Yes hello, I just recently purchased Traktor after hearing much about it. I
got it just a couple weeks ago actually...
Incidentally, my background is 7 years of vinyl mixing. With the advent of
CD only releases, limited and deleted pressings, MP3's and the internet,
it's high time we have a tool that expands our talent to encompass all forms
of music. If you can get it onto your computer you can play it with Traktor.
I've tried a bunch of other programs and found them to all be sorely
lacking. Traktor is the best I've found so far. It can be controlled by
midi, by keyboard, and by mouse. It's fairly intuitive to use and after 2 or
3 days of playing it can be sufficiently mastered. There's definitely some
nifty features to this software. The ability to cue and loop are nice as are
the effects available for each track. The overdub feature is particularly
useful as it allows you to record a mix in one pass and then record over it
on the second or third - adding effects or tweaking the levels.
A few things to note:
1. An ASIO soundcard is recommended for the cue/mix feature. If you don't
have an ASIO card you will need 2 seperate soundcards to hear master versus
channel.
2. Don't buy the software directly from Native Instruments. I paid $200 for
my copy and then found it shortly after (15-20 minutes after I placed my
order) for $150. I called them on it and they would not refund the
difference - actually it took them a week or so to even reply to my email -
and by then the product had already been shipped. So, here's a URL to one
for $150:
http://www.audiomidi.com/manufacturer.cfm?manufacturer_ID=127
3. If you've never mixed before I believe this is a good start but although
it has an 'auto bpm' feature it still requires a sufficient amount of skill
to master.
4. The manual is a bit sparse (less is more?) so after you've got the basics
down you're really gonna have to learn more advanced techniques on your own.
5. I've only tried mixing this with straight 4/4 techno so I'm not sure how
well it would handle BPM's of other genres. The concept remains the same
however and the pitch bend feature is an *invaluable* tool.
6. The "scratch" features are a joke. If you're buying this because you
think you can scratch with it then turn away right now and buy some
Technics.
7. The reverse feature doesn't work all that well because it doesn't keep
pitch. It would be the equivalent of hitting stop and then reverse - the
beats will be off. Maybe you could try reversing a loop and seeing if that
works....
8. The tap tempo option crashes the software anytime I try it with a track
already playing. If the song is playing and you I and manually set the BPM's
it kills my soundcard leaving it in an endless loop - requiring a full
computer reboot (Windows 2000 is my OS).
9. The BPM features are a bit funky and I'm still working out the kinks. For
now, I've found I need to note on a seperate piece of paper what the BPM's
for each track are. Traktor seems to sometimes save this info and sometimes
not. If you use the 'sync' feature to match the beats of two tracks and
Traktor has mistakenly recognized the BPM's of a particular track as
matching the other then they will be horribly mismatched.
10. Although you can turn certain visual elements on and off, a 1024x768
resolution is not enough to fit in the entire software window with all
options (most of them needed) turned on. It does have a nice full-screen
mode but it's lacking toolbars to scroll the window up and down.
The question - is it worth the money? Well, if you're looking for an
MP3/wav/wma/cda/etc. mixer this is the only one out there worth it's weight.
However, if you're just looking to expand your mixing skills to include
other types of media I'd recommend waiting until Final Scratch is out - sure
it's a few hundred dollars more but as a traditional DJ I've found making
the transition to software rather difficult. I still want to feel the record
in my hands and I need a physical mixer to bring it all together. Making a
mix CD with Traktor is taking me about 3 or 4 times longer than it would
normally take me with vinyl. First is the learning curve, second is the
medium, and third is the reduced hands-on feel that I've come to associate
with mixing vinyl. Still, I'm finding the software to be really fun,
intuitive and easy to master. If you've got the money I'd definitely
recommend it - you'll be hard-pressed to find anything out there that's
similar and works this well.
Shimone/Justes
http://www.staticbeats.com | Electronic Music
http://www.shimone.org | Digital Photography
----- Original Message -----
From: "qwerty" <miro.merlak@fer.hr>
To: "IDM" <idm@hyperreal.org>; "IDM-making" <IDM-Making@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Saturday, March 16, 2002 5:18 AM
Subject: [idm] mixing mp3s
quoted 14 lines hello...
> hello...
>
> can someone recomend me a good software for
> djing with mp3s... does anyone work with that that?
> i've had atomix mp3 but i don't really like it...
>
> thanks
>
>
>
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