Serato DJ migrate to Traktor

[lesmaisondeux]

OS X yosemite
Serato DJ 1.7
Traktor (whatever the latest copy shipped with an A10 and vinyl this week OCT 5th 2015)



so after 8+ years I am changing over to traktor from Serato.... main reasons are remix decks, now stems but specially MIDI clock sync is the motivator for the move... I like to use maschine to add percussion to the tracks I play and sometimes i have the same percussion running over the course of 2 or 3 songs bringing it in and out and tying them all together... (I play deep and tech house)- Serato DJ still has not implemented MIDI clock in or out and they removed 'bridge' support to ableton.... so getting maschine to be in beat and stay on beat manually is a bitch, same with drum machines- you have to keep nudging them

I do use serato with vinyl and I do not use the tempo sync at all- I beatmatch by ear; I respect the art form of DJ'ing as I learned with vinyl and that is my weapon of choice... and I cannot imagine using anything else on my main decks 1 and 2... additional decks can be anything else- I have used traktor in the past on b2b or impromptu sessions- I know it I get around within it and I'm fine with it.... it will be a good tool to expand my sound to the next level


my question is this:


I use strictly FLAC files and WAV (storage size is not a factor) I have my files organized by key and inside serato I have smart crates that include all the keys that are compatible within that key range, for example F minor criteria is:

F Minor / 4A            

3A    (minus 1    down 5th)
3B    (minus 1 major)
4A    
4B    (to major    Rltv. Min to Rltv. Maj)     
5A    (plus 1    up 5th)
5B    (plus1 major    Dominant Rltv. Maj / Min)
6A    (plus 2    Whole step modulation)
7A    (plus 3    Minor to Major)

and in serato I have only 24 smart crates with the results of the matching criteria for each key- (you with me so far?)


I get that traktor does not do smart crates so i think that (recurza/traktor-autoplaylist) will address that, anyone used it before?


I use keyfinder (open source and FREE) for finding keys and works awesome... I use KID3 (open source and FREE) for tagging which writes ID3 to WAV files and to FLAC as well


now because I use FLAC files I do not use iTunes... so how do I get my library into traktor so I don't have to redo cue points and loop points all over again... it's small only 2800 tracks or so but it's still a ton of time... i use yosemite so the SSL database import tool will not run-

so I am for sure moving to traktor no question about it the 1.8 release announcement was the deciding factor... I mean C'mon with colored keys and detection on a major release, people have been asking for MIDI clock sync for years even if it's just send master clock out?

now it's a matter of getting my music over in a relatively similar state to traktor...


what has been your recent (2014/2015) experience with this type of move... everything I found on the topic is very old some go back to 2008- and are just irrelevant to our set ups today... rekordbuddy V2 is not available... right? so what else is out there????



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'lost in translation+cruel intention' mixes on mixcloud.com/lesmaisondeux

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[Scalage]

I hate to burst your bubble but MIDI sync in Traktor is shite, absolute crap. You might as well not have it. It takes up a ton of cpu and you have to keep syncing it every so often as it will simply wave off into the distance.
I've tried it with Maschine and just gave up on it and used tap and nudge instead.

[lesmaisondeux]

strange; what OS and versions where you running...? the times I've used traktor we had MIDI clock- to maschine and ableton and we had no dropouts or resyncs I've been to sets where people where performers were doing MIDI over ethernet with traktor/maschine/drum machines/synths/LEMUR between two macbooks and they seemed to just floor it and not look back-

I get my A10 on friday; I'll load the shit out of my DJ laptop (Macbook air 1.4Ghz I5 with 8GB RAM) and I'll report if it drops out or not... do keep in mind that I don't have anything on this laptop but DJ software... I don't even go on internet with it and I have my tracks on an external SSD drive via lightning connector/USB3

[Patch]

That Traktor-autoplaylist looks very interesting.

I wonder if it can be made to update the an iTunes library with Traktor's playcount info???