Enter the new era of DJs by mixing video clips (DVD, DivX, MPEG,etc) which you can send on a giant screen. Virtual DJ brings you all that, in the most easy to use way. With its breakthrough BeatLock engine, your songs will always stay in the beat, and you can work your mixes incredibly faster than any other DJ could.
Compared to a full vinyl setup with all the hardware and physical media it requires, an MP3-based mixing station is extremely simple and cheap. There’s even free software to get you started, and one of the most popular programs available is Virtual DJ. Virtual DJ is often packaged with USB-based hardware mixing consoles from the likes of Hercules and Numark, and, in fact, if you really want to delve into the full array of features.
Once installed, Virtual DJ automatically populates a folder tree in the bottom left corner where you can easily access your music collection. The bottom middle serves as a tabbed, multifunction area where you can browse tracks, sample music bites, add effects, and make recordings.
Top of the window is dominated by two digital turntables, which are distinguished by color: blue on the left and red on the right. Each one has the ability to cue, loop, adjust pitch, scratch, and shift (among other features). In the middle is the mixing console, where you can adjust the gain and master volume, as well as transition between the two tracks. Once the songs have been dragged and dropped into the console, a bar along the top displays the sound waves of each to help with visual mixing. There’s also a video input option that lets you create montages to the music.
Requirements:
- PIV 3 GhZ computer
- 1024×768 SVGA video
- 4.1 DirectX compatible soundcard (with front and rear separate outputs)
- 1024 MB RAM
- 200 MB free on the hard drive
The stylish interface and high number of features score points, but learning how to use the program is a hit or miss proposition. Add also several interfaces to suit everybody from the beginner to the professional DJ, the possibility to record your mixes to burn them on CDs, to broadcast on the Internet and have your own radio station, to save your CDs directly in MP3, to use a headphone to preview the songs or an external mixtable to perform in a club.
