Forum: General Discussion

Rane Four works "perfect" with VirtualDJ.

I have personally used it in 6 live gigs this summer without any issues at all.

The only advise I have for Rane Four users, is to set zerodb setting at -6 or even -9db.
Generally it's a very good controller, but it doesn't like redlining. If you hit red on the VU you're gonna hear it! :)

PS: Yes, it's loud enough and you don't need to push it on the reds

You mean the color effects ? They are hardware.
Also VirtualDj passes the BPM of the deck on the unit. So, it should have no issue to handle it.

I will take a look at it tomorrow, but IIRC Flanger color effect works fine here.

Yes, the Color Effects is what I meant. I have to oscillate it by turning the knob, it won't work automatically. Serato's works automatically. Not that this is a big deal, I can oscillate by hand.

Yes, it's not possible, unless you're willing to loose one of 4 decks.

I cannot tell.
I have not used the FLX10.

I can tell though, that Rane Four was the first controller that made me think to replace my own personal favorite controller for gigs, DDJ-RZ.

The main differencies I can see between Four and FLX10 are:
Four has a hardware mixer, while FLX10 has a software one.
Four has some nice built in hardware effects and you can switch (on the fly) to software effects as well. FLX10 only offers software effects
In Four you can't have automatic headphones switching (because of the hardware mixer) but on FLX10 you can
The pads display on Four is far supperior to that of FLX10 as the display is always there. In FLX10 you need to manually bring it up for a few moments
The pads on Four are very nice, but FLX10 pads are a little better.
Four has a sturdy metalic body. FLX10 is more plasticy, but the construction/finish is very good. This also means that FOUR is heavier than FLX10
Four uses a standard IEC C13 power cable. FLX10 uses an external PSU

For the rest of their differencies you can read their operating manuals
https://www.virtualdj.com/manuals/hardware/rane/four.html
https://www.virtualdj.com/manuals/hardware/pioneer/ddjflx10.html

[quote=PhantomDeejay]Rane Four works "perfect" with VirtualDJ.


I just want to clarify here so no one else makes the same mistake I did:

While pretty much every part of the Rane Four "works" with VDJ, I sadly had to return it as it lacks some pretty basic functionality due to the hardware mixer. It's a great mixer controller overall, but the mixer doesn't play nice with our software.

If headphones are connected to the controller, you cannot use the prelisten function. It will play audio on the deck channels instead of over the cue channel. Alternatively, you can set headphone or prelisten output to play from your PC, and connect headphones there, but then you lose the ability to hear EQ changes in cue. This, on top of the inability to hear hardware effects in cue when connected via either method, is a pretty big compromise.

If headphones are connected to the controller, you cannot use the prelisten function. It will play audio on the deck channels instead of over the cue channel. Alternatively, you can set headphone or prelisten output to play from your PC, and connect headphones there, but then you lose the ability to hear EQ changes in cue.

This, on top of the inability to hear hardware effects in cue when connected via either method, is a pretty big compromise.

I'm pretty sure this is the case for a fairly large portion of conrtollers you will look at - once the mixing is done in the hardware, VirtualDJ can only send audio to the channels available (if you look at the audio setup, the headphones/cue path is not part of those channels, so to achieve what you want, one of the actual channels for audio would have to be sacrificed, and all of them pretty much lead to master output). It is additionally unfortunate that the Rane Four doesn't seem to have a master output cue (which is probably what you need to hear the effect result after the send to/return from VirtualDJ is done).

The additional truth here is, this is probably exactly how the unit will function with Serato, and Serato does not have a prelisten function. That is why what @PhantomDeejay said is correct...it does work perfectly with VirtualDJ, because the experience is the same as what you would get if you used it with Serato when it comes to that.

To achieve what you want, you should look for controllers that let the software do the mixing...the DDJ-FLX10 and DDJ-1000 are 2 that come to mind(note the audio setup shows "Master" and "Headphones" channels explicitly, so VirtualDJ can actually control what is sent to the headphones/cue vs output to master explicitly there).

Edit: @PhantomDeejay already addressed this in detail earlier... just doubling down on his claim being true.