USA mixers suck - we need a "standard" tool

DJ Gear & Hardware Hardware: Controllers, Mods and Gear
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USA mixers suck - we need a “standard” tool

Part question, part rant

Im a sound engineer, dj and musician…love music anyway I can get it. Im 39 and been DJing since 93ish… I understand the old school and the new school, I thought…

Why do extra functions/routing on a DJ mixer have to come at a loss of sound quality? Why has sound quality gotten worse on DJ gear? Why aren’t Djs demanding better quality equipment? Why do “house” mixers and “hip hop” mixers have to be so different?

…ok, I don’t want the sound engineering explanation… "well, its all about schematics and electricity… no, no, no,…I blame us as DJs. We can’t decide on a format (digital vs vinyl) and we definitely can’t decide on a mixer to do that. Its our fault for not demanding better equipment for our needs - we not telling the manufactures what we want…

the top three mixer companies in the usa keep giving us a new device every year. how could we create a standard with the industry changing what we use every 6 months. then we give into the marketing and buy it… if the mixer is that good (as good as they advertise) then we should be using it for at least 2/3 years.

why are only the 1% of djs and clubs using HIGH QUALITY rotary knob mixers… why aren’t the new digital mixers using the technology the of the old standards like bozak, urei, s and m, ars, etc… dj have leaned toward the digital format, making traveling with your music much easier, but we are way past mp3 days - 24 bit should be the norm for digital, we have the hard drive space… but still we got djs ripping youtube and playing it out - WTF

at this point digital and vinyl will live together, but damn, can we get digital to sound better - can you digital djs stop ripping low quality material please???

in the past when the big divide was vinyl vs cdc, we worked it out - clubs now stock both as standards… but can you digital guys decide on a universal controller ??? or at least can we get it down to just a couple…? and rip the sound quality better…i pity the fool

now lets be real here, the mixers we use in the usa are crap. pioneer sounds thin, transparent, brittle… since rane went serato, there preamps went to hell… allen and heath does a good job with sound, considering they use faders and not pots, there effects on the db4 are awesome sounding… but us usa djs keep telling clubs to buy pioneer - can’t we just admit that these pioneers sound like crap and move on…

so you want great sound quality, go buy a rotary for 5 grand (house mixer) (worth every penny)… but if you cut, scratch, juggle - forget it… you sound great, but no new transformer pattern for the kids to hear tonight… now i know if you use linear faders instead of pots, you lose sound quality - but allen heath still does a decent job. every hip hop mixer has the awesome optical fades, but they don’t sound that good…

when we starting over routing mixers boards (functions), then added effects, then added digital age…WE GET SHITTY USA MIXERS… its a shame…

can somebody make a pioneer, vestax, rane that sounds like a bozak?
can somebody make a bozak that has a crossfader?
can somebody make a mixer that sounds good w digital and analog (allen heath DB4 but still no one buys em in the usa)

CAN WE DECIDE ON A MIXER IN THE USA AS ONE GROUP OF DJS???

the being said, I’m taking recommendations on buying a mixer, top of line budget, for mixing house and hip hop style

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Why not use ‘American Audio’!?

:wink:

Sent from my SM-G900F using Tapatalk

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X1700 or Rane Empath

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Not sure why you call them Shitty USA Mixers when most of the brands you mention aren’t even based or built in the US (Rane got bought so scratch it out too). The most common brands are totally capable of building a top notch mixer but when people aren’t willing to pay the price tag attached to it it’s basically what leaves us standing where we are now. Rotaries are tied to audiophile circles and prices get inflated as a result.

From my experience and people around me the DB2 and DB4 were awesome on paper but they were riddled with firmware issues on the earlier days and it’s why most people stay away now.

Btw, have you tried the new DJM-900NXS2? It’s quite an upgrade in sound quality comparing it with the old model (which along the Xone:92 are the current industry standards)

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The reason sound quality has gotten worse on modern DJ mixers is largely because price points have gotten lower. So even “high end” companies now need to make sure their build cost is low enough that everyone makes their margin - AND the product is priced low enough that consumers will buy their products. Companies that don’t follow that model end up in either the niche market (like E&S), or their DJ division is subsidized by other more profitable divisions (like A&H, RCF, or pre-spinoff Pioneer). And if they don’t have either of those 2 things going for them, then they end up like Rane (who was recently purchased by InMusic).

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Picked a db4 up(brand new state) for 1100 euro’s…seriously take a look at this baby, drivers are good now for both mac and windows…

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Ehh what

Rane MP2014 + Tube Amp = WTF Uber tightness & Other World of dynamic range :slight_smile:

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As mentioned above the 900NXS2 is a nice bump in quality, and I’m loving some of the tweaks Pioneer has made from the previous model (high, mid, low FX application, etc.). Good stuff!

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Really it is a good bump and I want to order this one. Think that the company provides the best service ever!

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Necrobump. Jesus. Had Fatman Skank even posted since this thread?

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He posted later that day about how the DJR-400 sounded good and the A&H mixers were better than average for non-rotaries…

I apparently missed the origianl thread…which is good. I probably would have gotten in trouble…because I’m a weirdo who uses a rotary because he likes working that way but sees zero problems with the DJMs in terms of quality.

That being said, I’ve never heard any DJ mixer in a context where I can really decide on subtle sound quality issues. I also believe the vast majority of people haven’t either…

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I think a lot of people confuse warmth and clarity. The natural distortion created by analog circuitry can make something sound a little more natural (repetitive sounds are slightly different, sometimes barely noticable) which creates a sound that they are more accustomed to hearing as opposed to clarity which is a pure reproduction of sound. In the case of electronic.

The slight difference is really a matter of personal preference and doesn’t really mean one sounds better than the other.

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Either way, not something you are gonna notice unless you are in a studio atmosphere. And either is something the average (90%+ of) listener would notice.

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This is why I roll my eyes when people yack on about demanding lossless music over 320kbps MP3s. You’re literally never going to be in a situation where:
a) you can hear a difference;
and;
b) anyone gives a shit.

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Best thing to do with someone like that:

Before you go on, tell em how you only buy lossless because it’s so uber awesome. After your set, approach em and be like, did ya hear how clear it was?

Then break their heart when you tell them they were all wav’s and mp3’s.

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Disagree.

The differences between high end mixers…other than voicing differences…they’re pretty subtle. Especially with modern digital stuff.

And the words people use to describe them (warm, punchy, wooly, etc.) don’t really have precise definitions. If you have a preference, it’s okay to say you just prefer something without a pseudo-objective reason why. If, otoh, you want something “warmer”, turn the bass up half a dB.

MP3 compression artifacts, OTOH, aren’t that subtle. They’re clear as day on $15 earbuds and normal computer speakers…IF AND ONLY IF you actually know what they are.

That being said, the vast majority of people I’ve heard complaining about it don’t know what they’re talking about. It has almost nothing to do with bass, volume, the quality of the sound system, etc.. I hear it most easily in hi-hats, some snares, and reverb tails. There is also a change in stereo imaging, but moving a nearfield speaker 6" can make a bigger difference than that. Turning it definitely does.

It doesn’t bother me, but I do hear it. And so does anyone else who’s learned what it is. It doesn’t take golden ears or even particularly good ears.

Ozone and a few other all in one mastering apps/plugins can show you a preview of exactly what is missing, and there are free trials if you want to experience it yourself.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

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You’re telling me that you think people playing tunes in a club/bedroom/hall/podcast will be able to tell the difference between 320 MP3s and FLAC? There’s no DJ scenario where I imagine this is true. Sure, if you’re sat naked in the centre of an acoustically treated room with an ideally set up sound system, they might. But that’s not what people claim. They claim you absolutely have to have WAV/FLAC or your music will sound shit to the whole world.

I say stop wasting your time seeking out lossless when the only person who will ever know that’s what you’re playing is you. Does TIDAL even host DJ mixes?

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Nope. I can’t hear them in clubs because the sound is pretty universally too bad and too loud. Even if that weren’t the case, the earplugs I wear mask it. If David Mancuso were still doing his loft parties, you could easily hear it there. And there are a few audiophile/hi-fi clubs sprouting up (Sonos Studio, Brilliant Corners, etc.), and you absolutely could hear it there. But, it doesn’t require Klipschorns or B&W…it just requires the sound to be quiet enough that you don’t need earplugs to avoid damage.

There’s also zero effort involved in getting lossless files. Everywhere I shop, you can just select to get a wav or aiff instead of mp3. Set it as the default and it literally takes zero extra investment, apart from a few cents per song, which is still an order of magnatude cheaper than vinyl. And, if it’s down to “I need this unreleased song I found on soundcloud” and “I need lossless”, the song obviously wins.

It’s also not “good” vs. “shit”, it’s “good” vs. “specific problems”. Anyone who claims it’s total shit is lying. And, like I said, it doesn’t bother me to listen to or stream compressed audio. But I’ve blind ABX’d them significantly better than random far too many times to give any weight to anyone who says there’s no difference, including on $15 earbuds, though apple earbuds specifically are too crap.

The way this came up, ITT, was that someone else mentioned it compared to the difference between high end mixers. If you’re listening on DJ cans or KRKs in a normal bedroom DJ context, I seriously doubt anyone could hear the difference between a NXS2 and an ARS-4100. What they’re hearing is almost always going to be because they don’t know how to level-match them or don’t understand how to do an ABX test in the first place. And both of those will impact the results more than the choice of DJ mixer.

As for streaming and distributing mixes…yes, I give out mp3s just like everyone else. But that means that songs that started as mp3s were compressed, altered, recorded, and then compressed again, and then possibly transcoded, and then altered again since every streaming service at least does loudness matching these days. It makes it even more apparent.

My argument is not what you think it is. It’s simple…there is clearly a difference (as long as there’s sonic information in the song that would be affected), lossless/uncompressed is inarguably not worse, and there is absolutely no benefit to mp3 unless drive space or bandwidth are at a particularly high premium for you.

And, while some studies have shown that young people are more used to bad sound (earbuds, overdriven phone speakers, etc.), when presented with a blind, level-matched comparison…they pretty much universally prefer good sound (even to fairly subtle degrees) even if they can’t tell you exactly why.

Music is literally magic. It’s about transferring the emotions you have in your head to other people through a physical act. And the quality you present is a very small but not insignificant part of that. Better music wins over better quality music, always. But in this day & age, there’s no reason you can’t have both.

In the end, you do you. But if you’re offering things for streaming, you don’t sound as good as you could…just to save a few dollars a month.

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I don’t think the problem is finding or seeking out lossless. They’re available these days for most things. I think the issue is that many of us have already invested heavily in thousands of mp3s that have already been purchased, tagged, analyzed, organized, and put into playlists and we don’t see it being worth the money, time, and energy necessary to upgrade from an already excellent format to a flawless one. And depending on your DJ software, FLAC and ALAC can still be a pain to work with. And it’s hard to manage a collection that has a mixture of formats. (iTunes will ignore FLAC files for example. Tagging is an issue on some. I don’t think Traktor will read ALAC).

Yes a trained ear can hear the difference if they’re looking for specific artifacts, but if that’s what you’re doing at a dance club, rethink your priorities. And I’ve occasionally been able to pick it out in an ABX too but it generally requires repeated listening to a snippet under quiet circumstances (at least until a really obvious artifact shows up, which is rare). It’s not just clubs or DJing - I stream lossy formats regularly at home with decent equipment and at small house parties all the time and I can probably count on one hand the times I’ve actually noticed any such artifacts.

These days I buy most of my digital tunes via bandcamp, which offers several formats including lossless ones; I usually download the FLAC, and I record my vinyl into ALAC, but my large iTunes library is nearly all mp3 and so far I haven’t felt the need to spend the energy replacing, retagging, and reorganizing all the 320kbps mp3s in my DJ folders. I suppose if I ever got a gig at one of those audiophile clubs it would be worth the effort, but the truth is I would rather play vinyl in those environments anyway.

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And that makes sense. I haven’t gone back and upgraded all of my mp3s. Like I said, it doesn’t bother me. That being said, if you actually know what to listen for, it’s pretty quick.

The only times it bothers me is when I hear a hi-hat line turn into a cloud of birds, which is mostly in the car over streaming. And it doesn’t bother me often.

I just don’t know why people would buy mp3 these days.

Also, everything works with aiff. Which also holds metadata (unlike wav). As far as I’m concerned, it’s the perfect format.

As for vinyl in those places…I won’t argue that vinyl sounds bad. But it is also technically inferior, it just covers up its flaws with a hiss that people like for some reason.