This was the third DJ mixer that I owned. Surprisingly, I could not find any information whatsoever on this mixer on the Internet. It was a great mixer and I bought it or rather, traded it in second-hand. It lasted me from 1993 till about 2004, a good 11 years of service. It was built like a tank and gave some very clean, loud output. I love VU meters on mixers. They are easier to read than digital LED meters and this mixer had two big VU meters.
There were 7 channels on this mixer. 1st channel was for the DJ microphone. Channel 2 and Channel 3 were for microphone or line. Channel 4 and Channel 5 were dedicated LINE channels. I hooked up my Denon DN-2000F to these two channels. Channels 6 and 7 were PHONO/LINE channels but I hooked up my trusty Technics SL-1200s to. The master output utilised two faders, one for the stereo left and one for the stereo right channel. The headphone volume monitor was a slider instead of a potentiometer like other mixers. There was also a 5-band graphic equalizer too.
Even though I sold this away to get myself my Tascam X-17 (which incidentally, I still have and is still working perfectly), I still, in some way, miss this mixer. It has been on many a DJ gig, has aided me in transferring songs from my LPs and singles to MP3 format on my computer, via an RCA cable from the mixer to my computer sound-card. A great mixer and to the person that bought it, if you are reading this, you bought a good and solid mixer.
Now this is getting interesting. Imagine, two iPads, or one iPhone with an iPad, or two iPhones, being used as DJ tools. Found this little snippet of information at IK Multimedia. According to their website:
iRig MIX allows DJs to use a traditional setup with two devices (one plugged into each of the independent channels) OR a single iOS device. For the single iOS device setup, the output of the single device is split into dual-mono and sent to the individual channels. Additionally – for the first time on any DJ mixer – iRig MIX can be used for mixing any type of audio source (coming from mp3 players, CD players, etc.) with an iOS device using automatic tempo matching and beat syncing. This is accomplished with X-Sync, a feature that works in combination with the DJ Rig free app from IK Multimedia that is included with iRig MIX.
Interesting isn’t it? But then again, it assumes that you have at the very least one iPad and one iPhone. Both must be loaded with MP3s to use it. I would rather have a snazzy controller hooked up to an iPad with all my tunes. I tote my IBM x61 laptop with my Hercules controller when I do gigs. If there was a controller for the iPad, I would get one. It would be so much smaller and compact!
But I suspect what I just described is just around the corner… hey, you never know nowadays!
In 2001, I was stationed in a bar, taking over a friend who was the resident DJ there. They had this mixer installed in the bar and it was one of the cleanest-sounding mixers that I have played on in a very long time. I heard that this mixer is made in Belgium and they have been making mixers for many, many years so they have the domain knowledge. A bit expensive and a bit out of my range though but I must admit that I was very pleased with the performance of this Rodec mixer, and the fine sound it reproduced.
This is one of the few singles that endeared me to Whitney Houston. It was late 1985 and my friend bought this single. I remember that this song was so beautiful. There were two other songs on Side B, which were All At Once and The Greatest Love Of All. Today, I heard the news that Whitney Houston had died, at age 48. A shame really because she provided so many dance singles to us DJs. Whitney, you will be missed, if not by the hoards, at the very least by the millions of DJs around the world who were able to move dancers with your music. I know I am one of them.
I had the chance to see a demo of this baby today and boy was I impressed. It can work with Serato Itch and even with Traktor and it is so flexible. The things you can do with it versus what my Hercules controller can do is simply mind-boggling. Take for instance the effects bank, the advanced looping techniques and such. I was just left spellbound. Some more info on this product:
Designed in conjunction with Serato
Includes full version of ITCH software
4 channel layout with FX
Two dual layer deck simulators
Bi-colour LED layer assignment
20-channel USB 2.0 soundcard
24bit/96kHz audio system
168 individual MIDI messages available
RIAA/phono inputs for external decks
Mix outputs on RCA and balanced XLR
Separate booth output
Built-in hardware MIDI interface
Professional modular construction
High quality faders
Compact slim design
Fully compatible with other leading DJ software
ITCH includes FX, looping and time-stretching
It is not the cheapest controller out there but when you see what it is capable of doing, you will wish that you had something like this in your DJ arsenal. I would love to get one but it is a bit out of my budget at the moment. Maybe a bit later.
I had the chance to play with this Native Instruments Traktor controller the other day. All I can say about it is that it is very well-built and the sound quality is awesome. That being said, it is pretty heavy and twice the size of my tiny Hercules controller. Quality like this does come at a price and I am pretty sure that it ain’t cheap! But I must say that Traktor software is incredible. It does take some getting used to, and it is totally different to the Virtual DJ software that I am so used to using. The specifications are available on the Traktor website here. The controller, by itself, obviously has more buttons and controls on it than my Hercules which means better and greater functionality and options for the more discerning DJ. While I am all for simplicity, I suppose there are others who will appreciate what this controller is capable of doing. The one I was using was hooked up to a Mac Mini but the website claims that it works fine on Windows XP, Vista and 7. Maybe next time but for the time being, I am quite happy with my Hercules DJ controller.
I had the whole club crazy over this song about a week ago…pure, unadulterated dancing. They absolutely loved this! I have said it often enough…they do not make songs like this anymore. Just listen to it…the pure power of disco and the fat beats….just spells classic!
There are so many controllers available nowadays. the choices are just staggering. This is Denon’s offering to the DJ table. When I first got into mixing with CDs, I bought the best of the best then, a Denon DN-2000F and I loved it. It seems that Denon has carried the functionality that was so popular in their CD players over to this controller.
It’s basically a two channel version of the MC6000 controller, which was praised for its plethora of I/O options and amazing build quality, so expected the MC3000 to be relatively rich in these values too, albeit with a cut-down 2-channel, more compact design.
I might get this when my Hercules controller croaks but so far, it seems to be holding up just fine. I have always had a soft spot for Denon products and this one, priced at about $800 seems to be pretty good!
A friend of mine is selling these pair of active speakers. Now, to be honest, I have never heard of this brand of speaker before. They come from, or rather, are manufactured by a company named Concord. Now, these speakers sport 15″ woofers and what looks like a 1″ horn. They do look pretty hefty and I dare say that these speakers will pump out quite a large wattage of power. I would have bought these from him but for some reason, I do not like active speakers. Call me a relic, a dinosaur if you will but I have always believed in passive speakers, and that is why you will not find a single active speaker in my inventory. It would be great if anyone can give me more information on this brand. It looks pretty interesting. For DJs that want to ply their trade, or to sound guys doing rental, these just might be your ticket.
I have a second notebook, a Lenovo X61, that I use sometimes for mobile-disco parties (I hook it up to my DJ controller) and for clubs and pubs when I have to DJ. In fact, I will be taking it to the club tonight and testing it out for the first time. I have always taken my Dell Vostro 1400 but the notebook is too heavy. Besides, that is my primary notebook that I use on a daily basis. I hooked this up to a gig I was doing last Friday and it performed OK. What I am worried about is the age of the notebook because if it dies, there goes my night. I think it will perform ok. Just have to get some isolators for it.
