Paz75
i see alot of complaints about the hercules or rather problems with people who own one. is there anyone out there that has the hercules and is happy with it? if not, why dont we just resolve that the hercules is a piece of garbage and suggest people dont buy it?
for the record, i own and use an m-audio audiophile firewire box which i consider to be a piece of crap as well. but it does the job, sounds good and ties me over until i can get some serious pro gear...
for the record, i own and use an m-audio audiophile firewire box which i consider to be a piece of crap as well. but it does the job, sounds good and ties me over until i can get some serious pro gear...
geposted Sun 30 Dec 07 @ 4:34 am
Supacon
cstoll wrote :
--- Attention all Vista Users --- Crackles and pops can be direct attributed to the Vista environment in most cases. Please read the various topics here and you will see your issues are not unique because others are having problems with other applications. So even report it only happens when they use their MIDI devices. So... happy reading -- http://forums.microsoft.com/MSDN/Search/Search.aspx?words=crackle&localechoice=9&SiteID=1&searchscope=forumscope&ForumID=351
That's all really disturbing and such - but is there a solution? Is there a patch for Vista that can correct such problems, or some way of configuring it to minimize this?
To be frank, I never had flawless audio with VirtualDJ in Windows XP either, but it does seem like it's work a shot to try that... on this particular DJ system, it's been Vista Ultimate from day 1, and I just tolerated the glitches. It seems that they are getting slightly worse all the time too - I don't remember it being very bad at first.
geposted Sun 30 Dec 07 @ 4:57 am
Bren F
Paz75 wrote :
i see alot of complaints about the hercules or rather problems with people who own one. is there anyone out there that has the hercules and is happy with it? if not, why dont we just resolve that the hercules is a piece of garbage and suggest people dont buy it?
I would say that the Hercules works very well for the price.
If you're just entering the world of digital DJ'ing and you're on a budget, perhaps you don't want to spend a lot of money on something that might not work out, then the Hercules MK2 is a great option.
The soundcard is far better than most standard soundcards that come with your PC/laptop, and it has 2 outputs for monitoring (which many standard cards don't). I've used the MK2 in front of 2000 people in a super club believe it or not, and the sound quality was good. So, set-up right it can prove passable in a club environment.
It's not something I'd be willing to brand trash because I've made a lot of money from such a small investment, but on the other hand it's not the most desirable piece of kit out there, but reasonable quality at an affordable price is what makes it so popular.
geposted Sun 30 Dec 07 @ 7:48 am
cstoll
Supacon wrote :
That's all really disturbing and such - but is there a solution? Is there a patch for Vista that can correct such problems, or some way of configuring it to minimize this?
To be frank, I never had flawless audio with VirtualDJ in Windows XP either, but it does seem like it's work a shot to try that... on this particular DJ system, it's been Vista Ultimate from day 1, and I just tolerated the glitches. It seems that they are getting slightly worse all the time too - I don't remember it being very bad at first.
cstoll wrote :
--- Attention all Vista Users --- Crackles and pops can be direct attributed to the Vista environment in most cases. Please read the various topics here and you will see your issues are not unique because others are having problems with other applications. So even report it only happens when they use their MIDI devices. So... happy reading -- http://forums.microsoft.com/MSDN/Search/Search.aspx?words=crackle&localechoice=9&SiteID=1&searchscope=forumscope&ForumID=351
That's all really disturbing and such - but is there a solution? Is there a patch for Vista that can correct such problems, or some way of configuring it to minimize this?
To be frank, I never had flawless audio with VirtualDJ in Windows XP either, but it does seem like it's work a shot to try that... on this particular DJ system, it's been Vista Ultimate from day 1, and I just tolerated the glitches. It seems that they are getting slightly worse all the time too - I don't remember it being very bad at first.
Supacon - I wish there was a definite answer for you and the community on a solution. I have heard that sometime in February maybe there is a Microsoft patch coming out that is suppose to address these issues in their sound support. But that is just rumor as nothing is definite with Microsoft.
geposted Sun 30 Dec 07 @ 8:09 am
spinnaJ
Bagpuss wrote :
I would say that the Hercules works very well for the price.
If you're just entering the world of digital DJ'ing and you're on a budget, perhaps you don't want to spend a lot of money on something that might not work out, then the Hercules MK2 is a great option.
The soundcard is far better than most standard soundcards that come with your PC/laptop, and it has 2 outputs for monitoring (which many standard cards don't). I've used the MK2 in front of 2000 people in a super club believe it or not, and the sound quality was good. So, set-up right it can prove passable in a club environment.
It's not something I'd be willing to brand trash because I've made a lot of money from such a small investment, but on the other hand it's not the most desirable piece of kit out there, but reasonable quality at an affordable price is what makes it so popular.
Paz75 wrote :
i see alot of complaints about the hercules or rather problems with people who own one. is there anyone out there that has the hercules and is happy with it? if not, why dont we just resolve that the hercules is a piece of garbage and suggest people dont buy it?
I would say that the Hercules works very well for the price.
If you're just entering the world of digital DJ'ing and you're on a budget, perhaps you don't want to spend a lot of money on something that might not work out, then the Hercules MK2 is a great option.
The soundcard is far better than most standard soundcards that come with your PC/laptop, and it has 2 outputs for monitoring (which many standard cards don't). I've used the MK2 in front of 2000 people in a super club believe it or not, and the sound quality was good. So, set-up right it can prove passable in a club environment.
It's not something I'd be willing to brand trash because I've made a lot of money from such a small investment, but on the other hand it's not the most desirable piece of kit out there, but reasonable quality at an affordable price is what makes it so popular.
+1
I use the mk2 as soundcard n its a decent mid rate card too but yah u can't expect too much of it;) Good set up will get u good sound.
N back to topics, yes VDJ now have good sound engine n still it can be improved in near future..
geposted Sun 30 Dec 07 @ 8:11 am
Supacon
Personal Listening Test - Virtual DJ vs. Foobar2000
Just to see what I could hear, I acquired one of my DJ soundcards and set it up on my home computer, and I thought I'd set up a little listening test to compare the sound quality of VirtualDJ with another player.
The test setup is as follows:
I am using a professional 2 channel audio interface, an M-Audio Firewire Audiophile.
I'm using Etymotic ER-4P In-Ear Monitors to listen. They offer very high fidelity audio reproduction and over 20dB of isolation to minimize any external noise.
I have a track playing in foobar2000 at -0 volume on the first set of output channels, and the exact same file playing through Virtual DJ on the second set of output channels. VirtualDJ is set to have the music come through a secondary output for headphones.
Most of my source material is 320KB MP3 or FLAC lossless (in VDJ it is decoded with the WMP Audio Decoder). The genre is Dance music (house, trance, electro, etc).
I start playing one track in foobar, and as quickly as possible, I play the exact same track in VirtualDJ and align the tracks so that they are both perfectly in sync. Then I tweak the volume (using VirtualDJ's headphone volume control) to match so that both players are as close as possible. This audio interface has a little A/B toggle switch. I can use this A/B switch to seamlessly switch between sources so that it is very clear if there are difference (there is barely even an audible click, the switch is totally electronic and instant).
My Observations
Foobar2000 is often considered to be a very good high fidelity playback software. I'm using its stock internal MP3 and FLAC decoders and have no DSPs enabled. When comparing foobar2000 to VDJ, I find that foobar seems to slightly emphasise the high frequency sounds more than VDJ. I'm not sure why there would be an audble difference. I don't hear any distortion or any signs of reduced fidelity from VDJ, just that there seems to be less emphasis on trebles than in foobar2000. This is more noticeable in some songs than others. In many songs it's hardly audible at all.
To match the volume of VDJ's monitor to the output of foobar2000, I have been turning down the headphone cue volume. I have VDJ's performance settings are turned all the way up except for the scratch sound, which is set to Simple. 256 samples latency.
I wondered if the automatic gain correction in VDJ was responsible for a change in sound characteristic, but I experimented with this, and it doesn't seem to have a significant impact unless gain is turned so high that the audio actually clips, which induces distortion obviously.
Could there be some kind of equalization curve applied in VirtualDJ that would cause this?
I can't honestly say that anything sounds wrong, but I did want to point out that there is a difference between VDJ and my benchmark. Is there some other software I could set up a test like this with so that I could compare VDJ? I don't have Serato available, for one...
Just to see what I could hear, I acquired one of my DJ soundcards and set it up on my home computer, and I thought I'd set up a little listening test to compare the sound quality of VirtualDJ with another player.
The test setup is as follows:
I am using a professional 2 channel audio interface, an M-Audio Firewire Audiophile.
I'm using Etymotic ER-4P In-Ear Monitors to listen. They offer very high fidelity audio reproduction and over 20dB of isolation to minimize any external noise.
I have a track playing in foobar2000 at -0 volume on the first set of output channels, and the exact same file playing through Virtual DJ on the second set of output channels. VirtualDJ is set to have the music come through a secondary output for headphones.
Most of my source material is 320KB MP3 or FLAC lossless (in VDJ it is decoded with the WMP Audio Decoder). The genre is Dance music (house, trance, electro, etc).
I start playing one track in foobar, and as quickly as possible, I play the exact same track in VirtualDJ and align the tracks so that they are both perfectly in sync. Then I tweak the volume (using VirtualDJ's headphone volume control) to match so that both players are as close as possible. This audio interface has a little A/B toggle switch. I can use this A/B switch to seamlessly switch between sources so that it is very clear if there are difference (there is barely even an audible click, the switch is totally electronic and instant).
My Observations
Foobar2000 is often considered to be a very good high fidelity playback software. I'm using its stock internal MP3 and FLAC decoders and have no DSPs enabled. When comparing foobar2000 to VDJ, I find that foobar seems to slightly emphasise the high frequency sounds more than VDJ. I'm not sure why there would be an audble difference. I don't hear any distortion or any signs of reduced fidelity from VDJ, just that there seems to be less emphasis on trebles than in foobar2000. This is more noticeable in some songs than others. In many songs it's hardly audible at all.
To match the volume of VDJ's monitor to the output of foobar2000, I have been turning down the headphone cue volume. I have VDJ's performance settings are turned all the way up except for the scratch sound, which is set to Simple. 256 samples latency.
I wondered if the automatic gain correction in VDJ was responsible for a change in sound characteristic, but I experimented with this, and it doesn't seem to have a significant impact unless gain is turned so high that the audio actually clips, which induces distortion obviously.
Could there be some kind of equalization curve applied in VirtualDJ that would cause this?
I can't honestly say that anything sounds wrong, but I did want to point out that there is a difference between VDJ and my benchmark. Is there some other software I could set up a test like this with so that I could compare VDJ? I don't have Serato available, for one...
geposted Tue 01 Jan 08 @ 5:45 am
Bren F
Good test supacon, sounds like you did it in pretty much the same way as I.
Perhaps try the Traktor Demo? Traktor is considered to be an audiophile picnic.
I have to say that if there is a difference, then it is in the highs, but it's so slight (from my testing) that it didn't seem worth mentioning.
Perhaps try the Traktor Demo? Traktor is considered to be an audiophile picnic.
I have to say that if there is a difference, then it is in the highs, but it's so slight (from my testing) that it didn't seem worth mentioning.
geposted Tue 01 Jan 08 @ 6:07 am
DJ PHIL IT
happy newyear to all.this two orther dj software will be a good test also bpm pro and mixmeister,happy mixing for 2k8
geposted Tue 01 Jan 08 @ 8:49 pm
Supacon
Happy New Year to you as well!
I actually do own BPM Studio, although the bastards make you pay for an upgrade to support Vista, and I doubt it'd be worth it - awful software in my opinion. When it was newer, back in 2001 (more than 7 years ago?), it was pretty good, but most other software has come so far ahead and BPM Studio hasn't had any new updates or feature revisions, nor have they released their V5 software that they have been promising since 2002. I used BPM on and off for years, but had a lot of problems at the end which is why I bought VDJ.
I have a pirate copy of MixMeister, which I think has become great software for doing mix CDs (although haven't tried it live yet), and will probably be buying it sooner or later.
Anyways, I did download Traktor DJ Studio 3.3 and played with it a bit. I haven't played with it for over a year, and I haven't really delved into the guts and advanced features of it.
Doing a similar A/B test between this and VDJ here's what I found:
First off, I had to run VDJ in wave mode, not ASIO, because my soundcard doesn't allow two programs to use it in ASIO mode simultaneously. I didn't really dial in my audio setup in this configuration, so I have some subtle clicks and pops here and there that I wasn't getting in ASIO mode. But barring that:
-I hard no difference at all that I could notice between Traktor and VDJ when using stock pitch and settings. They sound identical, except for the bit of clicking and such. I didn't hear the difference between high frequencies that I heard in comparison to foobar, so that might be something weird that foobar does.
One thing about Traktor that I did notice - when set to highest quality, the master tempo, timestretch is Smoooth! That is probably about the best sounding master tempo that I've ever heard in any software. You can take a soft rock song or something and pitch it 30% up or down, and the most you hear is a very subtle and not-too-annoying texturization on prolonged vowel sounds in the vocals.
In VDJ when making even rather small tempo adjustments with keylock on, you can hear some warbling and distortion... it sounds kind of chunky, and this is with the default Master Tempo settings at "best quality". Not terrible, mind you, but Traktor has it down and kicks the crap out of VDJ in this respect.
As an aside, it's been a long time since I've heard it, but you can hear distortion in BPM Studio's master tempo from a mile away in a noisy bar. It's awful and is probably the biggest, longest running complaint for die-hard BPM Studio users.
BeatJump (which I'm addicted to in VirtualDJ) is very chunky in Traktor. Jumping ahead 32 beats, you hear a noticeable gap in audio playback. In VDJ I can jump ahead 128 beats wihout hearing anything, except for a very subtle click of you're listening with nice in-ear monitors. OT, but I like how the knobs work in Traktor - hold your mouse - the pointer disappears, and you move the mouse up and down for big adjustments, and left and right for small adjustments. Very smooth and nice.
To sum up:
I actually do own BPM Studio, although the bastards make you pay for an upgrade to support Vista, and I doubt it'd be worth it - awful software in my opinion. When it was newer, back in 2001 (more than 7 years ago?), it was pretty good, but most other software has come so far ahead and BPM Studio hasn't had any new updates or feature revisions, nor have they released their V5 software that they have been promising since 2002. I used BPM on and off for years, but had a lot of problems at the end which is why I bought VDJ.
I have a pirate copy of MixMeister, which I think has become great software for doing mix CDs (although haven't tried it live yet), and will probably be buying it sooner or later.
Anyways, I did download Traktor DJ Studio 3.3 and played with it a bit. I haven't played with it for over a year, and I haven't really delved into the guts and advanced features of it.
Doing a similar A/B test between this and VDJ here's what I found:
First off, I had to run VDJ in wave mode, not ASIO, because my soundcard doesn't allow two programs to use it in ASIO mode simultaneously. I didn't really dial in my audio setup in this configuration, so I have some subtle clicks and pops here and there that I wasn't getting in ASIO mode. But barring that:
-I hard no difference at all that I could notice between Traktor and VDJ when using stock pitch and settings. They sound identical, except for the bit of clicking and such. I didn't hear the difference between high frequencies that I heard in comparison to foobar, so that might be something weird that foobar does.
One thing about Traktor that I did notice - when set to highest quality, the master tempo, timestretch is Smoooth! That is probably about the best sounding master tempo that I've ever heard in any software. You can take a soft rock song or something and pitch it 30% up or down, and the most you hear is a very subtle and not-too-annoying texturization on prolonged vowel sounds in the vocals.
In VDJ when making even rather small tempo adjustments with keylock on, you can hear some warbling and distortion... it sounds kind of chunky, and this is with the default Master Tempo settings at "best quality". Not terrible, mind you, but Traktor has it down and kicks the crap out of VDJ in this respect.
As an aside, it's been a long time since I've heard it, but you can hear distortion in BPM Studio's master tempo from a mile away in a noisy bar. It's awful and is probably the biggest, longest running complaint for die-hard BPM Studio users.
BeatJump (which I'm addicted to in VirtualDJ) is very chunky in Traktor. Jumping ahead 32 beats, you hear a noticeable gap in audio playback. In VDJ I can jump ahead 128 beats wihout hearing anything, except for a very subtle click of you're listening with nice in-ear monitors. OT, but I like how the knobs work in Traktor - hold your mouse - the pointer disappears, and you move the mouse up and down for big adjustments, and left and right for small adjustments. Very smooth and nice.
To sum up:
- VirtualDJ and Traktor sound about the same by default
- MasterTempo/TimeStretch in Traktor is phenomenal, and sounds much better than VDJ's
- I haven't compared Vinyl/Scratching sounds yet... it's mostly irrelevant to me
- It seems more likely that I'll get distortion/pops and clicks from VDJ if I don't have my performance and soundcard settings optimal.
geposted Tue 01 Jan 08 @ 10:59 pm
DJ PHIL IT
yeah i did tell them off the bastards!! bpm pay just for upgrade to support Vista they email me back telling be nice,Traktor master tempo timestretch is the best out there,the key enabled is the best I've ever heard in any software also.i hope vdj will do some more work on this soon.
geposted Wed 02 Jan 08 @ 2:59 pm
Supacon
Heh... I used to resell BPM studio, and a customer of mine had just purchased two copies, and was told that he had to pay an upgrade fee for each one... so you can imagine that I wasn't too happy about that, and sent Alcatech a nasty e-mail too.
Here it is... this is just sad:
-----Original Message-----
From: Joseph D. Lien
Sent: Wednesday, June 06, 2007 6:42 PM
To: AlcaTech - Support
Subject: Fwd: Windows Vista Upgrade
Andreas Janiel:
It really disheartens me to hear that a customer of mine who has just purchased BPM studio, (and yet three copies of it!) has been denied an upgrade which should be freely available in the first place. This customer has in the last few weeks ordered two copies of BPM studio from me. This is something of a slap in the face after years of promising that owners of BPM studio after purchasing in 2005 would get a free upgrade to the next version, which has never been released, to this day.
I would greatly appreciate it if you would assist my customer with his problem.
It is true, and unfortunate that I have personally had these items in stock for a while. Will it be necessary for me to bring this issue up with my distributor?
Thank you for your assistance.
And his reply:
From: AlcaTech - Support
Sent: Thursday, June 07, 2007 1:38 AM
To: Joseph D. Lien
Subject: Re: Fwd: Windows Vista Upgrade
Dear Joseph:
In 2003 we promised a free upgrade to version 5 of BPM Studio.
But we never promised a free upgrade to Vista compatibility!
Right there is why VirtualDJ is the company to support they actually CARE about their customers.
Here it is... this is just sad:
-----Original Message-----
From: Joseph D. Lien
Sent: Wednesday, June 06, 2007 6:42 PM
To: AlcaTech - Support
Subject: Fwd: Windows Vista Upgrade
Andreas Janiel:
It really disheartens me to hear that a customer of mine who has just purchased BPM studio, (and yet three copies of it!) has been denied an upgrade which should be freely available in the first place. This customer has in the last few weeks ordered two copies of BPM studio from me. This is something of a slap in the face after years of promising that owners of BPM studio after purchasing in 2005 would get a free upgrade to the next version, which has never been released, to this day.
I would greatly appreciate it if you would assist my customer with his problem.
It is true, and unfortunate that I have personally had these items in stock for a while. Will it be necessary for me to bring this issue up with my distributor?
Thank you for your assistance.
And his reply:
From: AlcaTech - Support
Sent: Thursday, June 07, 2007 1:38 AM
To: Joseph D. Lien
Subject: Re: Fwd: Windows Vista Upgrade
Dear Joseph:
In 2003 we promised a free upgrade to version 5 of BPM Studio.
But we never promised a free upgrade to Vista compatibility!
Right there is why VirtualDJ is the company to support they actually CARE about their customers.
geposted Wed 02 Jan 08 @ 3:25 pm
DJ PHIL IT
to me VirtualDJ is the best dj software company when it comes to taking care of it's customers.oh you used to resell BPM studio ok ,i started useing it 1995 then came pcdj which came from bpm.both bpm and tracktor they take too long to update & upgrade but tracktor is offering more updates now.
geposted Wed 02 Jan 08 @ 7:20 pm
Supacon
Not only that, but AlcaTech actually threatened legal action against a forum where english speakers used to go for help with BPM, since they basically provide nothing of the sort themselves, because people were complaining about some of the problems with BPM. Can you imagine? They actually threatened (with no basis and no real ability to do anything) the owner of an independet forum that was set up not-for-profit, so that users of the software could get help!
As you can imagine, that was the final straw for that dude... it wasn't long after that that he sold every piece of Alcatech gear he owned and started using other software exclusively. His site used to have some nice comparisons of different DJ software on the market. (I believe it was axledentaldj.com, but I can't find it now).
Thankfully, Atomix doesn't work that way. If people go on the forums talking sh*t about VDJ, members of the company, and the community actually listen, and usually try to help the person, if it seems warranted, most often without any kind of blatant censorship like this...
But yeah, sorry... getting a little off topic here.
As you can imagine, that was the final straw for that dude... it wasn't long after that that he sold every piece of Alcatech gear he owned and started using other software exclusively. His site used to have some nice comparisons of different DJ software on the market. (I believe it was axledentaldj.com, but I can't find it now).
Thankfully, Atomix doesn't work that way. If people go on the forums talking sh*t about VDJ, members of the company, and the community actually listen, and usually try to help the person, if it seems warranted, most often without any kind of blatant censorship like this...
But yeah, sorry... getting a little off topic here.
geposted Wed 02 Jan 08 @ 7:53 pm
DJ PHIL IT
I remember this yeah i knew him to we spoke on the phone a few times.i did email them on this telling them may bpm RIP!
geposted Wed 02 Jan 08 @ 9:01 pm
digimixer
Been using the Herc MK1 (then MK2) as my sound card for around 4 years.
Can honestly say there is no difference in audio quality i can detect in comparison to traditonal CD Decks.
My only grunble with the Herc is that the Mic output level is way too low! (To the point that it just isnt worth using a Mic)
Can honestly say there is no difference in audio quality i can detect in comparison to traditonal CD Decks.
My only grunble with the Herc is that the Mic output level is way too low! (To the point that it just isnt worth using a Mic)
geposted Thu 03 Jan 08 @ 10:35 am
DJ PHIL IT
hercules never made good sound cards,and if you want to use a all in with good mic out behringer BCD3000 is the best
geposted Thu 03 Jan 08 @ 11:26 am
hkd987
well i have never been one to bite the hand that feeds me but there is a small problem in the sound engine of vdj which does not exist in serato
vdj does not load some of my songs the whole way though
i have tried in serato with the same files and this problem does not exist
also in itunes the problem is no were to be found
that is my only problem with vdj sound engine
vdj does not load some of my songs the whole way though
i have tried in serato with the same files and this problem does not exist
also in itunes the problem is no were to be found
that is my only problem with vdj sound engine
geposted Thu 03 Jan 08 @ 12:49 pm
Bren F
hkd987,
Try going into Options and setting "MAX Load" to "Always", this way a file is loaded regardless of size.
Try going into Options and setting "MAX Load" to "Always", this way a file is loaded regardless of size.
geposted Thu 03 Jan 08 @ 2:12 pm
Supacon
I've had this problem with songs not loading on occasion, but I haven't seen it for a while - I think it may have been fixed in a recent update.
When this kind of thing did happen, it was often followed by stablility issues, but it could be fixed simply by restarting virtual DJ, and then things would usually work fine.
Even though the songs wouldn't fully load (and display the waveform graph), they usually would still play okay.
When this kind of thing did happen, it was often followed by stablility issues, but it could be fixed simply by restarting virtual DJ, and then things would usually work fine.
Even though the songs wouldn't fully load (and display the waveform graph), they usually would still play okay.
geposted Fri 04 Jan 08 @ 9:51 am
abnorm
Phil's comments are not completely out of this world. I've always prefered VDJ's interface to other software, but its sound engine and EQ have always been behind others. It seems like it's not the first priority of the designers, or they are just not audiophiles. Yes, I can hear noticable difference between VDJ and others, especially on my studio monitor speakers. EQ is another story, it's just plain bad. I would never use internal EQ at a club. The sound engine DID improve a few versions prior, but not dramatically.
But then again, my EMU 1616M completely blows away Serato's soundcard. It's all relative. Some people are completely happy with Hercules.
But then again, my EMU 1616M completely blows away Serato's soundcard. It's all relative. Some people are completely happy with Hercules.
geposted Sun 06 Jan 08 @ 12:08 pm
