Internal vs External mixing

[MrPopinjay]

Neat idea. Wonder if I could sneak a 4th channel out of my ecler nuo that way.

[tito]

vinyl may be it is not dead and i have a huge collection of them and in places were is strictly vinyl i use it.
But to be honest, you do not get more quality and the vinyl gets wear with time so at least for me the switch to files is very convinient. I preffer to carry the laptop instead of the milkcrates and use vinyls to enjoy at home.
DVS systems are pretty good and you can do a lot of more different stuff than the vinyl.
If you master vinyls, dvs systems push you to another level not otherwise.

[Sn0wday]

Wow.. I almost got an S2 and then I came across this thread hahha, it seems the general consensus is that anything that doesn't use a true mixer fucking sucks. Like three pages of posts saying how an external mixer is crucial and in any scenario a set up with an external mixer/x1's/cdj/stables > controller/x1's.

Or am I getting all this wrong?




Are you serious? I'm still new at all this, but it isn't it kind of common sense that the red would mean "bad"? I learned that like, the very first day i decided to torrent virtual dj hahaha...

Bump, you guys seem incredibly knowledgeable and i'm really torn about what to get next.

[keeb]

There's nothing wrong with internal mixing to start out. There is a sound quality advantage with external mixing, but it's not so drastic that you shouldn't even consider a midi controller with internal mixing. Given the choice I chose to mix externally because I prefer it, but I mixed internally for 2 years and I don't regret it. Just buy smart with your midi controllers; don't buy a controller for $1-300 that you won't be able to sell for any money later. Get a VCI-100, S2/S4, etc. that will hold its value and you can learn on that without losing much money in the long-run when you sell it off. You may even find that you're perfectly happy with one of those controllers, or that you don't even like DJing as much as you thought.

Every DJ should try mixing externally at some point if for no other reason than to be able to appreciate the sound quality difference. That said, not every DJ needs to mix externally. It's a personal preference thing.

[Kaek]

You can mix externally quite cheaply.

Xone 22 + Traktor Audio 6 + Kontrol X1, two deck setup right there.

It is hell of a lot more portable as well as you only lug your X1 and TA6 around...

Decided to edit post listing some benefits of the above setup....

1) Modular, add the bits you need, I plan to add a Kontrol F1 when they are released to control the sample decks.

2) Some people say that the Xones have an incredible nice sound to them, I find it warmer than the pio's and nicer sounding than if played straight out of the TA6. This is subjective!

3) Xone 22 while bare on the fun features (fx etc) has all the other super handy bits which get taken for granted sometimes. Booth out, XLR master out, separate record out, FX send and return, innofader compatibility, dual headphone outs, XLR mic in etc.

4) Tight traktor integration. Kontrol X1 is superb, is easily mappable, NHL protocol.

5) DVS support

6) Xone filter!

[MrPopinjay]

You can go a lot cheaper than that- if all you want is 2 deck external mixing the Audio 6 is a VERY expensive soundcard. You're paying a premium as it's an NI scratch card.

[MaxOne]

Bump, you guys seem incredibly knowledgeable and i'm really torn about what to get next.

I'd still just get an S2 if I were you.

External has it's merits but an S2 deal at mo is hard to beat. I got an S2 and love it, and i have technics and mixer and all that too.

[mostapha]

Every DJ should try mixing externally at some point if for no other reason than to be able to appreciate the sound quality difference.

I think that's exactly backwards.

I can reliably ABX 320kbit mp3s and WAVs, and in the tests I've done (only done one), I can ABX 24/44.1 wav files that were summed on Pro Tools vs a Neve 88RS with everything else being identical (all board processing bypassed…all levels nominal). And I've used some nice analog DJ (A&H, Vestax, Rodec, Urei) and live sound (A&H, Soundcraft) mixers and heard good recording mixers (SSL4000g+, other SSLs).

All-digital, in-the-box mixers sound better if you know how to run them. The difference is only that they're usually less pleasing (in a tactile/aesthetic sense) and less convenient because–for some ungodly reason–people are obsessed with keeping things cheap and compact, because there's more money to be made selling 8-billion of the same controller to every bedroom wannabe than there is selling a handfull of awesome all-digital mixers to people who care and having to compete with Pioneer's marketing department.

[BentoSan]

Every DJ should try mixing externally at some point if for no other reason than to be able to appreciate the sound quality difference. That said, not every DJ needs to mix externally. It's a personal preference thing.

Digital has perfect sound quality, external degrade that sound quality - if you find that sound degradation pleasing that is an entirely a different argument but you cant say it has better sound quality, because it doesn't.

[deevey]

Every DJ should try mixing externally at some point if for no other reason than to be able to appreciate the sound quality difference.

So long as your EQ is Flat in Traktor, all you are essentially doing with an external mixer is Coloring the sound to that particular mixer's personality.... how is that going to be better sound quality

Any decent club will have an engineer on hand who is going to put the rig though a heap of other FX processors, gates, limiters anyhow.

Ask pretty much ANY engineer what they prefer, a clean digital signal to process or one thats been passed though an analogue DJ mixer.