"There is no skill in Laptop Dj'ing"

Zascar

I really hate it when people say there is no skill in digital DJ’ing. Yes, some programs do the beatmatching for you, but saying “my main gripe about "DJ's" that use laptops is that there is not that much skill involved” is like saying that “most of the skill in DJ’ing is beatmatching”, but I’m sure we all agree that this is not true.

Anyone with any sense of rhythm can learn to beatmatch and just cause you can beatmatch does not make you a good DJ. Being a good DJ is about the quality of the music you play, good song selection, smooth and creative mixing, planning your set, controlling the crowd and generally making your dancefloor full of punters happy! A computer can not do this for you, and this is 99% of what DJ’ing is about…

Depending on my mood I sometimes just prefer click a button and get the beats aligned, but I find these programs are not that accurate and you always have to fine tune manually. Lately when mixing at home I usually do the beatmatching myself, but if I am playing at a party etc its a lot nicer to be able to get that out of the way which frees up more time for planning my set or doing a few loops or effects and getting creative.

More and more big name DJ’s are using computers these days. Ableton Live is an incredible piece of kit. To master it takes serious skill, possibly more than what it takes to mix a few records. Like it or not the digital age is taking over DJ’ing. I have been using software to mix for about 5 years. At first anyone I met who Dj’ed themselves would laugh or just say its not real. Nowadays if you are not at least interested in the digital side you are getting left behind. I remember many people completely snubbing Pioneer CDJ’s when they came out. One of my best mates said “ I will never use anything but Vinyl” a few years ago, he has since sold his decks got CDJ’s and never looked back since.

Executive Steve

Zascar wrote:

I really hate it when people say there is no skill in digital DJ’ing. Yes, some programs do the beatmatching for you, but saying “my main gripe about "DJ's" that use laptops is that there is not that much skill involved” is like saying that “most of the skill in DJ’ing is beatmatching”, but I’m sure we all agree that this is not true.

Anyone with any sense of rhythm can learn to beatmatch and just cause you can beatmatch does not make you a good DJ. Being a good DJ is about the quality of the music you play, good song selection, smooth and creative mixing, planning your set, controlling the crowd and generally making your dancefloor full of punters happy! A computer can not do this for you, and this is 99% of what DJ’ing is about…

Depending on my mood I sometimes just prefer click a button and get the beats aligned, but I find these programs are not that accurate and you always have to fine tune manually. Lately when mixing at home I usually do the beatmatching myself, but if I am playing at a party etc its a lot nicer to be able to get that out of the way which frees up more time for planning my set or doing a few loops or effects and getting creative.

More and more big name DJ’s are using computers these days. Ableton Live is an incredible piece of kit. To master it takes serious skill, possibly more than what it takes to mix a few records. Like it or not the digital age is taking over DJ’ing. I have been using software to mix for about 5 years. At first anyone I met who Dj’ed themselves would laugh or just say its not real. Nowadays if you are not at least interested in the digital side you are getting left behind. I remember many people completely snubbing Pioneer CDJ’s when they came out. One of my best mates said “ I will never use anything but Vinyl” a few years ago, he has since sold his decks got CDJ’s and never looked back since.

fully agree.

Seanie M

Hi Zascar,
I know where the motivation for this thread came about!

I hear your point, and yes, it does have some merits. Like you pointed out about the CD revolution of the early 90's, when some considered CD DJing to be 'fake' and that the only way was through vinyl, times have changed since. The technology has improved with CD players so much, that most decks worth their weight in salt alone need to have the manual read out loud to understand the tricks they come packed with.

The same can be said for the "digital" revolution of using laptops ("digital" can also encompass CD-MP3 players). It is a case of changing with the times. Even the fact that you can get memory card players now shows how progressive, in such a short space of time, music technology is going. However, there is always one thing all these new units offer - a hands-on control, and experience, of being a disc jockey.

The whole "gripe" I have stems from e.g. some venues I gig in, other nights there is sometimes a DJ who just sits with his laptop hooked up to his mixer, and every three and a half minutes CLICKS play for the next track. More vibrant laptop DJ's will use Abbleton, Hercules, Traktor, and so on to create intelligent mixing of tracks into a set. But, invariably, it always comes down to the same concept for the laptop user - making it easy, in some cases, with the touch of an F key, too easy.

Using a deck (be it CD, digital, or even vinyl) in realtime control of a song or songs to drag, add effect, loop, play/cue/repeat, scratch'n'mix, and more, is what being a disc jockey is all about. Pressing buttons on a laptop? Yeah, you might be able to use the term "DJ", but you're not one really. No offence, just how I see it.

I have used my laptop for gigs before in conjunction with my Pioneers (making up at least a 3-deck system), but invariably, from feedback I eavesdrop upon from punters etc, I have heard more bad than good things mentioned about laptop musicians. Hence why I won't use it as an extra deck (or replacement) for the forseeable future.

Just my 2 cents.

Seanie.

Cake Fiend

I've said it before and I'll say it again, what can be done with the likes of Ableton is far more interesting to me than some guy playing records one after the other.

(Having said that, I'll not be getting rid of my Technics any time soon either )

Helix

Seanie M wrote:

The whole "gripe" I have stems from e.g. some venues I gig in, other nights there is sometimes a DJ who just sits with his laptop hooked up to his mixer, and every three and a half minutes CLICKS play for the next track

sure if a dj whos gonna do that was using vinyl or cd, all theyd be doing is hitting the start button on the deck and moving the fader over

whats the difference?

your gripe is nothing to do with digital djs, its to do with crap ones

electro.ie

It's all music, don't matter how its served once it's good. I hate these topics, I use Ableton for live sets, does that make me cool

tman

aye, a fellow dj looked down on me recently because I was considering buying a couple of cd decks to compliment my 1210s, apparently using cds is "cheating"...
funny that, considering that after a month I still find it easier to mix using vinyl.
Vinyl is a thing of the past, any dj that can't see that laptop/cd djing is the way forward needs a kick up the arse.

(i still love vinyl and will continue buying it, but there's just not enough new stuff being released on it to warrant sticking to playing purely vinyl)

I can kind of see where he's coming from though, mixing on cds and laptops makes it far easier to learn how to beatmatch... at this stage it's instinct to me, rather than relying on whatever is on the screen/display

Helix

learning to beatmatch isnt hard anyway

GarraiGamhain

That's my main gripe about "DJ's" that use lappies - there is not that much skill involved, yet everything to loose if something goes wrong. It is lazy, and I think berates the job. In my opinion, proper 1-on-1 decks (be it record, tape, or CD) is the only way to be a "disc jockey", otherwise, I'd just call you a jock-strap.

Now that CD player technology has moved on to be able to play MP3 discs (and even CD-RW ones at that), coupled with a good mixer with its sound effects and samples banks and so on, there should be no need to use a laptop with MP3's and using some piece of software on it to match the BPM's for you automatically (leaving out the Pioneer CMX-3/5000 player here!). More can go wrong with a laptop, and it is not "work" for the money being dished out for it.

I'll only bring my laptop to record my gigs.

I feel really strongly about this sort of thing, so much so that I just had to reg for this. Its funny when you talk about the only way to dj being to have two sources and a mixer rather than a laptop. What do you think happens in the laptop? You have two audio sources outputted to a mixer which is the exact same thing as with having two cd players. Its a piece of hardware that is playing encoded digital audio the only difference being that it can play more than one source at once and is far more versatile. Dj snobbery is one thing but snobbery from a cd playing bar dj is a bit much. I remember from my days in college when the then ents officer in Maynooth was trying to replace you with somebody with a bit more taste and skill, rather than just pressing play on the two top 40 cds.

GarraiGamhain

Helix wrote:

learning to beatmatch isnt hard anyway

People get obessed with beatmaching as a skill and its one that only took me a few hours to learn and a few weeks to master. Its a pain in the arse when you are playing gigs and it takes away from your performance. I'd rather be picking tracks out and getting creative instead of doing the pointless housework of keeping a track in time.

Helix

GarraiGamhain wrote:

I'd rather be picking tracks out and getting creative instead of doing the pointless housework of keeping a track in time.

thats it exactly man, spot on

Zascar

I'm really glad so many people have the same opinion as me. It amazing how times have chaged as I had this same opinion years ago, yet some DJ's are still nieve about the whole thing. I'm very interested to see how it all progresses in the next new years...

Anyone got any predictions as to where it is heading?

Seanie M

GarraiGamhain wrote:

I remember from my days in college when the then ents officer in Maynooth was trying to replace you with somebody with a bit more taste and skill, rather than just pressing play on the two top 40 cds.

Hhmm... you've got me there. I mean, I wasn't the SU DJ for 3 years (before moving on) for nothing. There was another DJ at the time who also frequently played in the union. You might be mixing me up with someone else. The 'then' ents officer also left the same time as me, and we have been in contact since now and again, and has always reminisced about the good gigs that were in the "Pull Pit".

In fact, I was brought int replace the then SU DJ because of your reasons above.

Oh, and I never bought the NOW... albums, but I know what you mean.

Seanie M

Zascar wrote:

I'm very interested to see how it all progresses in the next new years...

Anyone got any predictions as to where it is heading?

I'd say these fancy CD-MP3 decks will turn into SD (or equivalent), and then, a hybrid sampler-cum-laptop-cum-mediaplayer deck to have an all in one feel. I can only imagine the cost involved there... but it was ony about 6 years ago when the CDJ-500 MKII was 1,100 yo-yo's when it first came out! Look at the CDJ-1000 MKIII's with all that it has built-in - coming down in price fast too.

Seanie M

By the way, if I could add for the sake of fairness, this thread, after all, is based on opinions. I have mine (which of course will change when something makes it), you guys have yours. Less bashing of one's opinion's on this (or any topic, just saying) would be greatly appreciated.

Once I have had some sleep after the day I've had, I'll probably join in again tomorrow to go against the rebuttals!

jonny68

Yeah i agree with Zascar as well this is the way things are going so i think people should embrace it, im actually lookin to get a laptop and get rid of my desktop and hopefully by the end of the year start dj'ing on the laptop, i used to dj for a few years in the mid to late 1990's on the decks, and despite being an older fuk*er:o im still very much into the whole scene and id like to start dj'ing again and id find the laptop would be the way to go, id play across the board, sticking to one style of dance music is boring.

JCarey70

Zascar wrote:

I'm really glad so many people have the same opinion as me. It amazing how times have chaged as I had this same opinion years ago, yet some DJ's are still nieve about the whole thing. I'm very interested to see how it all progresses in the next new years...

Anyone got any predictions as to where it is heading?

When stripped to its bare bones DJing in night clubs transitions from 'Bedroom Hobby' to 'Job'. And to do a 'Job' you need 'Tools' and to do a 'Good job' you need 'Good Tools'. If using vinyl and 1210's is what makes you do the best job you can do then use them, if on the other hand you think CD Decks is the way forward then use them, and for the Laptop gurus who use mp3s and software as a tool then run with that. At the end of the day a job needs to be done, people are paying good money to have a good night, if you can provide that with your tools then by all means use one or an amalgam of the aforementioned methods. Nobody should be looking down at anybody. It's what comes out of the speakers that matters not how it gets there in the interim. Once people can walk out of the club and say that was amazing then the method should not be a factor.

However, I find that a lot of DJ's who've spent years building up vinyl collections succumb to sour grapes when a new method to play tunes is introduced. They should just be glad that vinyl has not completely passed from the scene altogether. I don’t believe it will and hope it doesn’t, but don’t let it block progress in other formats. The main argument they use in order to keep vinyl alive is to poo poo the sound quality of Digital as appose to Analogue. Maybe vinyl when magnified and analyzed minutely has a better sound quality but to the average human clubbers ear it is not noticed especially when it is amplified in big clubs. Live and let live is what I say

jonny68 wrote:

Yeah i agree with Zascar as well this is the way things are going so i think people should embrace it, im actually lookin to get a laptop and get rid of my desktop and hopefully by the end of the year start dj'ing on the laptop, i used to dj for a few years in the mid to late 1990's on the decks, and despite being an older fuk*er:o im still very much into the whole scene and id like to start dj'ing again and id find the laptop would be the way to go, id play across the board, sticking to one style of dance music is boring.

Why not get the laptop and keep the decks as well? The two combined could make for and even better overall DJing tool.

Zascar

JCarey70 wrote:

The main argument they use in order to keep vinyl alive is to poo poo the sound quality of Digital as appose to Analogue. Maybe vinyl when magnified and analyzed minutely has a better sound quality but to the average human clubbers ear it’s is not noticed especially when it is amplified in big clubs.

Good point. I always come back on this saying that a lot of my mp3's have been ripped from vinyl themselves - it is a digital recording and is EXACTLY the same as a record, so if you wan to be pedantic about it this is the way around

Makaveli

It's not exactly the same. It's compressed so the sound quality is worse.

Zascar

Can anyone tell the difference between a wav and a 320kbs mp3?

tman

JCarey70 wrote:

The main argument they use in order to keep vinyl alive is to poo poo the sound quality of Digital as appose to Analogue. Maybe vinyl when magnified and analyzed minutely has a better sound quality but to the average human clubbers ear it is not noticed especially when it is amplified in big clubs. Live and let live is what I say

Aye, it's such a crap argument, especially when you consider some of the poorly mastered/pressed vinyl out there. The degradation in quality from 320kbps mp3 to vinyl is instantly noticeable when mixing with them at home. at least with an mp3/wav, you're not relying on the pressing plant to not make a hames of it...

Scubadevils

Great to read this thread and see general agreement on the topic. I have just started to make the move to digital and am f*ckin loving it! I have been ripping my vinyl anyway now for over two years but I can now also include all my CDs which are much more varied in terms of music genres. I can't believe the flexibility offered in digital DJing and will not look back. Will still keep my decks and vinyl collection but I am without doubt sold on digital DJing.

Makaveli

Zascar wrote:

Can anyone tell the difference between a wav and a 320kbs mp3?

Me personally, probably not. Others can though. Mp3 is a poor quality codec really though and in a club situation with a good setup the sound degradation from the compression would probably be noticeable.

FLAC is a good alternative. Lossless and a lot smaller than wav.

PeakOutput

personally i believe anyone who says that digital djs are automatically less talented than vinyl is someone whos opinion i can disregard immedietley..............

i have no problem people prefering vinyl coz of its feel or because thats what they are used or maybe.....just maybe because of the sound quality( i think its a stupid argument but it is technically true) but to say that i am better than them because i use this and they dont is stupid...........

i used to use vinyl now i use serato....so guess what besides taking a record out of the box and placing it on the turntable i do exactly the same thing as any vinyl dj does during their gig. serato does not beat match for you although their display does make it faster to do...........this can only be a good thing as it gives me more time to concentrate on something the crowd will actually notice and enjoy.

i will judge a dj by listening to their mix and watching how many people are dancing in front of them..........thats it i dont care what they use as long as they are not just playing a mix cd

PeakOutput

Makaveli wrote:

Me personally, probably not. Others can though. Mp3 is a poor quality codec really though and in a club situation with a good setup the sound degradation from the compression would probably be noticeable.

FLAC is a good alternative. Lossless and a lot smaller than wav.

192kpbs mp3 i ALMOST the same quality as a cd (ie 44khz 16bit) 320kpbs mp3 is far better quality than cd.......vinyl is better sound quality but only if it is well pressed and you are using an extremely high end turntable(yes an even better one than your 1210's is required) coupled with a very high quality amp and speakers..........im talking about monitor gear here you wont hear a difference on club pa gear imo.............there are obviously people who are 1 in a million and will always be able to pick these things out by whatever means but you can leave them out of the group of your general to well informed clubber

Makaveli

There is so much wrong with that.

How can a 320kbps mp3 be better quality than a cd? An mp3 is compressed a cd is lossless. 192kbps is not almost cd quality. 192 is probably the best trade off for quality to size.

Helix

PeakOutput wrote:

320kpbs mp3 is far better quality than cd

i actually laughed out loud at that:D

PeakOutput

Helix wrote:

i actually laughed out loud at that:D

ye i take that bit about mp3s all back to be honest i did 2 mins more research and found loads of people refuting the original thing i read...........my bad completely........

i still stand by the fact the vast moajority of people will not know the difference between cd quality and 320 and most would be hard pushed to notice at even 192

Salthillwarrior

i still stand by the fact the vast moajority of people will not know the difference between cd quality and 320 and most would be hard pushed to notice at even 192

Completely agree. I've had this argument many times before with people and i've been threathening to do a scientific study on this and maybe get a paper out of it. A similar study was done with digital cameras where hundreds of people were asked ot compare a3 posters of 6mp and 12 mp cameras to see which one was better. The results showed that people couldnt tell the difference. THats the thing, the average person can't tell the difference.

One example, I was stuck one day at a party and I had to play a happy birthday track. I could only find a 16kbps mp3 (yes 16) and I played it. Of course I knew it was rubbish quality but do you think anyboyd said anything about it. No. because they were all just pissed and singing along to it.

Makaveli

They must have been awfully pissed, 16kbps distorts at low volume levels on ordinary speakers I can only imagine how awful it would have sounded.

Most people can't tell the difference between bit rates and it does depend on equipment but I still can't see how playing an mp3 in a club will sound good. Radio stations don't broadcast mp3s (or at least they used not) because the degradation is sound qaulity was too much.

kmick

Heres the magik of digital. You are sitting at home mixing and doing a bit of reserach on new tracks. You hear a tune you like. You download it at 192 (or whatever) and add to a mix. Now I dont care what anyone says about digital vs vinyl but this is one are where digital is superior. its all about making life easier and if you love music you just love it - who cares what format.

PeakOutput

Makaveli wrote:

They must have been awfully pissed, 16kbps distorts at low volume levels on ordinary speakers I can only imagine how awful it would have sounded.

Most people can't tell the difference between bit rates and it does depend on equipment but I still can't see how playing an mp3 in a club will sound good. Radio stations don't broadcast mp3s (or at least they used not) because the degradation is sound qaulity was too much.

the quality that you get from a radio station is **** anyway they limit the **** out of the signal before broadcasting.............i suppose there reasoning is that because they **** the signal up so much they need to have the best quality original signal to begin with so the end result is acceptable

also i bet you are hearing mp3s in clubs very very regularly without even realising it..........do you think the majority of "commercial" club djs know their bit depths from their pint glass?

Makaveli

More than likely they are playing mp3s. I don't listen to the music most of the time because it's usually crap. I have often noticed in a lot of night clubs that they increase the pitch on tracks slightly, I've never quite understood that.

I would say cds are probably more common than mp3s though.

Anyway this is all a bit off topic.

condra

Nice to see so many people around here are open minded when it comes to laptop DJ'ing.

I was expecting this thread to annoy me but it cheered me up

PS in my opinion 190kbps is fine, but I wouldnt use anything lower.

Regarding wavs, ableton live decodes mp3s to wav anyway, it has to.
Wavs are handy for use with ableton because they dont have to be decoded, which takes a few seconds.

PeakOutput

womoma wrote:

Regarding wavs, ableton live decodes mp3s to wav anyway, it has to.

they will still be mp3 quality obviously though but we have already mentioned how that hardly matters

condra

indeed

Helix

PeakOutput wrote:

they will still be mp3 quality obviously though but we have already mentioned how that hardly matters

youll CERTAINLY notice it on an mp3 converted to wav converted to mp3

PeakOutput

Helix wrote:

youll CERTAINLY notice it on an mp3 converted to wav converted to mp3

ye bit hes ctalking about a wav to mp3 to wav isnt he???? the second wav conversion should not change anything about the mp3 in terms of quality am i right?

Fnz

I remember reading one study on bit rates: most people could identify which tracks were encoded at 128kbps but everyone had difficulty in determining between 160, 192, 256 and above.

I decided a while ago to encode my stuff at 160 but just to be safe (in case I get some higher fidelity sound system in future and can tel the difference) I would now choose 192kbps.

It all depends on whether or not you're one of the few individuals with 'the golden ear'.

Incidentally, I think CD quality is something like 1440kbps.... and some individuals famously boycotted that because it didn't accurately recreate the proper sound.

Zascar

Has anyone here got a Digital & Vinyl setup where the can find a tune on Vinyl, and then download a few different bitrate versions and see if/where you can tell the difference...?

Scubadevils

I had in the past encoded both CD's and vinyl at 128 to 192 max but started recently encoding CD's at 320 - there is a noticable diffference in sound and without doubt a difference when mixed with Traktor. I plan now to encode everything again at 320 :mad:

If you encode the same track from a CD at various bitrates starting from 128 up to 320 in MP3 and then try a lossless codec such as FLAC you will notice differences as you go higher right up to lossless - do it with a good set of headphones or through a good stereo though. I have found (or maybe imagined) big differences in volume level and low/mid/high ranges + clarity.

Helix

Fnz wrote:

Incidentally, I think CD quality is something like 1440kbps.... and some individuals famously boycotted that because it didn't accurately recreate the proper sound.

thats right, mainly because its a pretty poor format

Helix

PeakOutput wrote:

ye bit hes ctalking about a wav to mp3 to wav isnt he???? the second wav conversion should not change anything about the mp3 in terms of quality am i right?

it was in reference to his mentioning ableton

say he brings in track x.mp3 to ableton to make a quick edit of it for himself. ableton converts the mp3 to a wav in the temp dump. so when you then export that set to a wav, and convert it back to an mp3, youre going to incur more loss of quality

voltamadan

Is the sound on vinyl records better than on CDs or DVDs?

tman

Zascar wrote:

Has anyone here got a Digital & Vinyl setup where the can find a tune on Vinyl, and then download a few different bitrate versions and see if/where you can tell the difference...?

Think I have a 192kbps mp3 of a tune that I bought because the vinyl pressing was so bad, and also a copy of that tune of a cd... from memory the cd sounded a little better...
i'm far too lazy to do any kind of testing:p

Zascar

voltamadan wrote:

Is the sound on vinyl records better than on CDs or DVDs?

So in time they will come out with DVD Audio and when that becomes the norm this topic will probably not be an issue. Either that or just use WAV's in your digitial setup.

Vinyl purists rarely mention the fact that vinyl can degrade, and in quiet parts of the song you can hear the needle pick up bits of dust etc, but somehow they think thats a good thing!

Prefabsprouter

GarraiGamhain wrote: »

People get obessed with beatmaching as a skill and its one that only took me a few hours to learn and a few weeks to master. Its a pain in the arse when you are playing gigs and it takes away from your performance. I'd rather be picking tracks out and getting creative instead of doing the pointless housework of keeping a track in time.

My feelings exactly! I'm not a great beatmatcher and to me its not JUST about bpm's (although it definitely is a factor) its about the music!!!

copeyhagen

I switched to digital about 5 or 6 weeks ago and i used to think of digital djing as being kind of cheating..but that was back in the day before even sasha had switched over to ableton. i learned everyhting on vinyl (for years) before i switched to digital and i think that really helps. i find digital mixing to be slightly easier than vinyl, but thats becuase you dont have to worry about the basics with regards to vinyl, like dodgy needles, a slight skip on a record while ur in the mix that you hadnt seen while cuing up.. its a lot more reliable. and with todays online fascilities its a lot easier to get tracks..and relatively cheap if ur buying

Zascar

Funny I was only thinking about this thread yesterday... was thinking of dragging it up myself...

I still stand my what I originally said, but I do also agree with some of the points that others have made. As i said I started on digital and only much later migrated backwards, but I love both in different ways for different situations.

I have the M-Audio Torq Xponent and it does the beatmatching for you, but I almost always try to do it myself. I dunno what it is exactly, but I feel like I kind of get 'more in tune' with the song and the mix if I beatmatch it myself. if I'm in a rush I'll just look at the BPM's on the screen and quickly get them in line.

I had a small party on New Years in my place and three of my friends who also mix all brought music. We had a set of CDJ's with mixer, but I also had my Xponent and Laptop. At first I was using the laptop but after a while I just got a few mp3 cd's and played on them for the rest of the night, didn't touch the Xponent. Mainly it was cause we were just playing about 3-5 tunes each and rotating, but it was also cause I had not mixes on CDJ's in a few months and they are lots of fun, and I think you kind of feel 'more involved' in the mixing.

I think the best setup would be CDJ's and a mixer, along with a DVS Setup like the M-Audio Connectiv or SSL etc. Best of both worlds, but a pain in the ass to lug around and set up if you do DJ around the place a lot.

A mate of mine who lives in London says that the DJ's in almost all the clubs over there now have some sort of DVS. Perfect if it's already installed as all you need to bring is your laptop!

staby

Hi all,

I am somewhat new to this board and came across this post.

I am 35 and DJing a while, Vinyl, Cd and now Digital collector, and it gets worse with the years.

I have being DJing with Traktor for a couple off years and it is such a joy to have all my music at my disposal and have all my originals stored in a safe place away from the messiness off DJ booths, Parties, etc which where they do be taken.

I have seen the comments off bitrates, etc, which are always a muddled topic.

For me, I always rip vinyl to wav, I then use EAC (Exact Audio Copy).

If I were to use compression, I would use the latest Lame decoder which delivers great sound compared to a couple off years ago.

Though with Disk Storage being so cheap, I always use WAV files, as I often run through a 5 K rig and with decks in the set up, using less superior decoded files a very much noticeable.

A lot off CD's these days are mastered with the so called Loudness War http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3Gmex_4hreQ on them, which is something to be aware off, large record companies adopting the stance off radio stations in turning up the dynamics off the music in which we the consumer should have the choice in.

Records too, have their faults in the recording process, as with some which were rerecorded in the 80's lacked bass to compensate for more space on the record.

All, in all, I would recommend in decoding your music at the highest bit rate available as to allow for the fullest Dynamic range available and for the love off music.

And yeah, I DJ using a lappy, being doing PC music now 10 years, ahh.

Have received my fair share off criticisms, though this is changing now, thank F*ck.

I suppose what can sum up the change is if anyone seen the DJmag 100, I know, though all the DJ's in it were asked what one piece off equipment could they not live with, over 90 off em said Ableton, MacBook.

Even Carl Cox, who only a couple off years ago was slating the ever pioneering Sasha for how out off touch he was for using ableton to his floor.

funny How things Change, heh.

francois

Zascar wrote: »

Vinyl purists rarely mention the fact that vinyl can degrade, and in quiet parts of the song you can hear the needle pick up bits of dust etc, but somehow they think thats a good thing!

Also there is something nice in having a large floor to ceiling shelves with records-I collect vinyl, not just dance but punk and 60's rarities, one advantage is if you are a serious collector is that there is an intrinsic value to vinyl-certain records will keep increasing in value, though that gets boot-leggers onto the scene (so you need to know the nerdy stuff, like matrix numbers and all that) Ebay is full of rip-off vinyl sellers passing off stuff which is faked.
I also like the pic-sleeves, and oddities like coloured viyl and pic discs
Vinyl can degrade, but if you look after it it will last almost indefinitely-a good and expensive needle is a must though!