Question about the CDJ-2000 Nexus

[Daniboy]

Tell Oakenfold to suck it. Use Traktor.

Hahahaha I didn't understand this too, why don't you plug your stuff on the cdjs and play with traktor?

PS: Forget loops if you are not using rekordbox. CDJ Auto loop without Rekorboxed tracks will drift like hell.

I wouldn't rely on rekordbox grids. There is a software called RekordBuddy which will import the grids from traktor to rekordbox, then you can rely on it.

[Eugguy]

Congrats on opening for oakenfold, however, i question how you have made it that far without playing on a pair of cdjs? to be honest, you should buy a pair of these as cdjs are pretty much (have pretty much been) the standard for 15 years or so. it would suck to use cdjs for the first time on a big stage and flop because you were too cheap to try/buy a set.

[Lex77]

Hey DJTT,

I'm opening for Paul Oakenfold this weekend and I'm going to have to play on 2 CDJ-2000 Nexuses. This isn't the setup that I normally use and I haven't played on CDJs in a few years, so I'm a bit out of the loop (pardon the pun). I want to play on a USB stick. If I want to use the link and sync functions, do I have to use rekordbox? I do a lot of sampling and use the loop function often, so sync sometimes comes in handy.

Thanks in advance,
Paul

So how did the weekend go?

[biutze]

So how did the weekend go?

Hey, Lex!

The show went really well! I played on my friend's setup, an X1 MK2, for the first hour and a half and then switched to the CDJs for the remaining 45 minutes (Paul went on at around 12:15). As I haven't played on them in years, my performance was a bit shaky, but everyone else assured me it sounded great, even though I think they were just being kind. For future shows, I'm going to have to use CDJs. So, I'm probably going to invest in one just to practice my beat matching and then buy another later on. I met Paul and he was really nice, contrary to what I've heard. He gave me a CD with an exclusive track, which I worked in my latest mix:



During the last hour, I played tracks 2, 3, 7, 8, 10, and 11 (you can find the tracklisting by following the SoundCloud link). Track 12 is the one that he gave me. Here are some photos from the night:
10370656_10200929957370110_713834682_n.jpg10419771_10200929954370035_1473872923_n.jpg10419808_10200929954730044_1470123765_n.jpg10425623_10200929943489763_359705598_n.jpg10417487_767242039975783_2948272614574410513_n.jpg

In the picture with Paul, I'm the one on the left. My friend Kosta X, who I played the set with, is on the right!

[Jane]

Nice one biutze and glad it went good (looks like was a great venue and event!)

[Daniboy]

For future shows, I'm going to have to use CDJs.

Just being curious, why is that?

PS: Congratulations for the gig bro!

[dsquareddan]

In all honesty consider yourself lucky not only that you are opening for a legend but that you also dont have to bother with such an utter piece of crap named Rekordbox. It has been nothing but a headache and obstacle for me in the past. Beat matching on CDJs is smooth and easy and I would highly recommend you simply go that route...avoid Rekordbox altogether and burn CDs dude. You may feel that you are cutting your set, embellished with samples and such, a bit short but in the end heed this:
Rekordbox is completely unreliable and you run the risk of showing up for your show with no tunes to play. Also, the above advice to simply have an external drive with nested folders is golden.

OK, let me re-iterate just to make it clear. Do not rely on Rekordbox to grid your tracks before a big event just for the convenience. You run the risk of having your database corrupted (has happened to me twice) and will ultimately end up using the pitch and jog anyway on loops because some sort of error the 2000s tend to make when looping gridded tracks.

In any case if you have any other questions or comments on using the 2000s i'll keep an eye on this thread.

Cheers!

disagree completely. have been using Rekordbox since it came out. Never once have had a single problem. I make sure to properly format my USB stick [fat32] (I've moved to SD cards more recently so other DJ's don't accidentally pull them out, it's happened). The only time you will ever get errors with files and rekordbox is if you physically go onto the drive and move things around and add or delete files. if you ONLY use that USB stick for Rekordbox, and only run it through rekordbox, you will never have a problem, I can promise you that. I've been using it nearly every weekend for 5 years now. And I go in and adjust the beatgrids of all my songs manually so they are perfect, set cue & loop points and tag all my tracks to be incredibly organized. It makes a difference.

On the flip side, I've seen more DJ's show up with USB's that don't have rekordbox and they've had all sorts of errors, not to mention the track waveform does not load instantly, the bpm isn't 100% accurate because it is analyzing the bpm on the fly, instead of before in rekordbox. you can't save cue points, loops, or hot cues. you don't have playlists and tagged items. and you can't re-import the playlist of the songs you played after to recall your setlist you played the night before.

CD's are unreliable as well, they skip, cost money, are a waste of resources as all that plastic just ends up in a garbage dump one day or another, and take a long time to burn and organize.

my only gripe with rekordbox is the export time it takes to move large amounts of lossless files from my computer to the USB sticks. but it still is not as long as it takes to burn the same amount of lossless files to a CD

[Daniboy]

The only time you will ever get errors with files and rekordbox is if you physically go onto the drive and move things around and add or delete files. if you ONLY use that USB stick for Rekordbox, and only run it through rekordbox, you will never have a problem, I can promise you that.

Sorry bro, but thats not true for some of us. I've been playing with CDJs for a long time and Rekorbox never worked for me. I've spent years on the Pioneer Forums trying to learn all the possible things I could do to make it work flawless [Expensive 32Gb(!) USB-Sticks, formatting them twice with SwissKnife Premium (bought the premium (!!)), even thought about buying a macbook (!!!) etc.]. Thnigs don't work. Tracks drift on loops. Hot Cues & Memory Points dissapear. Software crashed when opened and the only solution is to re-install it.

It may work flawlessly for some people, but it IS a nightmare for others.

There are millions of possibilities when using Rekordbox, the OS, the version of the OS, the Computer, the version of the software, the USB-Stick, the size of the USB-Stick, maybe its an External Hard Drive or even a SD Card, the format of the tracks, the kind of CDJs, the firmware of the CDJs.

IMO its impossible to make something flawless when you have that much variables on the process.

Sorry again, but that is the truth for some of us.

[DISaS73R]

CD's are unreliable as well, they skip, cost money

I've never had (or seen) a CD skip, they are actually quite reliable. Also, 50 CDs cost less than £10 and 50 CDs is a lot.

[SlvrDragon50]

I've never had any problem with Rekordbox either.

The only time I've had problems is when I pull my USB and the data gets corrupted, but it's a simple reupload of data from Rekordbox to the USB.

That said, I prep my tracks in Traktor since I'm too lazy to try and do circle of 5ths without Camelot key.