Why does Denon insist on being inferior to Pioneer?

This is a serious question. I am not trolling by an means and I hope this gets the attention of someone at Denon. There is a very simple feature that would push the Prime 4 WAY above any Pioneer controller with a matter of a simple Firmware update. I’ve seen this request on the forum for YEARS and even contemplated taking my Prime 4 back because of it

The feature is simple: Adjust the BPM in the Prime 4. Can someone please tell me why this is so difficult to do? Is it a hardware limitation? This could very easily be accomplished with a simple button in settings to “ignore ID3 tag for BPM”. The problem is that a lot of ID3 tags on Beatport are incorrect but there is no way to bypass this in the Prime 4. The only solution is to download the track, put it in Engine, and then put it on a USB.

That’s step 1. Step 2 is to simply adjust the BPM manually. A tap feature would be nice or at least program the BPM in on the touch screen. It’s so painfully simple that it’s infuriating.

You have a GREAT product! Blows Pioneer out of the water! Stand alone, 4 decks, a multitude of effects, even installing a freaking HARD DRIVE! So why can’t this very simple update be added to the firmware?

I do a weekly DJ set (as many of you probably do). Often I will tell my audience “pick a genre” then just go through beatport and mix tracks on the fly. For a live performance, of course I wouldn’t rely on streaming my music into the player but for online streaming… it’s essential. I don’t want to have to dig through a bunch of MP3s every week and then throw them into Engine. What am I missing here in the complexity of this?

Beatmatching isn’t a problem but when it comes to loops and other effects the incorrect BPMs are difficult , if not impossible to work with.

Which brings me to the Engine software itself. The least you guys can do is put in a beatport link so we can manually drop tracks into Engine and set cue points, proper BPMs, etc. Even though the track doesn’t exist on the hard drive or USB itself, could engines database not contain some metadata for Beatport that it looks to when loading a Beatport track? That way we don’t have to buy tracks we’ll only play once in off the cuff DJ sets done solely for practice and entertainment?

Come on guys! You’re so close! JUST DO IT ALREADY!!! What’s the use of having a Prime 4 if you have to connect Serato to have these functions? Might as well get a $1000 Pioneer Controller and Recordbox.

Cheers.

4 Likes

What’s up @chrisgeo,

When you say Denon is inferior to Pioneer, in which way? What does Pioneer gear do that Denon has yet to accomplish?

Have you submitted a feature request to ignore/override/edit the BPM on the fly?

It sounds as if the issue is more with Beatport than Denon, because if their BPMs are incorrect, it will impact users regardless of the platform that they use (i.e. Serato, Pioneer, Engine, etc.)

What’s up brother. Thanks for the reply. Well, from what I’ve seen, the DDJ-1000 connects to recordbox and streams Beatport Link. It also saves your music on USB in recordbox format. This is a hurdle for DJs to overcome when mixing on standard club gear so that’s one big point against Denon that they’ll never be able to overcome. The Prime 4 connects to Serato which is cool but what’s the point of having a stand alone unit with a bad ass 10 inch touch screen if you’re going to use Serato?

Price point: $1000-$1200 for a controller that is already Recordbox compliant vs $1800 for a stand alone that you have to jump through hoops to use Recordbox would be my first point and if you want to use it in that fashion (with Serato) it’s basically nothing more than a controller like the DDJ-1000.

The tech in the Prime 4 is EXTRAORDINARY. I’m sure there are Pioneer DJ’s banging their heads against the wall because the stand-alone Pioneer doesn’t have a 4 deck set up and wi-fi out the box. This requires a TON of programming and redesigning their hardware to compete with the Prime 4.

I think my frustration stems from the simplicity of these much needed updates to Engine and Prime. It seems so simple: “bypass ID3 tag on import”. The prime’s algorithm is great. I can throw a track I got on Beatport with the wrong BPM and ID3 tag stripped and the Prime 4 will calculate the proper BPM. So the tech is there. However, why doesn’t Denon implement this? I’ve gone through firmare and Engine update after update, waiting for this issue to be resolved.

Perhaps my title was a bit harsh. Tech-wise the Prime 4 is the best on the market but this fatal flaw really loses points in my opinion and it’s such a simple fix.

I’ve contacted Beatport. They just replied “yea, we know, a lot of the BPMs are incorrect”. I’m just thinking about this from a logistical point.

What’s easier? Add a function to the firmware to bypass the ID3 BPM or go through tens of thousands of tracks and update the bpm ID3 tag. And how much am I paying? Beatport $10 a month. Denon, $1800. Sure, after 180 months, I’ll have paid Beatport as much as I did Denon but out the door, Denon was a hefty expense. Which is why I’m turning to Denon for a solution.

And again, if I was the only one complaining about this then I’d understand but this request has been on the forum for years now.

People ask what I spin on and I always talk about the Prime 4 and what a great unit it is… but I have to also explain to my audience why I don’t recommend people buy one. I want to be Denon’s biggest cheerleader for people looking to get into DJing, back into DJing (like myself coming from a vinyl background) and I’d really like to see more and more Pros using Denon gear.

I write complex codes and algorithms for various applications. Unless it’s a hardware limitation that I’m just not aware of, I don’t understand why this very simple function can’t be added even at the basic level of “ignore ID3 BPM tag on import”.

Ugh. It’s literally just a few lines of code in the firmware!

1 Like

Perhaps You would like to vote on this feature, so it gets implemented…?

Here it is for You: https://community.enginedj.com/t/better-bpm-editing-engine-dj-os/36815/31

This was made explicitly on the users request, that engine prioritise the id3 tags over analysis. That was when engine ‘s algorithm was not detecting bpm as good as it does now. So we are now starting to ask to give us maybe an option to change the bpm by hand, use the tag or use the algorithm to do its job and eventually correct it.

Ta Daaaa! Whole topic summed up succinctly by Noiseriser.

If you want “ bpm adjust” added to prime 4, spend one of your votes on that request.

2 Likes

I completely agree with you, this bpm edit feature was already implemented in the mcx8000 (why did they remove it?), and it has been one of the most requested feature for 4 years now!! 4 years and still waiting, for a really basic and important feature that was already there…

I really think that the ultimate heads or bosses from Inmusic, Pioneer DJ, have some kind of pact or consensus, and they determine which features has every brand, and also determine the pace of development in the dj hardware industry. I am not trolling, this is what I think.

If I had the knowledge and the funds, I would open a dj hardware factory

1 Like

If the funds are there, the knowledge would not be an issue (many smart people in the world look for a decent job). As for features that make their way in to the devices - I don’t think that any standalone device has it now (meaning devices in production, not discontinued).

There is not one pioneer standalone device that allows you to adjust the BPM onboard. The 3000 doesn’t even analyze tracks on the player, everything must be done in Rekordbox first.

11 Likes

I have to admit that Denon didn’t quite meet my expectations in this area (standalone usage) either.

I download quite a lot of music and then add it to my engine database. I build a perfect beatgrid, set colored hotcues with individual labels, tag everything in detail with my own descriptions, assign stars and then sort the songs appropriately into different playlists.

It’s not that much fun. I thought that if I buy the SC6000, I can do this work on the devices themselves in the future (at least that’s how I understood the advertising with “standalone”). I thought I could combine the pleasant with the useful and edit the whole stuff during mixing.

But now I sit again in front of the computer and do all the stuff in Engine Prime for hours. At least I can sort the playlists on the units.

2 Likes

I have to say, claiming that Denon is inferior to Pioneer because the Denon’s don’t have a feature that the Pioneers ALSO don’t have takes a certain kind of creative thinking that is really special. Thank you for being so unique!

11 Likes

Always love it when people come on the forum to say a competitor does more, when in reality they don’t. Just because it doesn’t work the way they thought or want it too, they go on the attack. Sad really.

6 Likes

I advise you to play with the macbook, using serato and the keyboard so you should carry less weight than the denon, and you would have your functionality that you have requested so much, :slight_smile:

1 Like

So in short, your advice is “don’t buy Denon”? Yea, unfortunately, I’m having to give people the same advice. Hoping to change that though.

This topic was automatically closed 24 hours after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.