Hi,
This post is about: USB soundcards, party set-ups, software
I've been asked to be the music man and DJ at my sister's wedding and would like your thoughts on what type of mixer I could rent or buy.
Basically, there will be an iPod (iRiver), a laptop, and probably a discman. As we don't have a fixed playlist, we will chose what to play next as the party progresses. This means we want to monitor one source through headphones while the other is playing. Pretty standard mixer with crossfader needed I guess.
But which will work well considering the inputs (3.5mm mini-jacks or RCA phonos if I use adapters), input levels (laptop and iRiver headphone output) and output (unknown speaker system set-up). Any advice on affordable (but cheap) mixer that would work?
We're going to rent some speaker system set-up which I imagine is hooked up to a pre-amp. We don't know which yet, but it's a small party (~40 people) in a small space, and it should not be too loud. The input of this pre-amp can be the output of the mixer, right? Or do we need to rent something else?
What should I look out for when renting the mixer, pre-amp, speakers, ...?
Thirdly, it would be cool to have a laptop DJ who could monitor one song while the other is playing and maybe also crossfade. This way I would need a PC with two seperate output channels. I've been looking into if I can just hook up a USB (1.1) soundcard and use it together (simultanously) with a pre-installed PCI soundcard, and use some software that can make crossfades between the two. But
what PC hardware will allow me to do that? I've checked some M-audio, Hercules and Turtle Beach but they all don't seem to do what I want. Or they are overpriced (digital output seems overkill, and most cheapish rentable pre-amps are analog, right)? I think analog if good enough, so what hardware/software do I need?
I hope you people have some good answers to make this a super party
