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Forum: General Discussion

Topic: Dennon mc7000 setup advise
Hi all

After years of waiting for my mc6000 to die, I finally came to the assumption it's going to live forever!

Keep promising myself a newer controller with extra fancy buttons and lights, but don't really need a stand alone unit, so my logical upgrade would be the mc7000

So picked up a second hand one at the right price, it's got a duff mic2 button, but that should be simple. To sort out

After a couple of hours of play, I must admit, it's a whole new experience, the pads and pad modes, file browsing etc are making so many of the VDJ features more accessible, I am currently using the default mapping.

So here are a few questions

Has anybody updated or custom mapped the mc7000, to take into account stems, and other new features

Dennon asio, it's currently running asio atb44kz, I am assuming I need asio, I obviously dropped asio in favour of wasapi on the mc6000, so I guess my question is, is the mc7000 with asio nice and stable

I feel this controller will be a steeping stone to a brand new unit, but I don't know what to choose, the mcx8000 main feature is it's stand alone capability, which I would never use, so what competes or betters the 7000?

I guess it's time to sell the mc6000, it's been such a great bit of kit......
 

Posted Sun 26 Feb 23 @ 7:36 am
Hello young fella, haven't seen you on here for a while and yes to the remapping, read on........
Oh, incidentally I'm on a Mac, not that it matters as it was the same on my bootcamped Mac on Windows 10 (with ASIO drivers don't need drivers on the Macs).

I still have my original MC6000 Mk1 in its box stored somewhere needing the play buttons repaired and one of the faders resoldered. It was the 3rd time it happened to the same fader. But after using the CUE buttons to start tracks while DJing weddings, I took the plunge and replaced it with the MC6000 Mk2, which I still have and is still working 100%. After a few years of using that I decided to upgrade and got a Pioneer DDJ1000. I used for 3 months, but, didn't like it and sold it. I then tried the Roland 707m and really saw that as the ideal replacement for the MC6000 Mk2. Unfortunately, I had a bad experience with it losing the Bass during a couple of gigs. I never found a fix for it and sent it back, I only came across 1 other person on here that had the same bad experience. Everyone else rants and raves about the Roland and I'm tempted to have another try with one, dunno, just not sure ..........and then I bought the MC7000 which is now my main Controller. Two reasons to upgrade are the Pads and a bit more room to move about. It will be a hard act to follow, I am like you wondering where next?

On all these Controllers, I re-programmed the default mapping for the way I like to work. I use a combination of keys to enable smartPlay then pitchLock and pitchReset. As an Open Format DJ I will beat mix for maybe 30-40% of a gig. With these key combinations, I can easily switch on smartPlay (SYNC) then pitchLock and finally pitchReset. When I want to come out of beat mixing I hit smartPlay again to switch off the (SYNC) button. It works great for me.

DENON MC7000

Shift + CENSOR - to switch SmartPlay on/off
var '$shift' ? holding 500ms ? goto_first_beat : smart_play

VINYL - pitch reset slowly, double press resets instantly
pitch_reset

SLIP - pitch lock on/off
pitch_lock

You don't need to change the mapping for stems, it's in the pad section onscreen. Just select from the dropdown menu different pads for different purposes. Stems, Hotcues, Stems+FX and did you know there is also Remix Points in there that are created when your files are analysed???



My Systems Specs;
Main - M1 MacBook Pro (14-inch, 2022), Apple Silicon M1 Pro, 16gb, 500 gb SSD, macOS Ventura 13.2.1, VirtualDJ v2023-m b7469 (Early Access).

External WD Passport Ultra 2Tb HD formatted exFat containing Music & Video databases.

Controllers - Denon MC7000, Denon MC6000 Mk2.

Backup - MacBook Pro 15-inch 2017 (Touch Bar), 2.9 GHz Intel Core i7, 16gb 2133 MHz LPDDR3 Memory, Radeon Pro 560 4096 MB, Intel HD Graphics 630 n1536 MB, macOS Ventura 13.2.1, 500gb SSD. NTFS for Windows installed. VirtualDJ 2023-i b7445.

Bootcamped with Windows 10 Pro Vers. 22H2 x64bit.
VirtualDJ 2023-i b7445.

Hope this gives you even more fun with the MC7000 :-)
 

Posted Sun 26 Feb 23 @ 9:40 am
Thanks for your reply

Yes good use of the censor button mapping, I generally have both original and clean edits of tracks, so it won't get used as labeled

I have remapped the effects so that the three rotary controls are for the main parameter for each effect, not really looked into the mapping indepth yet, hoping you can map shift and the rotary for the secondery parameter

As for the mc6000, I would drop some new faders and button in it, they still seem to me fetching good money, I have just looked and my local facebook marketplace there are two listed, £350 and £400!

 

Posted Sun 26 Feb 23 @ 11:40 am
That'll be the one you bought off me in 2018 for £335.99 as I still have the email :)

It was like new when you got it. I had no idea they would hold their value so well.

Regarding the MCX8000 the standalone is great as an instant backup and you can use it for the last couple of songs at the end of the night and pack your laptop away. I have two of them and they're excellent. Just remember on the prime 2/4 you need to reboot the unit to switch between VDJ and standalone where with the MCX8000 it's seamless and you can mix n match inputs.
 

Posted Sun 26 Feb 23 @ 11:53 am
sureview wrote :

As for the mc6000, I would drop some new faders and buttons in it, they still seem to be fetching good money, I have just looked and in my local Facebook marketplace, there are two listed, £350 and £400!

Iirc I paid around £750 for my MC6000 with an extra 2 years warranty and I bought a Magma flight case for it at the time from DJ Superstore in Essex. The MC6000 Mk2 lives in the same flight case now. A couple of years ago Big Ron on here was interested in it, I offered it to him for £150, but he refused so, I still have it. As for replacing the faulty fader and play buttons, I'm afraid it's above my pay grade and beyond my skills. 🤷‍♂️

kradcliffe wrote :

Regarding the MCX8000 the standalone is great as an instant backup and you can use it for the last couple of songs at the end of the night and pack your laptop away. I have two of them and they're excellent.

I always wanted the MCX8000 for those very reasons but couldn't find one at the time and that's how I ended up with the MC7000 instead. I may still look for one to replace my MC7000 & MC6000 Mk2, but, as I'm in semi-retirement there's no urgency.
 

Posted Sun 26 Feb 23 @ 2:56 pm
kradcliffe wrote :
on the prime 2/4 you need to reboot


You do, but the mixer still functions while that happens, so you can feed in a signal from e.g. your phone or just use the mic while the unit switches. I've not used an MCX8000 but the standalone functionality on the Prime 4 is excellent IMO/IME.
 

Posted Sun 26 Feb 23 @ 4:00 pm
kradcliffe wrote :
That'll be the one you bought off me in 2018 for £335.99 as I still have the email :)

It was like new when you got it. I had no idea they would hold their value so well.

Regarding the MCX8000 the standalone is great as an instant backup and you can use it for the last couple of songs at the end of the night and pack your laptop away. I have two of them and they're excellent. Just remember on the prime 2/4 you need to reboot the unit to switch between VDJ and standalone where with the MCX8000 it's seamless and you can mix n match inputs.


kradcliffe wrote :
That'll be the one you bought off me in 2018 for £335.99 as I still have the email :)

It was like new when you got it. I had no idea they would hold their value so well.

Regarding the MCX8000 the standalone is great as an instant backup and you can use it for the last couple of songs at the end of the night and pack your laptop away. I have two of them and they're excellent. Just remember on the prime 2/4 you need to reboot the unit to switch between VDJ and standalone where with the MCX8000 it's seamless and you can mix n match inputs.


Yes it's was my second mc6000, the one I had previously was well gigged, but I still sold it for £250, so it was quite a cheap upgrade at the time, l love the dennon build quality, and they are resonable to repair, parts are not so easy to come by, but at least you can all the essentials, buttons and faders, which generaly are the only things that fail/wear out

I did consider the mcx8000, I know it's nice to have the standalone capability, but I always have a backup must player, I have a couple of cortex units and a Kam twin usb player, so I use these for playing music while setting up and end of night pack away

Again semi retired now, although, once a DJ always a Dj, maybe the glory days are behind me, but you all know what it's like when you have command of the dance floor!

I should really just sell up and move on to a nice sedate hobby where u don't have to pay PLI, pat test everything, and subscribe to a music pool......

Then again... Party on?
 

Posted Sun 26 Feb 23 @ 4:41 pm
Ahem, it does mean I have lost the 19 inch rack format.... Better look for a flight case....
 

Posted Sun 26 Feb 23 @ 4:42 pm
Was very brave today
Decide to take a look at the dodgy mic 2 button

So after removing all the knobs, face plate, back terminal board, so many screws I have lost count



About another 30 screws to remove the left deck pcb

This unit has definitely been opened up before

Found that the plastic mic 2 button was not sat on its little plastic pegs correctly, the actual switch was fine, so 30 seconds to put right, no parts required, still building it back up

 

Posted Mon 27 Feb 23 @ 6:20 pm
You are a brave man. Rather you than me.

Incidentally, when I first got my MC7000 I ordered a flight case with a sliding shelf. I sent it back almost immediately as it was way too heavy. So, I got one of these instead, it just means I have to take it out of the case at gigs to use it.

Controller case
 

Posted Mon 27 Feb 23 @ 7:28 pm
Awesome amazing work !

 

Posted Mon 27 Feb 23 @ 8:16 pm
djles.co.uk wrote :
You are a brave man. Rather you than me.

Incidentally, when I first got my MC7000 I ordered a flight case with a sliding shelf. I sent it back almost immediately as it was way too heavy. So, I got one of these instead, it just means I have to take it out of the case at gigs to use it.

Controller case


Thanks for the info on the case, I had looked at some solid flight cases, but the weight was an issue although everything I have is generally flight cased, I may give one of those a try
 

Posted Tue 28 Feb 23 @ 7:02 pm
It's a great case, it was Mike that runs Phase One that suggested it when I was there in person. I also got an acrylic Decksaver for it too. Just one thing, I put the MC7000 in with the front at the bottom when carrying because the Earth post on the back gets in the way and would cause issues.
 

Posted Tue 28 Feb 23 @ 7:12 pm
Well after re assembly, and having a good play around with the unit, fitting a couple of replacement knobs I thought I had done

Until random problems with the unit not starting up, after doing the usual tests, I found it was heat sensative, so probably a dry cap in the on board psu or a fulty CPU_RSET line

So another strip down to find the culprit


Although the unit runs off 5v, looks like the internal cpu is 3.3v, with no diagram it's hard to tell exactly where the fault is, but it's a dry 100uf cap right next to a sma ic (probably the _rset) and the switching 3.3v supply

Anyway replacement cap and it all powers up correctly every time now, phew
 

Posted Wed 29 Mar 23 @ 2:51 pm