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Introduction
Cast your minds back a few years, to a time when people began to lose their minds and thought that the revolution was starting with the iPod. From with the belly of the Numark R&D lab came the original iDJ, which on the face of it had some merit but when you scratch just beneath the thin veneer of wow factor, was sadly flawed from a DJ perspective. Needing 2 iPods and having no pitch control really wasn’t a great start for the supposedly DJ oriented product.
So off back to the labs for Numark. Smarting from the wounds of the scornful masses, work started on a successor, the first fruits of which were seen at MusikMesse 2006. It took them long enough to get it out there, but now the iDJ2 (not squared anymore apparently) is ready and out in the wild - and receiving much critical acclaim.
About the review: I had written the best part of this review back in November, but was informed that a new firmware upgrade (v1.09) was due and that it might be better to wait until it was out there. Well it's February 2008 and now it is out there, and from what I can see it was very much worth the wait.
So is it better?
Hell yes. The iDJ2 has been seriously remodelled from the original lack lustre edition and embraces all that is good and proper in the professional DJ scene. Stakes have been seriously raised in all areas and great lengths appear to have been taken to make sure that the iDJ2 shakes off the lightweight image.
In a nutshell, the iDJ2 takes the Numark D2 Director, flattens it out with a rolling pin and adds a mixer, a stunning colour screen and a shedload of ins and outs. What you end up with is a complete (and I don’t use the word unadvisedly) DJ solution that fits in a large laptop bag.
The original had a distinct toy like feel, worthy of not much more than a students pad where yoofmans would turn up with their iPods, plug in and pump out random chooons but some feel that they were DJs while knocking back blue drinks. But this is a whole different kettle of fish. This IS for DJs of all style and levels.
First impressions
You’re certainly on familiar Numark ground with a well developed look and feel permeating through the iDJ2. having got used to a stream of small iPod consoles, it actually feels bigger than you might expect. I suspect that Numark really wanted this to work properly as a professional level DJ tool and adjusted the layout accordingly.
Broadly speaking, the iDJ2 is a conventional DJ metaphor (as adopted by the slew of MIDI controllers) with decks, mixer and EQ sat around the big colour screen. Everything is where you would expect it to be and nothing is really out of place either. I’m sure some would argue that the pitch controls should be at the side of the jog wheel but it really doesn’t matter.
Quality wise, this is the usual Numark mix of solid and slightly flimsy. The case is a really tough plastic - one for a change not prone to scratches or fingerprints a la Total Control. The knobs are confusing - the main knobs on the top have just too much give for me, whereas the front controls are absolutely rock solid. The buttons are the now familiar squidgy rubber ones used on every Numark device every and do give solid feedback. The pitch faders work but like the knobs have too much side to side movement. Consistency Numark.
Faders
A quick note about the faders. Like the Total Control before it, the iDJ2 has an upgraded crossfader - a regular Numark D-Type in fact. Of course, seeing that Numark have a crossfader swap instruction PDF on their site, the urge to tear this apart proved to be too much and before I knew it, the bottom was off and the fader was in my hand. For the ever curious amongst you, I’m fairly sure that a crossfader swap out is possible. It’s a regular 4 wire affair, but the pins were just too closely spaced to allow me to drop a Pro X Fade 2 in there. But if you’re worried about the crossfader life, it looks like you have alternatives.
The crossfader does have a curve control… well switch that goes from linear to fairly sharp. You can crab if you're used to soft curves and big lags but for the pin sharp digital posse, this will take some getting used to. The crossfader curve is largely academic really seeing as it’s not really a scratch deck, but if you can master the...
Jogwheels
The jogwheels are likely to be of most interest to potential buyers. They act in almost exactly the same way as the D2 Director - simple rubber spinning platters that act as pitch bend controllers or pseudo scratch disks. It’s worth mentioning that these feel fantastic under your hand - a slightly rubbery grooved surface that feels very solid (no pushing down to grind against the body) and spin smoothly.
Obviously, people want to know just how these wheels perform. Well… the clue is in the name. While they feel smooth and responsive for mixing, you’ll be lucky to pull off anything remotely vinyl-like with them. They’re not touch sensitive, but simply respond to slight platter movement with your hand. Cueing for example isn’t ideal as the audio has a distinct lag compared to your hand movement, and let’s not even talk about how the audio spins down as you release the jogwheel and then gets back up to speed… oh OK - lets.
With a lot of practice, you can release the jogwheel at just the right speed and the audio picks up smoothly, but otherwise you’re left having to press the “Scratch” button to engage the audio at the right time. It’s not perfect but it works. Rudimentary backspins are possible though, but they max out at 50% pitch thus sounding artificial. It is however further complicated by the cue slipping if you scratch for more than a few babies.
So for the rather more platter dependent vinyl spinners amongst you, the iDJ2 will leave you wanting if you were hoping for the same sort of performance. But for the majority of potential users, the jogwheel feels great and works perfectly for pitch bending.
iPod and USB
One of the obvious key selling point of the iDJ2 is the iPodability (yes a new word). Sat right at the top of the unit is a universal dock. It’s adjustable so even your tiny Nano should fit snugly. Provided you’ve taken the time to prep your iPod properly, you’ll get a seamless integration between the iDJ2 and your music.
The key is in the preparation of the your iPod because once it’s plugged in to the dock, it’s simply a vessel for your music, with the iDJ2 grabbing music and feeding it to channel A or B. But the iDJ2 can act as a very large and expensive dock for you to not only play your music but also to watch video as well. Entering “direct mode” turns channel A into a big iPod controller that plays your music just like you were using your scroll wheel. Not only that, you can also watch videos from your suitably equipped iPod via the S-Video port on the back of the iDJ2. Neat and nifty, but not nearly enough to make you buy it on its own - just a nice side effect really.
But it's not just iPods that are catered for - being the digital age, a serious volume of music is being kept on external devices. This can be simple USB keys or Flash media storage, all the way up to huge terabyte disk holding all the music ever made ever. And the iDJ2, via the USB ports can handle the best part of these USB devices as well. On the back are 2 USB ports, but you can also daisy chain USN hubs if you so wish. And with the advent of the v1.09 firmware, you can also use external CD and DVS drives and have the files operate in almost the same way as digital data files. The release notes do state that using tracks from the same CD at the same time isn’t a great idea though.
Each device appears as “USB#” on screen if plugged in directly and as “USB#-#” if plugged into a hub. It entirely depends on how you want to manage your music - you could keep one huge music collection that goes everywhere with you (and run the risk of losing all your music in one go), or keep a selection smaller devices to spread the load and have some sort of fail safe should the worst happen.
File formats
In the digital file format wars, there were winners and losers but overall some firm favourites emerged with those people wanting to spin 1s and 0s and the 1s and 2s. It does seem that the mixture of compression and quality has won out with lossless falling by the wayside with DJs. So it's no surprise that the iDJ2 handles MP3, WAV and AAC only. In the previously discussed iPod direct mode, you can also play DRM protected i.e. iTunes Store music as well.
Perhaps other formats will be supported in further firmware upgrades but working with MP3 will keep just about every potential customer happy.
The Interface
The success of the digital DJing experience is all about how the device interacts with you and your music. Thankfully, the IDJ2 experience (and D2 for that matter for they’re the same software) is a pleasant and fulfilling one. I did go into serious detail in the D2 review so in a bid to keep this brief, here’s an overview of how it all works, without the nitty gritty. For the complete detail, check my D2 review.
A few words about the screen: part if the joy of the iDJ2 is that you don't need to lug around a laptop to use your digital files, but of course you need some window into the belly of the beast and the utterly wonderful colour screen gives you just that. This is a massive step up from the D2 unit with its mono screen and makes the iDJ2 experience easier and more pleasureable that the D2. Having full colour available could have made the iDJ2 interface a crime against colour and useability but the Numark R&D team have clearly realised that less is more and kept colour to a level where it is striking yet easy to use.
Music can be accessed directly from your external devices and used simply on a file level i.e. without all the MP3 tag goodness. To get the best from the iDJ2, you should process your music through the supplied Librarian software. Running on Mac and PC, this software analyses your music collection and builds a database of key data. This can be a seriously lengthy process (like all night and then some) but the new v1.09 software now gives you some flexibility on how detailed you want to be. This can be as simply as building a database with just ID3 tags in or at the other extreme, building seek tables for much better and visual track searching and BPM analysis of every track.
As a guide, I processed 1000 tracks on an iPod in fast mode in 10 minutes and 13 tracks on a USB key in advanced mode in 20 minutes. While it does take a dogs age - literally days on big drives - I recommend doing the full analysis as the iDJ2 experience is much improved for it. building seek tables means instant loading of tracks rather than a 10-15 second wait. The profiles for example are quite simplistic rather than being true waveforms, but can be helpful if looking for the quiet part of a track when mixing rather than trying to remember where it is by time elapsed.
Note to Numark: seeing as the Librarian application can generate BPMs, it would be really handy is that BPM is written back to the original MP3 ID3 tag. Thanks.
Having created the library files on your devices, you can plug and and get straight to mixing. You can load tracks right into the channels from the library or use the iDJ2’s internal “crate”. This is a list of tracks that you chosen to put into the crate from any devices you’ve plugged in. It is just a list and doesn’t actually copy the music and only gives you access to the audio when the device is plugged in. Tracks previously loaded don’t appear, and should you plug in the external device again, the iDJ2 remembers that you’ve got tracks in the crate from that device and gives you options on whether you want to reload them and just where in the list you want them to appear.
Selecting tracks from the library is simple and works on a device level rather than lumping all your devices into one looooog list. Pressing the “Library” button brings up a list of devices and a list of ID3 tags - Track, Album, Artist, Genre, BPM, Year, Playlist or files, the latter giving you file level access to your music. You’ll soon see just how messed up your tags are at this point! You can move entire sections of your music to the crate - all the work of one artist, a complete album or whole playlists for example.
Tracks can also be searched for very easily as well. Using artist, track and title tags, you can soon locate your music, and in this new v1.09 release, it’s a near instant result as well.
Playing the music
This is a doddle and a heap of fun as well. It’s as easy as going into the library or crate, selecting the track and loading up into channel A or B - or both. The play/cue buttons work exactly as expected and allowing the cue to stutter just like a hot start. However, there are no saveable cue points - not a single one. Shame.
The iDJ2 as ever comes with Numark's proprietary Beatkeeper™ BPM technology, although if you've already fully analysed your audio the BPM should already be displayed, and increase or decrease as the pitch is moved. This Beatkeeper technology also seemed to make looping much easier as hitting the start and stop used to mean clean beat for beat loops. But for some strange reason, it doesn't seem to be working as well as it used. And the ability to edit the loop hasn't been included either.
That said, I had a lot of fun with doubles using loops and cues on both channels for simulated hot start drum pad action.
Sound
You’d be forgiven for thinking that being such a small device running nasty little MP3 files would give you a less than pleasing audio experience. You couldn’t be further from the truth. The iDJ2 has full 3 band EQ with kills and 12dB boost, but surprisingly the gains don’t kill. Odd choice to say the least.
Metering is functional but very pretty indeed with Star Trek-esque glowing solid meter lights. Aside from a 0dB marker, there’s little way of accurately checking the volume. All that happens when it gets distorted is that the meter gets brighter and stays on with a vaguely red light coming on at the top of the meter.
Cueing is well catered for with pre fader and master cueing and mixing between the channels as well with the mix control. You also have tone and gain control - and the iDJ2 is loud in your ears so the control is very welcome. Split cue would have been nice.
Quality wise, there is nothing to complain about at all. The iDJ2 can certainly knock out some real noise - very loud indeed, but is crystal clear with enough headroom in the EQ to punch up any crappy sounding MP3.
Pitch Control
A selection of pitch ranges are catered for: 6/12/25 and -100/+25% are selectable from a menu and with this v1.09 update operate on an impressive 0.01% pitch. And for extra control, the pitch fader has a zero click plus a 2mm dead zone so that you can get accurate pitch around the zero click.
Key lock is also included but somewhat bizarrely as a menu enabled option per channel rather than a simple button. another really odd decision there. It works as you expect and gives a pretty good quality within a certain range. But the lack of instant on/off action makes it unfeasibly annoying to use to be honest.
Ins and outs
Seeing as the iDJ2 is likely to be a huge hit with the mobile DJ crowd, a microphone input has been added to the front. Nothing too special, just a jack with gain and tone control as well as an on-off switch. Warning: the mic channel does generate a lot of background noise. Switch it off when not in use.
Round the back is where things get interesting. Being a small all in one iPod based controller, you might think that Numark would skimp connection-wise and simply bung some RCAs on there. Oh no - the iDJ2 comes with a healthy selection of inputs and pro outputs that extend the use from simply being a iPod player to that of a simple 2 channel mixer.
So rather than being left at the mercy of your USB media not having a nervous breakdown mid-set, you also have the option for external switchable line and phono grounded RCA inputs, allowing you to run a full set of CD decks or even really old fashioned turntable thingys. This is switchable on the front face and works with the crossfader, line faders and EQ. You don't get to use loops but I don't really expect many people to be plugging decks into these. It's more like a cool extra feature than being a must have, but I'm sure it'll grab a few extra buyers.
On the output side of things, the iDJ2 comes out guns blazing. While you might expect some dodgy unbalanced RCAs being the limit on a device like an iDJ2, Numark have seized upon raising the status and including balanced XLRs as well as the aforementioned RCAs as well.
Software + updates
The joy of digital gear is the ease of updates. Reaching a landmark v1.09 release, the Numark engineers can tweak existing software to make it better, or even add whole new features as well. Not everything goes smoothly of course, but generally each release sees the iDJ2 get that little bit better.
Where it really begins to get potentially interesting is with the software itself. The iDJ2 and D2 Director are built on the same Linux base, and Numark have released a software developer kit (SDK), opening up the doors for some clever clogs to come with a tweak here and there or maybe even a whole new OS - much like JJ has done for the Akai MPCs. Time will tell.
Essential Extras
In a strange twist, the iDJ2 - unlike the D2 Director - doesn't come with a keyboard. Both interfaces operate in exactly the same way and benefit enormously from USB keyboards. So quite why the iDJ2 doesn't come with one is a mystery. Numark sell this one specifically designed for the purpose but any one will do.
But while the iDJ2 is extremely portable, like throw it in a big bag portable, it's only a matter of time before it begins to show signs of wear and tear. Laptop owner who lug their around around can attest to this so it's a good idea to put in in a hard case. And yes - you guessed it - Numark can supply you with a flight case designed to keep your iDJ2 snug and protected, as well as well as keeping you associated gubbins you need to carry around with you together as well.
And importantly, included in the package is the much needed keyboard with handy slide out drawer. But not just any keyboard - this one is backlit, making operation in even the darkest corner of a seedy badly lit club is a breeze.
The case itself is your standard fodder - copious amounts of dense foam cuddling your IDJ2. You can seat the iDJ2 nice and flat or better still angle it upwards in the case. The prototype case I had has transported this demo unit around the globe over the last half a year or so and has held up very well under the strain of couriers who couldn't give a toss for the contents, rather than the owner of said case gently transporting it even it it could withstand a serious amount of pain.
Summing Up
When I first saw the iDJ2 all those years ago (well... 2), I had high hopes of fiddling with a mini jack of all tricks box for all styles of DJs. What I found was the modern equivalent of the old dual CD decks in a flight case rig, but lacking the bulk and encompassing the benefits of the digital age, but also lacking a few things to make it appeal to everyone.
While the iDJ2 has a lot of bases covered here, I feel that effects might have been a worthwhile addition. Given the possible main market, a few really simple ones like echo and phaser would make all the difference to this unit, especially as it's an all in one box meaning post-fader effects would be easy to implement. The only option is to add effects to the master output.
The jogwheel performance is also somewhat disappointing. To me, if you're going to add a scratch function - even if it is an effect - it should be added properly, which the iDJ2 most definitely isn't. I do hope that the R&D team can make this aspect better in subsequent releases.
Niggles and missed opportunities aside, the intended audience will find a near perfect unit that does almost everything they need in a compact and incredibly portable box. Provided you put in the time in prepping your music collection, the iDJ2 will reward you with a truly great mixing experience, while leaving money in the bank. For regular mixing, it's a lot of fun but importantly operating at a professional level, elevating this above the toy that many will perceive it to be.
Ratings
Build Quality - 8.5/10
This is a solid little unit that should withstand the rigours of playing out on a regular basis. Just remember to wrap it up safe.
Sound Quality - 9/10
Despite being a small and relatively inexpensive unit, the iDJ2 has impressive sound.
Features and Implementation - 8/10
As a straight forward mixing box, it does almost everything you might expect. The jog wheel implementation could have been better and the looping isn't as well done as other Numark units.
Value for Money - 9/10
You get everything you need to rock a crowd for the price of decent CD deck, with all the real convenience of a small package to boot.
Bottom Line
This is the true DJ in a box for the digital age. The target market will be very happy indeed.