Anyone here know anything about turntables and scratching/mixing?

My setup runs with four decks...3 technics 1210's and one vestax pdx d3....with reverse,joystick etc....never liked the vestax...its not about the spec sheet and how many features a deck has....its 100% about the feel and responsiveness for me..and nothing feels remotely as good and solid as a technics....there's no reason to by any other deck in my opinion.
Although.....i learned on belt drives, but for scratching they're useless.

you learned on belt drives... blimey, when you upgraded it must have been like a whole new world!

I had to completely re-learn everything when i moved to technics...i was so used to having to make big adjustments to the pitch control (which wasn't even a slider...it was a little wheel) that i kept making my pitch adjustments too big. Once i learned how precise technics were i was fine.

Belt drives.. you have to drop your track in 1min in advance and give it a running push to get going :)
I had some other brand that was supposed to be direct drive but it was only marginally better than belt. It had a little knob (teehee) on the front for pitch. Found it at a garage sale for $fuckall.

no! serious question

There's no crossfader, it's a rotary mixer. You 'mix' by using the channels

As used by Larry Levan, Danny Krivit, Francois K, Kenny Carpenter, Ron Hardy, Frankie Knuckles etc - basically all the disco and House DJ's from the 70's/80's in NYC & Chicago

You can do the same with a 'normal' mixer by using the channel sliders and leaving the x-fader centered. Some of the guys back home would do that. Don't ask me why (ok you can if you really want).

If i had the money i'd go for the allen and heath rotary mixer that was out a few years ago...it had the option of a seperate crossfader unit at an extra grand and needed its own dedicated valve amp too...but fuck me it had the smoothest rotary faders i've EVER felt....but £4000 was out of my price range....my vestax pmc 46 rotary is still going strong for now.
Also like vestax's newest top of the range rotary mixer...the black one....beautiful piece of kit.

My mates (who actually played out) were using A&H mixers (normal sliders). Not 4k though!

Damn....i want it again now :(

I'd say it really doesn't matter what miser you have at the start... but if you can find one with replaceable sliders then that's a real advantage as you'll rip through them in no time. Maplins used to do a great 6 channel mixer with a neat little Aux send and return to plug in your own delay unit (But I'm going back to early 1990s here!). As far as decks it's all about 1200 or 1210s - and get the black ones they look so much better than the silver ones. Look after them and they'll last a lifetime.. I still use my decks every day and they are nearly 20 years old. All that said... it's so much easier with Tracktor, you'll be juggling like a pro in a matter or minutes.

All that said... it's so much easier with Tracktor, you'll be juggling like a pro in a matter or minutes.

Nah it's all about reel to reel........

:)

that's what I'm talking about. proper mix tapes...... recorded from the radio. Ha ;)

I have shitloads of tapes at home... just waiting for me to go back and record them all onto CD or something. If only I could find a tape deck (and flight).

DJR 400 for the mixer (but useless for scratching as it has no cross fader)

Technics decks, strip out the tonearm and use the origin live base plate and a custom modified rega tonearm.

Pistinator - I used to have the vestax isolator, but it sounds too crunchy, try the E&S for a much more rounded sound.

Back to the OP, you could consider avoiding vinyl altogether and going for the Pioneer CDJ's, lots of hip hop dj's use them these days.

The isolator is decent enough in the flat but agree, on a decent loud system it fails. Was looking at an E&S at the time but didn't wanna splash the cash when I was only gonna be using it indoors

I have shitloads of tapes at home... just waiting for me to go back and record them all onto CD or something. If only I could find a tape deck (and flight).

good old greg wilson on his reel to reel

Greg Wilson live is the nuts

Greg is one of the nicest men in dance music.

He often stays at my place when he is in London, so if anyone wants to come along to his gigs just drop me a PM, you can then help lug the reel to reel around as it weighs a ton.

Didn't he used to work in Toys R Us in Manchester years ago?

Greg Wilson live is the nuts

He is the man.

He played at the horse and groom a while back. 6 hour set!!!!!

Which H&G? First time I heard him was at an Unabombers party about 4yrs ago, he played the afterparty upstairs at some boozer on the corner of Viccy Park, ACE!

vestax pmc 06 is still one of my favorites, very simple and easy to use 2 channel mixer with the smoothest crossfader, specially designed for scratching and vertical set up.

The one in shoreditch. It was a sunday eve/night.

He's playing on the 16th at the Gramaphone on commercial street.