DJ VinylTouch
First off, I would like to say that among various other great things, the devs at VirtualDJ do a very good job at creating mappings for new controllers coming out.
One thing I have realized, however, is that not every controller gets mapped, and for the ones that do, competitors seem to be fighting back with including features that are only available through their offerings (e.g. phase HID and probably some features for deck 3 and 4 usage of the pioneer DJM S11).
There is at least one major controller that isn't supported fully - the Rane Twelve MkII (as far as I have seen, reviews show the LCD display doesn't give the BPM readout).
Based on this observation, other than the changelogs, is it possible that can know what is planned to be supported in future, like through general announcement on forums/social media pages similar to what the other vendors do for an upcoming controller?
Is there any worry about competitors becoming draconian enough in their deals to have hardware vendors deliberately not work with VirtualDJ in the future?
I ask this not from a gear crazy perspective, but from the perspective of knowing that there will be hardware options in future, if/when it becomes necessary to upgrade.
One thing I have realized, however, is that not every controller gets mapped, and for the ones that do, competitors seem to be fighting back with including features that are only available through their offerings (e.g. phase HID and probably some features for deck 3 and 4 usage of the pioneer DJM S11).
There is at least one major controller that isn't supported fully - the Rane Twelve MkII (as far as I have seen, reviews show the LCD display doesn't give the BPM readout).
Based on this observation, other than the changelogs, is it possible that can know what is planned to be supported in future, like through general announcement on forums/social media pages similar to what the other vendors do for an upcoming controller?
Is there any worry about competitors becoming draconian enough in their deals to have hardware vendors deliberately not work with VirtualDJ in the future?
I ask this not from a gear crazy perspective, but from the perspective of knowing that there will be hardware options in future, if/when it becomes necessary to upgrade.
geposted Thu 09 Mar 23 @ 1:28 pm
PhantomDeejay
Without going to far, I'll provide only the info I can share in public:
First of all Rane Twelve MKII is supported fully and it was done with cooperation with Rane.
That's why it includes VirtualDJ HID and VirtualDJ TC modes on it's operation set.
The only feature missing is the BPM readout. Actually though, this feature has been implemented from our side! If you take a deep dive on the mapper you should find it!
However it doesn't work for you because it needs a newer firmware that Rane haven't released yet. So it's not up to us, but up to Rane.
Now for the rest part of your post:
NO. At least not in the way you mean.
Mapping a controller can be an easy task or a super difficult task depending on the features of the controller itself. Therefore generally we don't announce support of new gear before we are almost ready to finish it's official mapping.
It has happened before that a specific controller had some special quirks that made it unable to support officially. Or that delayed the official support for months, even years.
There's no point to announce that we will support the "X" controller if that's going to be after months.
So, generally we DO anounce support of devices as we come ready to provide official mapping.
Also in general we DO support everyhting that we can get our hands on. Every major DJ controller out there that I know of, and is available, is currently supported.
Also we DO actively try to support every new piece of gear that gets released by hardware companies.
This means that new gear is always added at some point. We cannot and we will never provide an ETA, because as I said, mapping a piece can take from hours to months to complete.
So, as a resume all you need to keep in mind is this:
Every new piece of gear will get eventually supported, and you don't need to worry if you're going to have new options available to you or not when you decide to upgrade your gear. You will have newer options!
The only catch is that somethimes you may have to wait a little if you're after the new flashy thing that just got announced.
First of all Rane Twelve MKII is supported fully and it was done with cooperation with Rane.
That's why it includes VirtualDJ HID and VirtualDJ TC modes on it's operation set.
The only feature missing is the BPM readout. Actually though, this feature has been implemented from our side! If you take a deep dive on the mapper you should find it!
However it doesn't work for you because it needs a newer firmware that Rane haven't released yet. So it's not up to us, but up to Rane.
Now for the rest part of your post:
NO. At least not in the way you mean.
Mapping a controller can be an easy task or a super difficult task depending on the features of the controller itself. Therefore generally we don't announce support of new gear before we are almost ready to finish it's official mapping.
It has happened before that a specific controller had some special quirks that made it unable to support officially. Or that delayed the official support for months, even years.
There's no point to announce that we will support the "X" controller if that's going to be after months.
So, generally we DO anounce support of devices as we come ready to provide official mapping.
Also in general we DO support everyhting that we can get our hands on. Every major DJ controller out there that I know of, and is available, is currently supported.
Also we DO actively try to support every new piece of gear that gets released by hardware companies.
This means that new gear is always added at some point. We cannot and we will never provide an ETA, because as I said, mapping a piece can take from hours to months to complete.
So, as a resume all you need to keep in mind is this:
Every new piece of gear will get eventually supported, and you don't need to worry if you're going to have new options available to you or not when you decide to upgrade your gear. You will have newer options!
The only catch is that somethimes you may have to wait a little if you're after the new flashy thing that just got announced.
geposted Thu 09 Mar 23 @ 2:42 pm
DJ VinylTouch
Thank you very much for the reassuring response. I'm honestly not concerned with getting the latest hardware when dropped, I was just concerned with hardware availabilities at any point in time. Competitors always want their thing to be chosen first, so I just wondered if there is ever a threat of that falling into hardware support. Universal hardware support is one of VirtualDJ's biggest selling points...but it the knowledge of support is one of the biggest issues to come up when I recommend the software to friends...but for me it's just knowing I'm solidly supported, both hardware wise and software wise, at least in the near future.
I appreciate the time and effort that you guys put into the software and making it work with virtually everything that is important.
I appreciate the time and effort that you guys put into the software and making it work with virtually everything that is important.
geposted Thu 09 Mar 23 @ 5:38 pm