on-the-go while DJing.
I think I've seen that set-up used elsewhere. As I understand it, you preview in DJ1800 and output in iTunes. But as DJ1800 is DJ software, wouldn't it make more sense (and is it even possible) to do it the other way round?

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chrisbe
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#23 Post by chrisbe » Sun Mar 28, 2010 5:22 pm

Haydn wrote:But as DJ1800 is DJ software, wouldn't it make more sense (and is it even possible) to do it the other way round?
As I wrote, with DJ1800 you can't build up a playlist and I prefer to have one for my set, so I can prepare the upcoming 3, 4 songs and if necessary I still can change the order last-minute without losing the overview.

There's probably another point, I really like iTunes, if there only would be a prelistening feature...

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dogpossum
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#24 Post by dogpossum » Fri Apr 02, 2010 3:31 am

chrisbe wrote:
Haydn wrote:But as DJ1800 is DJ software, wouldn't it make more sense (and is it even possible) to do it the other way round?
As I wrote, with DJ1800 you can't build up a playlist and I prefer to have one for my set, so I can prepare the upcoming 3, 4 songs and if necessary I still can change the order last-minute without losing the overview.

There's probably another point, I really like iTunes, if there only would be a prelistening feature...

If you're just using DJ1800 to preview, maybe go with something 'lighter'? That's why I ended up using cog - it's so low impact. I'll show it to you tomorrow if you're interested...

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trev
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#25 Post by trev » Fri Apr 02, 2010 10:18 pm

I just bit the bullet and bought Disco XT.

This is how I've currently configured my screen (click for actual size). I'm still playing around with it to get the best layout. Currently playing is top left. Upcoming playlist is down the right side. Search (iTunes) is bottom left. I'll report back once I've used it in combat.

Image

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keither
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#26 Post by keither » Sat Apr 03, 2010 10:10 am

That's really hot.

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chrisbe
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#27 Post by chrisbe » Sun Apr 04, 2010 12:16 am

Disco XT is very tempting! Last year I downloaded the demo version but I never took the time to check it out properly. When I see now this screenshot I really should do that :shock:

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trev
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#28 Post by trev » Fri Apr 09, 2010 10:55 pm

I used Disco XT for the first time at a gig last night (previously I was just using iTunes). I was a bit nervous about it because it was a big event with 100+ people. Fortunately it all went really well!

The Good:
  • I can now do live previewing (finally!), and it's designed so there's no chance of accidentally playing something thru the wrong channel.

    I now have precise control over crossfading. This was awesome for playing live tracks that finish with applause because I could start the next track and let the applause continue and trail off. It also meant I could control the precise amount of a gap (if any) between the end of a song and the first note of the next.

    I can now change the tempo without affecting the pitch. Obviously you don't wanna mess with this too much, but I did speed up Tuxedo Junction about 10bpm for a shim sham just to try it out. :twisted:

    Rock solid playback for 2 hours, no stability issues (phew!)
The Bad:
  • I spent much more time than usual thinking about the changeover and whether things were technically okay, than searching, watching the dancefloor and thinking about which song to play next.

    I'm used to using iTunes to search and sort, and although Disco XT integrates with iTunes, the look and feel along with the smaller screen space allocation, was different enough that I was a little out of my comfort zone.
    (I expect both of these issues to lessen over time)

    I use a USB soundcard to allow the extra headphone out needed for previewing, but I noticed when testing it that I had to have the USB plugged in before you open Disco XT for it to ever detect it. Not really a big deal, but it means you have to close down the program if you forget to plug it in first.

So, recommended (so far!).

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trev
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#29 Post by trev » Mon Apr 26, 2010 7:56 pm

For those following, DiscoXT let me down twice at my last gig.

The first incident was when music was playing and I was using the drop-down menus. It seems if you hold the menus down for more than 5 seconds or so, the music stops. Very bad. This is most definitely a bug.

The second issue was that it wasn't playing the next track automatically. This may have been a setting that I had inadvertently changed, but everything appeared the same as before, and there was no obvious solution. I had to do a fast switch-over back to iTunes.

I really like the features of this software, but for now I'm going to retract my recommendation.

straycat
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#30 Post by straycat » Tue Apr 27, 2010 3:59 am

trev wrote:I really like the features of this software, but for now I'm going to retract my recommendation.
'Megaseg', I keep saying, and does anyone listen? ;)
Costly, yes, but a great interface for my purposes, and reliability-wise it's rock solid.

These days, I can't imagine using anything else (except for that magical bit of DJing software for the iPad that I really must get around to writing)

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