dj help -- mixing without a cue knob

[Gunark]

So I went on a boxing day shopping spree today, and bought myself a nice shiny new vestax PCV-275. I love it. The whole thing just screams quality. However, like many other higher-end mixers, this one does not have any sort of pre-fader for cueing (i.e. a knob or fader that lets you fade from cue to program). I really got used to this on my old numark, and now I'm having problems figuring out how to get by without it.

The mixer has a split-cue button, which sends the program to the right earpiece on the headphones, and the cue to the left earpiece. Do people actually use this? I find it really weird and cumbersome.

Or do you just take of your headphones and listen to the monitor once you've got everything cued and ready for mixing?

Or perhaps there is some other technique that I'm not aware of?

 

[The Electrician]

Dont push your mixer to hard or if will fry... the new vestax mixers aren't as good as the older ones...


Damn Mass production... Booooo

Wes

 

[djmikeconradi]

I use the monitor speaker for cueing/mixing, its the easiest way i find when playing out at club/raves. Its a little more difficult when playing at home where you might not be able to turn up the volume too loud.

my 2 cents


mike

 

[Adam Duke]

Use the cue regularly for cueing the track up, then do a quick check with both tracks cued in the headphones before you drop it (i find my ear cues tracks a smidgen too slow in most situations, personally).

@m.

 

[d.code]

I use the moniter stricly when ever I play. I find it so much easier to beat match ect.

 

[Gunark]

<font face="Verdana, Arial" size="2">Originally posted by The Electrician:
Dont push your mixer to hard or if will fry... the new vestax mixers aren't as good as the older ones...


Damn Mass production... Booooo

Wes</font>

That's exactly the sort of thing I don't want to hear after laying down 800 bones

Anyway I think you may be talking about the PMC mixers. Vestax recently re-released their PMC line with lower prices and shittier components.

From what I've been told, the PCV's are okay though. The fader on the one I bought is guaranteed to 2 million passes, which sounds pretty good.

 

[Kalemic]

I'm not sure if this is old news to you since you've would have been playing with your new toy for a bit now but...

I have the PMC-270A and the way I cue shit up with mine when using the split cue, is to have the volume fader of the playing channel at a high level, then hit the split cue button, and for the new track flip the cue toggle to on. That way you can perfectly hear the playing track in one ear and the new one in the other. After the matchup is quite close, I hit the split cue button and then hit the cue toggle on the playing track so I will both playing over top of each other in both ears and you can fine tune the mix perfectly.

I like this feature because its like having your own monitor without actually having one phisically there. Good for parties where people "forgot" a monitor or when the supplied speaker is too crappy to accomplish anything.

Now mind you I may like this because I taught myself to mix through headphones without a mixer, a skill I think is quite useful since alot of the times when your out spinning you can get fucked over on the monitor situation.