Just a brief note to report on my experience of using Miss Pinky with the Mackie D.2 pro, which for those of you who don't know is the first DJ mixer that connects directly to your computer by firewire.
I was hoping to bypass all the cabling, pre amp stuff that makes vinyl emulation a bit of a bore and have as a setup:
Decks - Mixer - Macbook
Nice and easy?
Well no, though the D.2 is an incredibly slick mixer, Mackie have not quite gotten this right. It does have all the necessary components such as firewire, built in soundcard, built in pre amps etc, but for some reason the routing of the audio does not allow for the audio signal coming in from misspinky vinyl to leave the turntable directly and come back in through the firewire switch at the top of each channel. The integrated soundcard just doesn't allow for it.
This basically means that the firewire function is just for using your iTunes or maybe ableton live through your mixer.
Why?
Well thats what this post is for. I am praying that someone has had a little more success with this setup than me. (or else I've just wasted a grand on a mixer). On the box of the D2 it says Traktor Scratch approved, unfortunately I have no experience of using traktor DJ and can't manage to find much info about the setup online. I still think you have to use a soundcard though and do all the usual cabling.
If you think about it, this is the future of vinyl emulation, no unplugging and reconnecting and testing audio levels and millions of tangled up cables... just decks and a mixer as it should be.
If you know, or want to know anything, please give me a shout!
Cheers Fellas