Help And Advice, Where have I gone wrong Options

[fester]

Personally speaking I would use a PC based controller.
I find the HDD / SD card players fine to use as backup but the sheer versatility of running Virtual DJ wins every time for me.
If you have a large database of music I find it very time consuming and tedious finding my way round a HDD controller especially using the typically very small screen. With a PC based system it's so easy to find and search for tracks and the screen size makes browsing folders so much easier.
One of the things I like a lot and use often in VDJ is the similar track function which will search your database for tracks in a similar key and bpm. Really handy if lets say you are in the mix doing a 90's dance set.

It's also very easy to keep your library up to date, just download or rip your cd straight to your pc, no faffing about with database managers etc

[rockymount]

[quote name='Raymilkybarkid' date='Mar 20 2011, 08:56 PM' post='260474']
The main problem is that now I have to listen to 23,000 tracks to check the tags.
having spent 3 months ripping I may as well just start all over again.

Hi Raymilkybarkid,

Did look to reply to you a couple of days ago and luckily my membership came through today so I can now reply Gadget got the ‘ripping’ part spot on as Exact Audio Copy (EAC) which together with the LAME MP3 Encoder Gives perfect mp3’s (EAC automatically detects your CD Reader(s) and if you’ve got more than one even tells you which one has the least ‘jitter’ and which is the best to use for ripping !!!). For tagging I personally use TagScanner which you can download either from here ;

http://www.xdlab.ru/en/download.htm

or here;

http://fileforum.betanews.com/detail/TagScanner/981935153/1

in the latter case you can click on the image to see just how comprehensive it is and it’s just so easy to set all the tracks to a particular album, artist, genre etc. The Music Renamer tab even allows you to change the actual PC Filenames, whilst the List Maker tab allows you to output the track, title, artist etc, info directly to Excel (and it’s got a built in player so you can listen whilst you’re tagging ).

Also when I just want to play an album’s worth of mp3’s on my PC without overloading my PC’s performance in the slightest (i.e. whilst I’m surfing, photoshopping etc.) I use foobar 2000 which has such a small PC footprint it’s unreal.;

http://www.foobar2000.org/

Have a good weekend

Rockymount

[DJMickeyk]

Now here is my next problem do I use a PC based controller or do I use a HDD controller.
Budget is about £1200 so any tips would be welcomed. Ideally I wouls still like to be able to play CD's as well.

I have been using this week in week out for some time now and it works very well with VDJ, you can switch to CD control on either deck in seconds, even if you are playing a track from VDJ on that deck. I think Pioneer do a similar product within your budget which I would guess is equally as good if not better. Only problem with this system is that if your controller goes down you lose both PC and CD playback, so you would need some form of backup. Never used a HDD based system so can't comment but the denon is a pleasure to work with and has been very reliable for me, I've not heard of any other users being unhappy with theirs either, it did have a problem when initially released but Denon have sorted it long ago with a firmware update.

[gadget]

I have been using this week in week out for some time now and it works very well with VDJ, you can switch to CD control on either deck in seconds, even if you are playing a track from VDJ on that deck. I think Pioneer do a similar product within your budget which I would guess is equally as good if not better. Only problem with this system is that if your controller goes down you lose both PC and CD playback, so you would need some form of backup. Never used a HDD based system so can't comment but the denon is a pleasure to work with and has been very reliable for me, I've not heard of any other users being unhappy with theirs either, it did have a problem when initially released but Denon have sorted it long ago with a firmware update.

That's good to know you can switch in/out of CD control... which is something I cannot do with the HD2500 (Midi control *or* hd2500 control - although you can flip between CD and internal devices, but not in Midi mode )

I still want an HC4500 + drawers :)

Cheers,

david

[mjmac]

Ray, i hope you have made some progress on a way forward let us know how you are getting on!

While i know iTunes isnt everyones cup of tea, i find it very handy in creating quick play lists and ripping my cd collection, ive used it for years and not had an issue with it.. based on i always set the ripper to 320k mp3 and not used the standard apple settings...

Even if you do use windows media player (WMP) the same thing prevails... you must ensure the ripping part of the software is set correctly. Meaning by defauly iTunes or WMP will rip in their native setting... typically produce AAC or WMA (iTunes / WMP respectivly).

Now using these native formats may cause play back issues in VDJ, traktor or serrato... (however they are all much better with this in their latest versions)... but years gone by very few of the DJ apps would play native formats and mainly worked with mp3 or wav.

DRM = Digital rights management is normally applied to music files purchased online.... however, cd's did have a form of DRM that prevented you from copying music to the hard drive via iTunes or WMP... by creating a non standard audio cd - basically the cd wasnt mastered by the big record companies to 'red book' standards... so i doubt any of the music you have had ripped is drm protected - as you wouldnt have been able to rip it in the first place!

So the files you have will not be DRM issues... but more like format problems and VDJ not recognising them.

Here are some links you can read more if you wish >
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_rights_management
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Book_(CD_standard)
!You may need to copy & paste these links if they dont click and open!

i personally dont want to push itunes at you but it does take a lot of the effor out of creating play lists and filling... esp if you are not very confident using windows explorer or osx finder?!?!

for me i itunes is the centre of my music world... both traktor and rekordbox look to the itunes library.. not sure if VDJ will have the same integration as traktor?!?!?!

As previously said... ripping to 'wav' is best, or 320k mp3 - these two formats you wont go wrong with!

Having said all of that - i do tend to purchase online now rather than rip from my collection... as i hate spiders and my collection is stored in the loft... my loft is full of spiders!

This post has been edited by mjmac: Mar 28 2011, 10:34 AM

[Dan allanthemsdisco]

I believe PCDJ provide in house training and will clean and configure your DJ computer for you £100 i believe - its all on the pcdj website
just thought id add it because for some people that could be very useful!

[aimeehudson]

try narrow down

[aimeehudson]

I would like to say a BIG thank you to Rob for the post he was bang on and it had nothing to do with DRM.
It was down partially to me not understanding the software and how to use it properly.
The tagging format was not consistent thus causing some of my problems.

Now here is my next problem do I use a PC based controller or do I use a HDD controller.
Budget is about £1200 so any tips would be welcomed. Ideally I wouls still like to be able to play CD's as well.

:wall: