Chee

I was / am a big fan of pinball, and actually own an Addams Family machine Too bad it's stuck in my parents place, just waiting for me to get my ass into gear and get a place big enough to put it Became a fan in the mid/late 90's, during the second Renaissance of pinball, back when Bally / Williams ruled the scene. Have you seen the virtual pinball set-ups you can buy, with the large LCD screen mounted to act as a virtual playfield, with proper flippers etc?

Worked for me too, Thanks Steve

Great read, thanks for the link. I remember when Q was singing the praises of the 447's. Prior to that I had the Stanton 500's, and always wondered why everyone was switching en masse to the 447's. In fact, I never stopped to wonder why the 500's were the de facto standard in the early 90's - I never realised that DMC had some exclusive license with them.

I'm beginning to find the +/-8% pitch on my trusty old 1200Mk2's are becoming a bit limited, and miss the days of having up to +/-50% with the TTXs, so I am also beginning to consider getting new turntables with a larger pitch range. I had a look at the Reloops, and the reviews seem positive. But I'm also concerned about the reliability of the super-OEMs, after having been burnt once with the TTXs. The petition to get the 1200's manufactured again looks interesting, with the latest reply from the CEO last month https://www.change.org/p/panasonic-company-matsushita-corporate-re-introduction-of-legendary-technics-turntables/u/9314791 Who knows, I might be able to get my hands on a box fresh M5G some day...

And now I have to choose between the 62 and 57MKII...Not to mention the weakening Australian dollar making these things more expensive as the weeks go by

Thanks guys. Had a look at the Z2, found if to be less than half the price of the 62 here in Australia, but I'm not sure I want to go down the Traktor route. I'm a Serato-head, I am used to it and have some sentimental reasons for sticking with it.

Hi all, another old boy here slowly getting back into DJing and turntablism. Been a solid 8 years since I did any major work / practice on scratching, and about 5 years since doing any mixing stuff. I'm very much from the analog era, and the very early days of the digital era. Recently though I've been introduced to the latest in digital DJing, with loops, cues, loop rolls, effects, sync etc, and it got me excited again. I dusted off my old 1200s, my 07 Pro and my old SL1 box, upgraded to SSL 2.5, bought myself two Dicers and an Akai LPD8 and have been mucking around with a few things. Not sure if I'm just rusty, but it seems like the latency on scratching with SSL 2.5 is worse than the earlier versions? Maybe the software is now trying to do too many things and the SL1 is showing it's limitations? Anyway, I've had a look at the Rane 62, and it looks like a nice way to really get into the digital DJing side of things, but still keeping my turntablism roots and familarity with a 2 channel battle mixer. I like the look of the multiple MIDI buttons, the on-board effects, the general compactness of it all. However, I'm a bit put off by the price, as I'll only be playing in my bedroom. As I mentioned above I do have the Dicers and the LPD8, but I find the LPD8 a bit clunky to run all the effects (eg it's not easy to switch from the Super Knob FX mode to the Ultra Knob FX mode). Also I like the idea of post-fader FX on the 62, which I can't get with my current set-up. Lastly, I'm thinking I need to upgrade to SDJ (Slip mode looks like fun). So, should I just stump up and get the 62, or is there an alternative set-up that you guys might recommend (eg SL2 box, another mixer, plus another MIDI controller). Thanks!

^Yup yup, love that record burn sound for the exact same reason.... It's. About. To. Go. Down.

Been using Newshosting as a provider since about 2005, and NZBMatrix as a index site for about the same time. Back then, I paid 5 quid for lifetime 'VIP' access to NZBMatrix, and I pretty much still use it on an almost daily basis. Binsearch.info is my second most used nzb site. I used to use Grabit as my client (freeware), but it was a bit of a resource hog, so I have recently switched to Binreader. Simple, lightweight program, but doesn't have quite the same bells and whistles as Grabit did. One thing I'd like to get into more is the automated process using something like Sickbeard, RSS feeds and SABNZBD. I've tried it before, but it was all too clunky for me, plus I don't really like SABNZBD as a client. If anyone could upload an idiot-proof step-by-step guide, it would be much appreciated! Newsgroups and NZBs all the way for me, I might use torrents once every 6 months nowadays. Retention for all the major providers is now getting into the realm of 1500days (ie 4+ years!). Only thing these days is DMCA takedowns of files, but that's also provider dependant (Astranews seems to suffer from these takedowns the most)

As long as you're getting one of the newer revisions of the TTX, you'll be fine. I got the very first version they released back in '03, and one of the IC control chips burnt out within a year. End result was that the lights would all come on, etc, but the platter wouldn't spin. This was because the heat-sink they had was too small, and it basically overheated and fried the chip. The later revisions had air vents put into the body of the turntable, and had a better heat-sink design. Not sure how these have stood the test of time tbh. Apparently the IC chip is a cheap fix, but you have to have the skills to de-solder the old one and solder the new one in place. It's a shame really, because the TTX is quite a nice table. *EDIT* I'm sure you've already seen this article, but just in case... http://www.djworx.com/skratchworx/reviews/ttx.php

Serato's crate file system is pretty simple, for both Mac and Pc, it's just a folder called _Serato_ and _Seratobackup_. Back these up, and if you want to do a fresh install, you can simply overwrite the new folders with these ones. This trick also works as a way of running multiple libraries. For example, you could have a library of hip-hop only and when you want to start a new library, rename the crate folders to something like _seratohiphop_ , then start a new library with just EDM tracks. To switch between the two, you simply rename the EDM library to something else, and change the hip hop library back to _serato_ and _seratobackup_. I don't run a Mac, so couldn't tell you where these two folders are, but I'm sure Finder will sort you out.

The onboard software FX can't do post-fader out, with or without a MIDI controller. At least not on the SL1 anyway. This makes sense, as the sound file is being processed before it even leaves the control hardware and goes into the mixer.

I just bought an Akai LPD8 today, I had been looking at the Novation Dicers for a little while but decided that I wanted the knobs for controlling Serato's DJ FX. It's definitely not perfect, but for the price point its a great piece of kit. Much has been said about Akai's build quality, and the LPD8 seems to follow this tradition. I had no problems mapping the pads and knobs in SSL, but didn't seem to find a use for the Control and CC functions. It's too bad that there are only 8 pads total, so you can't really map the 5 cue points you can set in SSL per turntable. But still, from my tinkering today, I'm happy with my purchase.

Not sure if I'm qualified to comment on this thread as I've only ever used Serato, but basically I've had an SL1 almost since the day they came out, on account of one of my best mates (at the time) being one of 5 employees of Serato back in 2002 (back when Serato Scratch was a ProTools plug-in). As an aside, my one (uncredited) claim to fame was suggesting that they make the grooves on the control record so that you could see them in 1 minute demarcations. Also, I think it was A-Trak's idea to use the inner part of the records as a way to select the tracks from the software. Anyway, I've recently updated to the latest 2.4.3 build, and finally started to play around with the DJ FX plug-in. Considering that had I paid for Serato back in 2003, that in 2012 I am still getting FREE updates that improve the functionality of the product, that says a lot for Serato's (and Rane's) dedication to their customer base. Vinyl emulation-wise, I would agree that it's not 100%, but 95% there, due to sticker-drift issues etc with fast precise cutting. But at the same time I can do so much more with Serato than I can with vinyl, so it's a fair trade off. I still use my good old Scratchy Seal if I need to bust out some Ahhhs or Freshhhs.

Sheeet I've been away from scratching for like 5 years, and most of it still sounds the same. So far, to me, it looks like scratching peaked back in '06. And don't get me started on the DMC... that shit peaked in 2003.