I have to buy a complete digital dj set up with laptop, software, etc
Frank
2,373 Posts
I know, it's really ironic to have me ask this question...
Here's the situation:
Ken, my main man in Ghana was a friend of a friend who got recommended to me to help me out with plugging some "records wanted" adverts, buying a SIM card and other chores to prepare for one of my trips to Ghana a couple of years ago. He didn't have any interest in any of this old music at the time but was heavily into all the current Ghanaian club bangers. He ended up joining me on a good part of my digging trips all over Ghana ever since and really, really got into the music. He started collecting records himself and kept tracking down stuff for me while I was gone. He also helped me find various artists and sign re-issue deals. He became friendly with a lot of the people he met while doing all of this . Recently he had more and more of the oldtimers ask him if he could play dj gigs for them so they could get together and dance to their old tunes. Ken also believes that there would be a strong chance to get a young crowd for some small scale club gigs since he feels that like himself, a lot of people are getting really tired of all the autotuned desktop generated hip-life and modern R&B that gets played everywhere.
Now it is out of the question to do this with vinyl since no club in Accra has turntables and I'm pretty sure that most don't even have a usable mixer and buying and shipping a complete analog dj set up to Ghana would be cost prohibitive... so I guess we have to go digital here. Which would also be great because I could with time send him my entire collection as digital files.
Needless to say that I have no clue as to what to get.
My idea was a PC laptop which would have to be a sturdy one that can handle a bit of dust and a few bumps. Maybe a Thinkpad? I heard they are super sturdy but have bad battery life and are a bit slow?
What software woud be best?
Woul I also have to buy some sort of a control unit?
I don't think that he will want to do any fancy mixing or anything but I also don't want him to feel stupid by only fingering around on the touchpad... I remember once seeing a dj use some sort of a control unit that looked like one of those CD-dj units with elevated round plastic thingies that could be turned around to cue up tracks... appearance is sort of important. Ghanaians love electronic gadgets and a nice looking set up would probably go a long way in getting some acceptance from the younger crowd.
I thought about also getting a video projector. Is there a solution that you assign jpgs to tracks that then get fed into a video outlet on the laptop? The idea would be to show people the record cover to the song that he's playing.
I hope I'm not asking too many questions all at once....
Thanx!
Frank
Here's the situation:
Ken, my main man in Ghana was a friend of a friend who got recommended to me to help me out with plugging some "records wanted" adverts, buying a SIM card and other chores to prepare for one of my trips to Ghana a couple of years ago. He didn't have any interest in any of this old music at the time but was heavily into all the current Ghanaian club bangers. He ended up joining me on a good part of my digging trips all over Ghana ever since and really, really got into the music. He started collecting records himself and kept tracking down stuff for me while I was gone. He also helped me find various artists and sign re-issue deals. He became friendly with a lot of the people he met while doing all of this . Recently he had more and more of the oldtimers ask him if he could play dj gigs for them so they could get together and dance to their old tunes. Ken also believes that there would be a strong chance to get a young crowd for some small scale club gigs since he feels that like himself, a lot of people are getting really tired of all the autotuned desktop generated hip-life and modern R&B that gets played everywhere.
Now it is out of the question to do this with vinyl since no club in Accra has turntables and I'm pretty sure that most don't even have a usable mixer and buying and shipping a complete analog dj set up to Ghana would be cost prohibitive... so I guess we have to go digital here. Which would also be great because I could with time send him my entire collection as digital files.
Needless to say that I have no clue as to what to get.
My idea was a PC laptop which would have to be a sturdy one that can handle a bit of dust and a few bumps. Maybe a Thinkpad? I heard they are super sturdy but have bad battery life and are a bit slow?
What software woud be best?
Woul I also have to buy some sort of a control unit?
I don't think that he will want to do any fancy mixing or anything but I also don't want him to feel stupid by only fingering around on the touchpad... I remember once seeing a dj use some sort of a control unit that looked like one of those CD-dj units with elevated round plastic thingies that could be turned around to cue up tracks... appearance is sort of important. Ghanaians love electronic gadgets and a nice looking set up would probably go a long way in getting some acceptance from the younger crowd.
I thought about also getting a video projector. Is there a solution that you assign jpgs to tracks that then get fed into a video outlet on the laptop? The idea would be to show people the record cover to the song that he's playing.
I hope I'm not asking too many questions all at once....
Thanx!
Frank
Comments
http://www.tanith.org/?p=1973
You can embed any jpg as artwork into an mp3, which any proper player on a PC (like MediaMonkey) will show if it's present in the mp3. MediaMonkey will embed the jpg for you if you ask it to. As far as hooking it up to a projector so only the currently playing mp3 artwork is shown, I don't know of anything that does that but you can make MonkeyFlow (like the ipod's cover flow) full screen and project that.
There may be a dedicated projection app that does exactly what you want, the technology is all there.
Looks good but $850 for the controller is a bit too steep I'm afraid...
I think this should do just fine:
$300 for a software/hardware package sans laptop seems budget friendly.
As far as their speed is concerned, yeah, the Thinkpad bloatware that comes on them does consume more memory than I would like (that's bc I like no bloatware at all, ideally) but this stuff is pretty incredible for rescue/recovery and business applications, so I leave it on.
This machine only had 2G of RAM when I bought it, it still does. I believe you can order them with 4G at a reasonable cost, or you can always order them w/ 1G and slap 4G in when you get the computer. 2G has always been enough for me to run Serato, be online, etc. simultaneously so I don't think speed is really a concern if it's primarily going to be a dj machine.
haha... ok, that's pretty flashy.
What is this thing called, I can't even seem to find it online.
I'm not sure if a laptop wouldn't be better since Ken's old one just gave up he might be better of with a new laptop than with an ipad. Although he'd cause a hell of a stir with the above set up for sure...
Maybe virtual dj and a hercules controller would be a better choice than the Numark/Traktor combo:
http://www.numark.com/idjlive
I don't think this is out yet and it also looks a bit Toysrus. I could only find a "presentation" of it on youtube where the unit wasn;t even switched on.
Get one that is easy to get fixed locally preferably under guarantee. The Toshibas I've owned were always rock solid but I hear Lenova are good machines.
http://www.numark.com/mixtrackpro
And a 12" Asus 1201n :
http://usa.asus.com/product.aspx?P_ID=sZ0sI6WqjnCHGFta
Virtual dj is pretty nice and free.
Styling.
This looks good and with around $550 for everything together, this is also very budget friendly!
Thanx!
Sorry, Frank I just updated my post. You probably most likely want the mixtrack pro instead of the mixtrack. The difference is, the pro has a soundcard built in which will help everything a lot. It is only about $50 more.
A couple 1210s and a Rane?
Rotary mixer?
I'm still using my two 1210s and the Vestax PMC17A which I bought 13 years ago... it's probably considered a crap mixer by most but worked fine for me for all these years.
Cosign on this setup.