Is most club equipment broken or wonky?

[Bassline Brine]

So, I'm still fairly new to playing out. But recently as I've gotten a few more great club/rave gigs, using the installed gear... I've run into a problem that's making me somewhat rethink using the 1200's. Usually when the promoters are providing the equipment... there are no issues. Most likely because it's their own gear. But.

At the two clubs I've played at that have had 1200's installed, both times the tables have been wicked uncalibrated. Which... isn't a huge thing and can be overcome, but is a pain to just jump up and get used to? It was by and far something I had trouble with going back to back with a friend, but someone I've never mixed before with last night. I want to be able to focus on mixing, and not have to think about the pitch as it is something that just moves naturally when it's calibrated correctly.

Do I just suck it up? Deal with the cards in using 1200's? Is this something that's just to be expected everywhere? Should I just take a screwdriver and fuck up my 1200's to get used to this? (lol not really, but seriously...)

I've also recently heard horror stories, albeit not always as bad, of CDJ's in clubs. I haven't really used them yet (as I stick with 1200's w/ Serato)... but man.

Is most club equipment broken or wonky? Is this something I'm just going to need to get used to?

Part of it is my use of Serato I guess, where I still do actually manually beatmatch. I've thought of switching to Traktor for various situations to get around this to honestly use Sync or some such to overcome this. Or it's just a matter of getting ready for this.

I love spinning. But using equipment that is wonked out, bothers the crap out of me >.<

[firebr4nd]

The upkeep of club equipment is not something that's in your control at all, and unfortunately it must be overcome. :/ You could try talking to the owners about it though. If you regularly play at a place with an uncalibrated set of tables you could learn how to do the fix yourself (fairly easy as long as you have a multimeter), and offer to do it for them. Can't hurt to ask, right?

[MaxOne]

This is exactly why I stopped using serato. Now I use traktor, x1 with the mixer. Even if the crossfader is mash the levels are normally fine and I don't have to stress. DVS nearly ruined too many parties for me

[padi_04]

This was the main reason I got into the whole controller world.

[keithace]

(looking for upvote...forgot this wasnt reddit)

[Bassline Brine]

Yeah. I love Serato.

But this is really making me rethink my choice, and I might honestly go to Traktor about it. Because then at least, I could at least add in controllers with relative ease and practice with that.

Going to be giving it more of a go with Serato, but it also seems like a lot of the working DJ's here are making the transition from Serato over to Traktor, or have, and yeah... it's making a lot more sense to me now.

[padi_04]

Why not moving to Itch/Serato DJ? Might be worth hanging on to that if you are into the it's workflow and general experience, unless you are using it just for it's DVS capabilities.

ps: the traktor fanboy in me died a little after writing this post

[Shishdisma]

If you have reasonably solid tables and play at the club with relative frequency, try to get in a bit deeper with the clubs promoters and event staff. Being able to bring in not broken equipment for the lineup for a club with pretty busted install decks is a huge bargaining chip with promoters and managers, especially if they're your friends.

[DJZILCH]

the club i regularly play at has 2xcdj900's and the djm900 nexus

the djm900 is really beaten up and the 3rd channel is dead, dead as in no matter how loud the gain you pump into it, it just comes out really really low and distorted, and in the past i have played in many venues with missing fader knobs (lol) , xfader leaking, channel leaking etc, so it depends on the club really the really nice flashy clubs tend to service their gear regularly, some clubs dont

[Shishdisma]

the djm900 is really beaten up and the 3rd channel is dead, dead as in no matter how loud the gain you pump into it, it just comes out really really low and distorted,

Tell the SM to stop using the analogue inputs like a scrub. Unless there's something wrong with the actual input bus (at the DSP level), or the S/PDIF terminal, the analogue trim is probably fried, but the digital in should be fine.