Traktor - Weaknesses

As Native girl says you just have to use multiple beat markers. As soon as it starts to drift lay another one. Not ideal to use rips though really as they sound bad and drift. Best to use digital masters that all have a rounded, steady BPM and sound cleaner

 

I don't use snap mode, I use Vinyl mode almostalways. Basckspins suck otherwise.
I'm turning slave on and off on the decks as I need it and use master mostly as the reference tempo. That way if I'm mixing Speed Hip-Hop at say 128 BPM and want to change gears to something faster and more electro then I can grab master tempo and wind it up without loosing sync.

I think we both get the right result we just have different ways to get there.

Phil

 

Had the same problem with "Y.M.C.A."
The beats drift and beatmarkers won´t help at all - but have played that track so many times ... i know where to take hand on the record ;-)
I think that´s the reason, why DJs earn money for doing their job - because we know what we are doing...

 

I see a marketing idea here.

Who fancies "warping" all the obvious party oldies, burning them to CD as wavs, then selling them on to DJ's who haven't got the time / inclination to do it themselves.

Over the next month, I've got a load of parties to do, & I'll be playing loads of old rubbish. If anybody fancies warping the following, I'd be happy to paypal you a few dollars / euros (I don't think there's a legal / copying issue here, as I own the originals)

Trammps - Disco Inferno (full length version)
Stevie Wonder - Superstition
Village People - YMCA (Yes, I know! ......but I throw all self respect out the window if I'm doing corporate christmas things)
Aretha Frnklin - Respect

There's plenty others as well, but that's just a few that immediately spring to mind. If anybody seriously wanted to help with these then drop me a line. They would need to be sourced from the original CD / wav. ....I don't want to go from mp3 to wav then back to mp3 again.

IMIANWILLIAMS AT HOTMAIL DOT COM

 

Thats good about 3.2 being better at bpm detection, its something that really does need to be looked at.. imo other programs out there don't suffer as much as traktor seems to with beat mixing with no prepration before hand with tracks

 

heheh nice one Ian!! ;D

 

beat grid is always be a problems...
cos it waste so much time (almostly if you have <1k of music)

why traktor don't adapted the beat warp (Ableton Live & Mixmeister 7)?
They Have a great BPM detection....
Why NI don't make it in traktor???



<ooo>
Phill...
USE MIXMEISTER 7, it has same consept with LIVE,
The + is, with mixmeister 7 you can Export The file to, MP3 or WMA (not Only To Wav).

<ooo>
N.Girl
Use More than 1 Beat grid mean you only use the grid as a Sinc Meter, n you will need to pich bend the track if it start drifting...
if you flated the beat (using LIVE/Mixmeister), you anly need 1 beat grid, n don't need to pich bending any more...

 

Mixmeister has it pluses but in my opinion far more minuses, Its why I use Traktor, it does things how I need em done. I have no problems playing stuff that bends out of time, its simply matter of adjusting phase sync to make the SOUND tight!

Just like Mixmeister Live has its value and it minuses, Not the least of which is the prep time. With Traktor I can play and mix immediately I geta track, Beatgrids whilst very desireable and useful are NOT essential if you listen to what is being played.

In response to what you said to N.G. You got it exactly, that shows you the value of putting on on beatmarker, If only to make it easier to crrect things as they drift and yes you do bend pitch if they drift its what we do to keep the sound tight.

As I have said in the past, its not critical to have (or run) your sync meters centerlined, its critical the stuff coming out of the speakers is spot on, if it isn't, all the fuzziness in the world on screen doesn't mean d!ck!

Phil

 

anyways, i know how to use my ear and pretty sure i did not beatgrid all the tracks i have... ;-)

there are even days, i totally **** on syncing anything, the tracks having beatgrids or not, and ride the pitch all the night just for the fun of beatmatching them!

 

i can relate to that too! Sometimes it's crazy that we miss beatmatching!

as for Ableton having better BPM detection etc, rubbish me-old-son!
It can't even put the bloody 1st warp marker on the 1st beat yet and minutes into the track, the warp markers go nuts and you have to re-adjust.
Trouble with Abes is: You can't pitch an individual track to beatmatch (Nudging is rubbish)
you HAVE to warp your tracks

Traktor makes this optional - if you ever turned up with 50 brand new tunes that you didn't know and had to play a set, you'd be OK with Traktor - Cue'ing, multi-clip waveform display, manual beatmatch etc would get you there

Just ask Sasha to turn up unprepared with 50 brand new tracks and pull off a set ... I'd pay £100 to see him play that set!!

Kr.

 

wohooo...

sory phill....
iam not mean to use Live/mixmeister to mix/ play on the gigz...
but i mean use that as an audio editing (repairing drifting beat off the track)
using mixmeister are more simple than using Live.

but for live gigz..... the only candidate IS....
T3.....!!!*
That the point....!!! (^_^)

*: suported by great hardware offcourse.

yeah....
that one of the point that make me love T3. we can count the intro/outro beat witout manualy counting on it.
we can use beat jump as a counter.

hahaha....
that Right!!! all of my friend who use Live (beginners Allmostly), will be confused if the croud request a tune that are not in their playlist.
They look like spinning MIXED CD....

 

I'm a new user to this thread & it's amazing how sensitive you Traktor loyalists are...you can't take a little criticism & then you respond twice as harshly as the original post. Reminds me of how Technics folks & vinyl dj's initially responded to um...digital music dj's.

As a new user who is interested in using Traktor, I don't want to read about all your sensitivities and insecurities.

The fact is, the software should be easy to use & having to create a beat grid for every track is tedious and time consuming EVEN if it works to perfection. If you can send someone away from a demo in two minutes that means I will have to spend over 10,000 minutes setting up beat grids for my primary collection of tracks.

Take the criticism, make the software easier to use, market the product realistically, and then users won't continually ask the same questions and have the same criticisms. The fact that users continue to show up at events asking about it is proof enough that it doesn't work as well as it could or SHOULD.

The competition is ramping up so don't be blinded.

 

Have another read of the original post in this thread. Language barriers or not, the poster clearly has problems understanding certain aspects of the program but why try and look for answers by being rude and saying things like

"Anybody likes to discuss is? Not me my mind is set on this!!!"

on a forum where discussion is the entire premise for its existance? :S

 

Yep you are right some people are more sensitive than others some people do provide more basis in fact for discussion than others. Some people have their minds made up about something beofre they begin discussion and are not willing to alter their views regardless of any new information provided

I wouldn't pay to much heed to the sensitivities and insecurities, I would however pay attention to the posted solutions and guidance. The sensitivities and insecurities are only useful if you are spoiling for a flame war or fight it would be better that these were not started.

From my perspective this issue of setting up a grid on a track is only time consuming if you are unfamiliar with the process and or have an expectation that all your music will be perfectly beatgridded BEFORE you commence any play. Its simply not reasonable or required that all 10,000 of tracks be beatgridded before play. Learn to beat grid on the fly and teach yourself to play traktor with off center sync on tracks and you won't care that the track is not perfectly gridded. Learn to tweak a grid as you play it and you won't even care that you started to play with only a beatmarker and no notion the grid was adjusted correctly or not

Sure we should take the criticism... where its founded! I think many of us recognize the current gridding strategy is not perfect but its a simpler system to play music on the flay with than Warp markers where the track must be exhaustively and thorughly checked. Ableton Live style warp markers mean non flat tempos can be pulled in line but it takes considerable time to do it. Each of the two modes discussed here solve a problem but not the same problem exactly.

My further argument against your statement is that in some cases people come to the forums demanding solutions that clearly show a lack of experience and willinglness to learn to use the technology as it currently is to their adavantage. In some cases their criticsm highlights a need to change, In other cases it highlights a need for the user to adapt and its often the case that those users who need to adapt are the ones most unwilling to do so. Its simply not possible to easily adapt the software to suit everyones tastes or needs. Its commonly seen that in such discussions the user will compare Traktor to a competitive product and ask why does Traktor not behave like product X? Or if Product X is so much better than Traktor because it can do this. If that statement were actually true then we would all be using product X don't you think?
Competitive analysis is very valuable and looking at the ways other software solves problems is most useful to allow a product to develop more useful functions. However occasionally the case is that people come here to the forum expressing frustration with Traktor when I suspect the reasoning for their dersion is often more about drawing direct comparison to the other software as Fuktor did and in the process stirring up dissent than solving a problem they have at present.

Its coming on like a rollercoaster race at present and anyone with software in this space without major product development efforts in place is likely to get left behind. Its no longer enough to refine your product you have to be innovating and inventing.

Phil

 

Phil, which programs do you consider to be the direct competition of Traktor, and which do you think are the best of them, and why? Maybe some of their strengths and weaknesses vs Traktor's?

Phil