Cueing System?

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Daddyslipdisk

New DJ
Apr 23, 2009
17
0
I plan on using Virtual DJ Pro on a laptop when I start doing gigs. My first is on Memorial day that I'm doing for a party at our house. Obviously not getting paid, but I'd rather fail in front of friends than in front of paying clients or a PO'd bride. But my question is about cueing up songs on the laptop.

I have a dual Gemini CD player that I can fade between players from one side into another, but how do I accomplish that with a laptop? All of the sound is coming out of the headphone jack, so even if I split the sound with one going to the PA and one going to headphones, anything I hear in the headphones will come through the PA.

A DJ I met showed me a DJIO unit that I guess splits the sound and allows you to cue without any issues like that and he said that you use this unit in conjunction with the settings in VDJ that are used to dedicate each side to an output. He doesn't mix at all and just matches BPM and goes with it and it sounds awful. But I only have one output and that's a single sound card in the laptop coming out of a single output headphone jack. Does the software setup a virtual split outputs internally or something?

So at this point I am at a total loss. Can anyone explain a way around this in layman terms or direct me to a "how to" manual for this?
 
Daddyslipdisk said:
I plan on using Virtual DJ Pro on a laptop when I start doing gigs. My first is on Memorial day that I'm doing for a party at our house. Obviously not getting paid, but I'd rather fail in front of friends than in front of paying clients or a PO'd bride. But my question is about cueing up songs on the laptop.

I have a dual Gemini CD player that I can fade between players from one side into another, but how do I accomplish that with a laptop? All of the sound is coming out of the headphone jack,As it should be, get yourself an external sound card like the Gigaport. so even if I split the sound with one going to the PA and one going to headphones Are you nuts? Never do that! You are thus splitting a stereo sound, like putting one speaker in one room and the other speaker in the other room., anything I hear in the headphones will come through the PA.

A DJ I met showed me a DJIO unit that I guess splits the sound and allows you to cue without any issues like that and he said that you use this unit in conjunction with the settings in VDJ that are used to dedicate each side to an output. He doesn't mix at all and just matches BPM and goes with it and it sounds awful. But I only have one output and that's a single sound card in the laptop coming out of a single output headphone jack. Does the software setup a virtual split outputs internally or something?

So at this point I am at a total loss. Can anyone explain a way around this in layman terms or direct me to a "how to" manual for this?
Click to expand...

Answers above are in red! I am going to be blunt here. You will also need to do a lot of reading about equipment and practicing before you take any Bride's money!

A DJ program should be able to give you at least 3 stereo outputs, Left Deck, right deck and headphones. You will need a soundcard with at least two stereo inputs and two stereo out. You can use your laptop headphone outputs for just that or send it to a channel on your external mixer (Via a male mini pin to two male RCA ) for cueing. You configure the sound card and also the headphone output by going to settings/preferences on your DJ program. Some DJ programs give you the option of mixing internally or using an external mixer. I hope that helps.
 
Great advice. As mentioned in previous posts, I did DJ work back in the late 80's and early 90's in clubs before the MP3 phenomenon hit, so I was at a disadvantage coming in clueless with the laptop usage. Unfortunately, the advice I've been getting has been from DJ's who are telling me exactly what you're saying not to do.

An external sound card makes perfect sense to me with multiple outputs that I can fade between. As for upcoming gigs, none on the books yet except personal stuff which will stay that way until I'm comfortable that i can actually look like I know what I'm doing. It's not a question as to the actual DJ part as it is learning the new equipment and that's getting more expensive as I go.

Thanks again for all of the advice. Ya'll keep it coming and I love the brutality.
 
Daddyslipdisk said:
Great advice. As mentioned in previous posts, I did DJ work back in the late 80's and early 90's in clubs before the MP3 phenomenon hit, so I was at a disadvantage coming in clueless with the laptop usage. Unfortunately, the advice I've been getting has been from DJ's who are telling me exactly what you're saying not to do.

An external sound card makes perfect sense to me with multiple outputs that I can fade between. As for upcoming gigs, none on the books yet except personal stuff which will stay that way until I'm comfortable that i can actually look like I know what I'm doing. It's not a question as to the actual DJ part as it is learning the new equipment and that's getting more expensive as I go.

Thanks again for all of the advice. Ya'll keep it coming and I love the brutality.
Click to expand...

You can start learning right here on this Forum by doing a search for threads such as "External Sound Cards", "DJ Software" ETC.
 
Well, welcome to forum first of all! If u dont get the info here, 'read my lips bro' ,ur never gonna get any info anywhere! cos u've just stepped into the No.1 DJ Forum in the world!
So as far as your concerned..u need to dj with your laptop using vdj and u need '2' outputs..one that goes to your PA sys and one that u can cue with ur headphone.
Well i'd suggest you a cheap way to do this. Get a USB 5.1 sound card first which i believe costs less than 10$ in the US (I've attached the pic). Once u get that..just plug it into your USB port and now you have '2' sound cards in ur laptop. Assign the Main output of your VDJ to your Primary Sound driver (Ur laptop's soundcard') and the secondary/cue output of VDJ to your USB sound card. and Wallah! u get to hear the cue track in ur headphone. Hope this helps you.
HEre's an ebay link for the USB sound card. Might be helpful for you :-
http://cgi.ebay.com/USB-Audio-Card-...4|66:2|65:12|39:1|240:1309|301:1|293:1|294:50
 

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djshaun said:
Well, welcome to forum first of all! If u dont get the info here, 'read my lips bro' ,ur never gonna get any info anywhere! cos u've just stepped into the No.1 DJ Forum in the world!
So as far as your concerned..u need to dj with your laptop using vdj and u need '2' outputs..one that goes to your PA sys and one that u can cue with ur headphone.
Well i'd suggest you a cheap way to do this. Get a USB 5.1 sound card first which i believe costs less than 10$ in the US (I've attached the pic). Once u get that..just plug it into your USB port and now you have '2' sound cards in ur laptop. Assign the Main output of your VDJ to your Primary Sound driver (Ur laptop's soundcard') and the secondary/cue output of VDJ to your USB sound card. and Wallah! u get to hear the cue track in ur headphone. Hope this helps you.
HEre's an ebay link for the USB sound card. Might be helpful for you :-
http://cgi.ebay.com/USB-Audio-Card-...4|66:2|65:12|39:1|240:1309|301:1|293:1|294:50
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I would not buy that for pro audio! Try this instead. http://www.audiolines.com/product.php?productid=69319
 
With the Gemini you already have a feel on how a controller works, to make operation of the software easier I would suggest the following which includes a high quality integrated sound card and you use it just like a CD player, but it has a lot of other neat little tricks to make the most out of VDJ Pro. This is also one of the controllers I use.

DN-HC4500.jpg


http://www.nlfxpro.com/cart/product.php?productid=17298&cat=1256&page=1
 
These are great suggestions. I would probably go the cheap route until I get funding to do it right. Since it's just solely being used for the headphone mix only, the $10 route may be okay. Using my 4 channel mixer, the dual CD player obviously can fade between the two sides, and the laptop and player can fade from one to the other, but the question of how I fade from one MP3 to the next within the same laptop was the only question at hand.

But while the cheapie can let me hear the headphone mix, assumably I would have to change the soundcard source once I wanted that track to playback through the PA, correct? So that's the unanswered question at this point.
 
Welcome to the forums.

There's "what can be done", and "what should be done". The latter is subjective.

Your original question was: CAN it be done? Despite the replies so far, the answer is yes. You can split out and feed mono-summed left and right channels to two channels of a mixer. The settings can be found in the "config", "sound card" settings. I can screen shot those if you need it. Why you would need three channels of audio is beyond me, unless you're doing three or more decks. You can cue the deck that is entering your mix, and then switch sides back and forth between TWO channels.

I would prefer to see stereo used, and clearly, better components will yield better results. There are controllers, like the Denon 4500 (picture by SVO), and the Hercules RMX (which I'm a rep for) have sound card sections in them, and might be something to consider down the road.

If you have further questions, or would like screen shots on setting this up, let me know.
 
Steve Sharp said:
Welcome to the forums.

There's "what can be done", and "what should be done". The latter is subjective.

Your original question was: CAN it be done? Despite the replies so far, the answer is yes. You can split out and feed mono-summed left and right channels to two channels of a mixer. The settings can be found in the "config", "sound card" settings. I can screen shot those if you need it. Why you would need three channels of audio is beyond me, unless you're doing three or more decks. You can cue the deck that is entering your mix, and then switch sides back and forth between TWO channels.

I would prefer to see stereo used, and clearly, better components will yield better results. There are controllers, like the Denon 4500 (picture by SVO), and the Hercules RMX (which I'm a rep for) have sound card sections in them, and might be something to consider down the road.

If you have further questions, or would like screen shots on setting this up, let me know.
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Steve,
I use Traktor 2.6.1 (Two decks + 1 headphone = 3 stereo outputs) and Traktor Studio 3 which has 4 decks + 1 headphone = 5 stereo outputs). I like to mix manually and externally so I need stereo outputs from each deck. Traktor has a feature where you can preview a song before it gets to the deck. You can also cue from each deck. If I use Autoplay/mix within Traktor, then I only need a combined stereo pair + headphones. So yes there are some of us who use multiple outputs otherwise companies won't make them! :sqwink:
 
Canute careful how you direct

This unit has been tested by a good friend locally and I have two of them as backup to my Behringers. These are so convenient but yet work as good as most any they are no nonsense. I have the ones which have a volume control on them which gives you a bit easier control.:sqwink:
ahoustondj said:
I would not buy that for pro audio! Try this instead. http://www.audiolines.com/product.php?productid=69319
Click to expand...
 
ahoustondj said:
Steve,
I use Traktor 2.6.1 (Two decks + 1 headphone = 3 stereo outputs) and Traktor Studio 3 which has 4 decks + 1 headphone = 5 stereo outputs). I like to mix manually and externally so I need stereo outputs from each deck. Traktor has a feature where you can preview a song before it gets to the deck. You can also cue from each deck. If I use Autoplay/mix within Traktor, then I only need a combined stereo pair + headphones. So yes there are some of us who use multiple outputs otherwise companies won't make them! :sqwink:
Click to expand...

The OP didn't ask about Traktor, he asked "can Virtual D.J. do (x, y, and z)? Is it unreasonable to hope you might at least answer the question asked, prior to espousing your own views? Or, if you don't know VDJ well enough to answer the question, start by admitting that you don't, and instead, you're talking about Traktor?

You can prefer anything you like, but so can someone else, including those who want to split one sound card, via mono. Because if no one wanted to do that, it wouldn't be an option in the config. menu of Virtual D.J.
 
Steve Sharp said:
The OP didn't ask about Traktor, he asked "can Virtual D.J. do (x, y, and z)? Is it unreasonable to hope you might at least answer the question asked, prior to espousing your own views? Or, if you don't know VDJ well enough to answer the question, start by admitting that you don't, and instead, you're talking about Traktor?

You can prefer anything you like, but so can someone else, including those who want to split one sound card, via mono. Because if no one wanted to do that, it wouldn't be an option in the config. menu of Virtual D.J.
Click to expand...

All those DJ software work on basically the same principle. I experimented with virtual DJ before I got Traktor. Anyways my response above was to your statement
Quote "Why you would need three channels of audio is beyond me, unless you're doing three or more decks. You can cue the deck that is entering your mix, and then switch sides back and forth between TWO channels."
 
I asked you this, because you stated that THREE OUTPUTS were needed, by someone who is trying to "squeak by" with a single audio output. Plenty of us don't need three outputs. And by your own admission, you like running more than two decks. If that's what you like, more power to ya!

There's a pretty significant difference between NEED and preference. All I'm asking is: can you answer the question asked first, before tangenting off on other ways or your idea of "better ways" to do something, especially with a new member here.

While I don't agree with you about three stereo channels being needed, I do agree that I would never want to do what the OP asked. But I know that it's possible, and how to do it, should I ever need to, or be compelled to. I explained the basics of that (and offered more specific help if needed) AND THEN suggested better ways of D.J.ing, some of which I think you agree with. I try to practice what I preach.
 
ahoustondj said:
All those DJ software work on basically the same principle. I experimented with virtual DJ before I got Traktor. Anyways my response above was to your statement
Quote "Why you would need three channels of audio is beyond me, unless you're doing three or more decks. You can cue the deck that is entering your mix, and then switch sides back and forth between TWO channels."
Click to expand...

Well ahoustondj...I actually make use of three channels in my mixer even when I use my VDJ ...through my mk2.. the reason being that I dedicate one channel to my laptop's soundcard so that I can play winamp immediately through it if There happens to be some problem with VDJ (Which has been v.v.v.v.v.v.v.v.rare.. only 2wice, i'd remember) So i guess maybe he has some other audio output routed to the 3rd channel!?
 
Having a sound card with 2 outputs that I can swap between makes the most sense to me. A mixer is what I'm used to being that I'm old school from LP days. Plug the headphones into the mixer, listen to the mix while the record is playing, fade from one to the other. So a unit that sits between VDJ and the PA output makes the most sense and what I would probably be able to get used to the quickest. The DJIO seems to be a good option for that.

The reason why I have a 4 channel mixer is to dedicate one channel to the laptop with VDJ, two to the dual CD player which I will probably mix between off and on, and the other for a mike to MC.

I think for now I'll just fade between the laptop and the dual deck until I get comfortable with the "auto-mixing" that VDJ is doing. As a result of being old school from back in LP days when LP's were the ONLY media we used, I am VERY hands on with the mix. There wasn't anything automatically mixing or beat matching for you. I just think you can be more creative and get a better mix of sounds instead of simply just beat matching. I've heard DJ's that do it and 80% of the time it sounds awful when notes are clashing.

Can some of you supply some sales people that can talk me through the purchase of some of this stuff (i.e. ahoustondj) or anyone else here? I like to know what price points I'm looking at so I can start setting the money aside.

Thanks again for all of the varied suggestions. You're right. this IS the best DJ forum anywhere.
 
i was just looking at the post above with you saying you need some sales people who can talk you through purchases.i thought you were doing your first gig on memorial day,isnt that on monday?
 
CMWAT said:
i was just looking at the post above with you saying you need some sales people who can talk you through purchases.i thought you were doing your first gig on memorial day,isnt that on monday?
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Yes, but that's a personal gig for me to get comfortable with the system. It is not a paying gig. Thank God.
 
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