Numark's all-USB DJ console

Another funky and innovative product by Numark! A more professional version of the iPod console, this one allows you to mix music on a flash drive, iPod or portable hard drive! You can even search for music by plugging a keyboard into it. The large LCD display shows both waveforms and playlists.

Looks like a mobile DJs dream come true, and it may even be great for clubs/bars, depending on how robust it is (can it handle many DJs treating it bad, and a few beer spills?). But until it does become standardised, I think I'll stick to buying records.

UDG Record Bags

I've got two record bags, a 50/50 non-UDG one made out of strong plastic-like material, which can hold about 80 records, and a UDG trolley bag which can hold around 65 records. I also have a smaller bag to take around 20 records when I need just a bit more than my trolley bag can handle.


My dream-bag is the flip-front/slanted UDG bag which can hold around 90 records but also lets you loosen the front of the bag so you have room to look through your records. I saw another DJ (Corey from Vanilla Room in Sydney) use this and it looked awesome! It's cool to be able to fit in 90 records and be able to flip through them too. But of course carrying this will be a headache as it doesn't have any wheels.


My most used bag is a 50/50 one like the one shown on the picture on the left, but it doesn't have any padding, and it's not a UDG bag. Nonetheless, it does allow you go take the top off, and put some records in the top half and the rest in the bottom half. As useful as this sounds, it's not that great, as half the records that fit in this bag can't be placed nicely without them slipping and falling, which makes going through the records a hassle. I prefer to just take out a few records and place them against a wall -- much easier to browse through them than when they're in the top half of the 50/50 bag! Like the flip-front bag, this one doesn't come with wheels either so it's a bit of a hassle to use a separate trolley (mine doesn't have a strap like the one in the picture).


My travel companion -- the UDG trolley bag is currently my favourite. The 50/50 bag seems to be wearing out a bit -- it doesn't close properly without a fair amount of force, which forces me to give more attention to my trolley bag! This one is amazingly robust. I've dragged it all the way from one of San Fransisco's City train stations down to Pier 39 and all the way back, which is a 1.5 hour walk, and it was dragged on all sorts of surfaces without any problems. The wheels are rollerblade wheels so you can give it all the torture you want without causing any damage. The only reason I didn't use this bag too often was because the capacity is only 65, but otherwise it's a great bag -- definitely my favourite travel companion (65 is enough for most of my overseas/interstate gigs).


Because of the low capacity of my travel companion, I also use a small bag to take a few extra records. It looks nothing like the one in the pic on the left though!! The only problem with this bag is that it is not meant for records, so I can't fit many in, and the record covers get damaged a bit because of the zipper. So I think the best move for me would be to get a flip-front bag and to sell off my 50/50 bag, or for now, to just get a bag like the one on the left picture, until I can afford a flip-front. Maybe by the time I can afford a flip-front, they'll also have a flip-front trolley version -- the best of both worlds!

Fancy DJ Tables

Check out these futuristic DJ tables! I'm not sure which ones are actually used in clubs but I wouldn't mind having one at home to go with my furniture.

Numark's IPod DJ Mixer?

Since IPods are so popular, this seems like a neat idea. Instead of carrying crates and crates of Vinyl or many CD cases, just plug in your IPods and start playing! Great for mobile DJs, but not that great for club DJs -- it will take some time for something like this to get standardised in clubs, even if it becomes successful.

There's a couple of additions they need to include in the current model before it can realistically be used by DJs though. How will pitch control be implemented? I'd imagine the track (or a part of it) will need to be downloaded from the IPod to the device so pitch control can be simulated. The problem is, downloading will take some time, so the system may not be useable (at least with current technology) during a live performance (waiting ten seconds to get to a track on CD with my Numark CDN-36 is long enough!). From the pictures shown, it doesn't seem like there's a pitch control option on system.

Another issue is with scratching -- the track (or part of it) will again need to be downloaded and buffered first. But scratching is not really a strong requirement -- many CDJs don't support it.

A feature that would be helpful for many DJs is if the mixer can be separated from the DJ system (e.g. a rack-mounted Numark DJ kit requires the mixer to be connected separately). In this way a top of the range mixer can be connected to the IPod DJ console (that will include only the jog wheel, play etc. buttons and pitch control).

Looking forward to playing around with one of these things, whenever they become available in stores around Melbourne!

Sony MDR V250V headphones

Bought a pair of Sony MDR V250V headphones after realising that the time is up for my (cheap) Philips headphones. The Sony has everything I needed; it had rotating speakers, was lightweight, compact, and cheap ($50 after bargain)! I'm not sure if the Sony speakers lying on my ears rather than covering them would cause difficulty when I play for 4 hours or more at a stretch though. I chose the Sony over a Senheisser HD 212 which went for $100 (after discount from $115). The only possible advantage the Senheisser could have had is better sound quality (which for me is not that important when beatmatching on headphones), since the Sony is more compact and versatile and black in color (which I preferred over the silver Senheisser).

Gemini BPM500

Spoke to Gary Couch (webmaster of RainbowRadio.com) about the Gemini BPM500 mixer. I asked him about how accurate the automatic BPM extraction was and he said: "I never thought much about the BPM display as I have been DJing so long that I can usually pick out the BPM within 5 beats of what it actually is and/or match beats while cueing within the headphones.". Hmmm, thats pretty cool. I also asked him about auto-start of the CD player (i.e. my Numark mixer starts the CD player on moving the crossfader) to which he said:"As for the question about starting the song on the fade automatic nothing I know will do this as that would be controlled by the cd player and not the mixer. It also would not be as acurate as simply starting manually.". This I thought was pretty weird :-/ I've seen at least one professional DJ using the fader to start the CD player and I was surprised that him being a professional DJ himself hadn't heard about it. Maybe it's rarely used then.

Denon 1800F

Started using the Denon DN 1800F twin CD player at Lustre Lounge. This needed a bit of practice (about 4 hours) because it was a bit different to my twin CD player in that no scratch support was provided, no looping, no manual BPM counting (which is useful for beginners) and no fader auto-start (which wasn't really needed). Also, the cueing in the Denon was a bit different to my Numark. The mixer (Gemini BPM500) at Lustre was old, but had automatic BPM detection. This was good for many House tracks but when it came to RnB music, the BMP detection went crazy. I had to get used to mixing using only pitch control which turned out to actually be the way to go!

My first DJ Kit!

Received my Numark CDN-36 from the states, which I bought for AUS$ 750 including shipment! Thats a pretty good price I reckon compared to prices here in aussie. Before the CD players I had bought a cheap Numark CM 100 mixer, that didn't even have separate high/mid/lows for the 4 different channels (there's one equaliser for all four!). But turned out to be ok for practice. Altogether it costed me just under AUS $ 1000!