New Equipment, What Would You Choose?

I’m on a mission from God to get the band no DJ Bus back online! (no Elwood or Jake!) I’m going to be playing mostly GB gigs, weddings, birthday and anniversary parties, pagan rituals and the likes! No club work! Also, I’m a Pro Audio guy so I do not want junk! I need just about everything for Equipment!

1st Software? In my past DJ life I used Virtual DJ & PCDJ Dex. Now seems like Serato has the Market?

2nd Hardware controller: dependent on software which I seem to be leaning towards Serato is there a decent controller with good specs that is better for DJs doing functions vs. club work? The new Denon MCX8000 is nice but seems like an overkill, and feel I’m paying a premium for a controller that doesn’t need a computer, but I can’t see using those little screens and searching through song folders quickly without a keyboard and mouse? Also looking for a good road case dependent on controller selected?

3rd Regardless of the controller, I’m thinking of adding a 2nd rack, road case that will accommodate an Allen Heath (type) 10 channel mixer up top. My thought is to bring the controller main outs into the mixer, in the same road case as the mixer add a Furman rack mount AC strip and something like a Sure BLX/PG58 dual Handheld wireless system? Plus add a wired Sure SM58 as backup mic into the mixer. Using 5 out of the 10 channels will give me room to add a stereo mini cable for iPad etc… and added mics, keyboard, Guitar if need.

4th speakers: I went to B&H, Guitar Center and Sam Ash in NYC and compared the QSC K12 with Ksub, Bose FI with Sub, and EV EKX 12P with 15P sub, I was hoping to hear the PreSonus studio live speakers but not popular enough for anyone to have them connected!

Also looking for speaker tripod stands that have some type of lift assistance, i.e. hand, auto?

I understand that there are a lot of manufactures and a lot of this is one person’s opinion vs. another. I thought it would be fun to start this topic and have people comment on their experiences and if they had to repurchase equipment what might they choose?

Thank you for your time and support

Best Regards:

Chris Paras
C&C Sounds

We'll what did you like from the above you compared? I'd take the EKX setup. I own that and the QSC system. EV sounds a bit better and louder.

If there's one thing I've realized when it comes to equipment....
I like to use what I like to use, because I know what I want in the gear I buy.
Other people can only suggest what THEY like.
If you don't like GREEN, would you buy a green car, just because someone told you to?

It seems as if you've researched it and thought it out quite well....which is a great first step.

For live performances, after having been a pro musician myself, I'd add some sort of digital voice processor. When I was playing in my Top-40 show band we used 3 DeltaLab 1024 delays and DeltaLab Harmonizer. With all the changes that have occurred since, I'd recommend the TC Helicon VoiceLive which is amazing. I have their VoiceLive 2 in my DJ system and use it to create fun on DJ gigs and keep singers on-key for Karaoke shows.

Or, buy a digital mixing console and all (or most) of your processing is included.

I used the QSC for years - love them - but I would stay away from the KSub. It just can't take the punch. The KW181 is a much nicer alternative with K-series tops.

Sorry it has taken so long to get back to everyone! But wanted to update my status!

So I purchased the Denon MC600MKII, and a friend is semi retiring and moved to FL so I grabbed his OSC K12’s and Sub. Not the EV’s I want but great 2nd choice!

Now the question is software. In the past as I mentioned I used PCDJ RED, and Virtual DJ. As you may know Denon now ships with full version of Serato, and also downloaded the trial version of PCDJ DEX 3.

As the IT-Guy I can see some differences between Serato’s DB which is fast and smooth using my Top Hits USA library from the beginning to current! Approx... 2 TB. But I do some Karaoke and want the flexibility and integration that PCDJ gives me? Again I’m doing typical wedding etc… gigs, no clubs, and I moved away from my vinyl long time ago (don’t need to feel the vinyl etc..) probably sometime after my 1st dbl hernia op!) ! Any thoughts on Serato DJ vs. PCDJ Dex 3 for wedding type DJ gigs will be appreciated.


Thx
Chris

I use VDJ but my son loves Serato. Just download demo's and see se which works best for you.....actually you have a version of Serato and VDJ has a version called home which is free but can only be used with a computer not a controller but that would give you a chance to check it out.

Just a note: I've got a friend who uses VDJ Home. It worked great on Windows 7 but since he's upgraded to Windows 10, he can now only get it to play music for 10 minutes, then it shuts down the sound output on his
notebook.

Running VDJ on 10 and so far, no issues.

Which version of VDJ? I'm running two laptops with VDJ Pro 7 & 8 on Windows 10 and all is well. But my friend who is basically a "bedroom DJ" runs VDJ Home.

I am using VDJ pro 7.4 , I should add that I upgraded my laptop from 8.1 to 10