djay for Mac and iPad review, video hands-on and giveaway

We’ve covered djay and the djay Remote app’s release, but I think the video (on the next page) shows you how awesome the two are together. I’m not a professional DJ, however. I understand many of the basic concepts and tools, as I’ve seen some former roommates practicing their skills — and skills beyond merely loading up the Electric Slide, too. But djay is accessible to anyone who wants to make a mix for a party on up to real, pro DJs who are looking for an electronic alternative to lugging around a box of records and a couple of turntables. I’m not sure djay can completely replace a full rig for a pro, however, but it comes very close.

Be sure to read through to the end as two lucky readers will win a copy of djay the Mac application and the iPhone remote app.

Interface

The UI for djay is meant to simulate having two turntables and a simple EQ/mixer in front of you. Added to the right is an iTunes-like playlist manager and some buttons to enable audio input/output (more on this later) and samples. Overall it’s a simple, yet powerful interface that puts everything at your fingertips. Plus, there are ample keyboard shortcuts available for almost every necessary function in the application.

The iPhone interface (which I preferred to use on an iPad — the app scales up nicely but is not universal) is a subset of the Mac app, focusing on one turntable at a time and giving you a larger, more tactile surface to spin the record back and forth. My biggest complaint here is simply that if you are a professional DJ who is used to having minute control over the platter as it spins, you’ll find djay, when you release the surface, will only spin back up in the direction it was going — in other words, it is not 100% accurate as a turntable simulator. However, for most applications (simply providing a quick break or scratch) it does OK.

I’ve included a video on the next page of how you can interface a MIDI controller with djay for even more “real world” controls.