Dave,
Believe it or not I had exactly the same idea as you a
couple of weeks ago when I replaced the CD drive in my
machine at work and brought the old one home with the idea of having a second drive in my machine
that I could use solely for playing CDs.
The prospect of having a fully featured CD mixing system
in your PC for just the cost of an extra drive and
software is pretty stunning it has to be said and if it
were done properly it should blow most of the dedicated
dual CD players out of the water EXCEPT (like you say)
for the interface which is still going to be confined to
point, click, crash etc...... (maybe you could use
mouse/jpystick/trackball movement to simulate the
turntable wheel?)
ideas like this are needed to move mixing on to the next
level and DJs who don't accept that are going to die a
death..
I probably haven't given this as much thought as you but
to my mind the advantages would be:
you wouldn't be restricted to pitching up/down by only
8%
the program could be made to actually sync the beats for
you!
the potential for sampling and mixing on the fly would be
great! there's too many possibilities to mention
basically all the advantages of CDs, samplers, and computers combined
into something that should by far oustrip a pair of turntables in its
creative potential.......
and the disadvantages :
computers don't like sweaty nightclubs
surely some minor hardware mods would have to be made to
a PC for it to be able to mix 2 CD outputs and leave a
channel for cueing?
wouldn't the above put off casual downloaders?
the interface
the interface
the interface
vinyl DJs would HATE you!
Anyway, it's a very exciting idea and I hope you succeed
in bringing it to fruition.
That aside I'd just like to say I think the "Anti CDJ"
attitude amongst British clubbers is very retrospective.
Dance music is (supposed to be) a progressive art form
and the DJs who make the transition NOW from vinyl to CD
are going to have a major advantage in a few years time
when vinyl finally dies off.
It's the same with the Roland 909 and 303. These sounds
have just about been worked to death yet still people
resist change. To me the 303 is now just about the
equivalent of the electric guitar : Yes, electric guitars
were very new and exciting in the 50's but 40 years later?
NOT!
Ditto the 303, we've been hearing it for nearly 10 years
now!
Respect
Mike