BPM Analysis & the 195 BPM Artificial Ceiling

Legacy Products Engine PRIME
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Greetings DenonDJ Forums - this is my first post. I picked up an sc5000 a week ago in the hopes that the Denon players could/will replace my Pioneer CDJ-2000nxs2 players.

I play a lot of music that averages around 190BPM though can range as high as 210-215 bpm. I’m curious why Denon (as of Dec 27 2018) chose to cap the BPM analysis at 195 bpm?

I totally get that the majority of DJs out there do not require a BPM analysis higher than this - but hundreds of records and tracks come out every month exceeding this range. I’ll assume that Denon hasn’t taken an aesthetic stance regarding 200 BPM music, so perhaps the need is just something that hasn’t been considered? Or maybe something is planned for the future releases?

Looking forward to learning more about this player, seeing how Engine evolves, and ending my dependence on Pioneer DJ. Thanks! matt+

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Hey @mattpositive we are aware of this issue & we are in the process of addressing it. Thank you

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Thanks for confirming that Denon is actively in the process of addressing the upper range BPM limit - opposed to a vaguely hostile, totally non-committal un-answer one might imagine receiving at certain rival existing Support/Forums. I’ve only been on here for a week after picking up a sc5000 but already it feels so much better checking in here to read the latest posts/replies, than I used to feel when staying current with some other forum. Looking forward to the future!

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I’m a open format Dj, but Denon people, please, Why can’t we manually change the bpm in engine prime? I mean this isn’t rocket science.

I am, Not happy with this purchase of sc5000 prime, why can’t I see the music wave while connected to serato? The Denin Mcx has the screens while used with serato, but their flagship doesn’t? Who is doing the descition making here? Another things is that, it’s not so simple to drag and drop crates from Serato. However, It’s 2019 and serato, reckordbox tracktor and virtual Dj been having this feature for ever.

How is it that Sc5000’s are a profesional system but prime is in need of a MAJOR overhaul and not 6 months away, I’m talking about right now! How does Denon expects people to spend such large sums of money, and this Engine prime and I can’t even manually adjust a simple BPM in it, perhaps I don’t know how to do it, but that is even worst, because if the lack of tutorials is unprecedented for any system on the market.

There are 250 Dollar pioneer controllers that have more tutorials than the whole prime collection, So I don’t understand why was this BPM cap started to begging with. I mean the person who decided on this should not even be on the team, because obviously he had no idea about the many people that use genres above 200 bpm. Since when is Restriction ever helpful on your prepare music software?

Why do I say this? There are thousands of Latin DJ’s that Denon is not taking into account that play over 200 bpm daily in clubs weaddings and birthdays. Yet Engine prime provides highly inaccurate readings in Latin genre music and it can’t even be manipulated in Engine prime.

So the question is, when can we expect a serious overhaul on prime, that takes into account Not only Dj’s That play house music? But also other Genres like Latin music, Because if that is Denon goal just to go for house music, it should be advertised as such, that way we know there is no support for other genre Dj’s. I’m Not happy with this transition thus far, there is not fast updates for the prime series.

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Same reasons why Pioneer CDJ’s don’t have it when connected with SDJ. Nothing new, there are several topics here on forum and god knows how much on Serato and Pioneer forums. All conclude same thing: Serato does the integration with software. With SC5000 at least you get 4 deck control over SDJ.

Unlike CDJs and SC players, MCX was made from start with Serato as SDJ controller and as such got full integration

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The BPM algorithm really struggles at anything other than house or techno.

I’ve had my units for more than year now and I’ve never done one gig publicly in standalone with them. I either use the SR2 or my DJ808.

If January comes and goes…and this bpm algorithm is still not looked at…I guess its time to start reconsidering my decision to invest in the Prime set up.

Please Denon…don’t let the multi genre DJs down. Whilst this cohort may not headline festivals but we make many people happy (and a few people sad when you don’t play their request) every night of the week at the local bar/pub/wedding venue/school dance

There are other styles of music you know…even the golden boy Laidback Luke plays hip hop in his sets.

I’m rooting for you.

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Exactly 46 days ago @Chloe_DENONDJ said

After 46 days of 195+ bpm tracks piling up (and having to manually double each and every one as needed either during the time I would normally use for familiarizng myself with new tracks), I’ve simply stoped using EP. I’ve also had to stop using my sc5000 this week in order to get ready for a show that was meant to be sort of my own personal Denon DJ cheerleader routine (an sc5000, a turntable, and a sampler), but now will just be a turntables + Pioneer xdj1000mk2 thing. I’ve spent so much time wrestling with EP and related things that I failed to prepare a set of sampler material comfortable enough with to play live…mostly bad time management on my part, but the fact that I’m currently re-importing etc into RB (5 days before I play) in order to catch up to my regular workflow routine is also telling. Anyway, I posted in this thread 1) because it was the first post I made 46 days ago (not very long but it feels like kind of a lifetime of putting up with unfinished tools) and 2) posting this in this topic seems the least dramatic place. I want the Prime Ecosystem to succeed - but I’m not a religious or spiritual person and I’m done waiting .

PS. I do plan on using the sc5000 as a two channel ‘loop’ device for some projects. It is, in the end, a great machine.

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Hi @mattpositive / all

Thank you for your patience so far and continuing faith in the Denon DJ hardware and software. Just to advise, I’m personally contacting the Product and Development team today to discuss the above and will come back to you once I have a response.

Thanks

Paul

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Thanks @paul_denondj I do appreciate the response. And I totally get - in general - the position you and the support staff are in, being the first (and only) point of contact with users for Denon DJ. I realise you (and Chloe etc) are not the developers, engineers, etc - and more importantly not the MANagement. Apart from upper limit BPMs cramping my style, etc. I’ve found the Denon DJ support staff to be (just about) the most attentive and patient (without being robotic or automated… of all the major dj software companies . (One might say your staff works at a higher pulse.) Thanx, m+

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Hi again @mattpositive

True, we’re not the Developers and Engineers, but what I can add to your very kind observation of the good work our regular Forum (and Support) team here are doing, is that there are a variety of individuals from various departments, positions and international locations keeping a watchful eye on this Forum. Although all cannot regularly and continually engage in all thread activity, this includes ‘management’, ‘directors’, ‘product owners’, ‘co-ordinators’, ‘customer support’ and more. The simple reason is, we all want the same thing at whatever ‘level’ or ‘department’ we may work - to give you guys and the products you invest in, our very best service and attention.

Regarding the discussed ‘upper BPM limit’ issue. The Dev team have this on their radar for sure and are aware of this thread. Their focus and energies are on making the Engine Prime ecosystem, overall, the best it can possibly be and we have considerable resources now invested in this one goal. Obviously certain operational features take both more time and resources to improve or develop, but it is important you guys keep giving us feedback and requests however large or small in priority to your workflow.

One thing I’d like to find more about, so this can be factored into this conversation, is what musical genres, and perhaps your size estimation of the DJ marketplace that would like this additional BPM ceiling?

With best regards

Paul

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I’ll look into getting some quantitative data on what percentage of digital music sold has a greater than 195 bpm, etc. But the first talking points that come to mind are:

  1. Rekordbox analysis runs up to 255 BPM, and has for some time. Though unlike EP, when RB ‘halves’ a upper range BPM track (eg. 100 when it should be 200) you can easily bulk change the bpms - though RB usually gets the BPM right. My point isn’t that EP should have all the features RB has exactly - it’s that when there’s a choice between a two possible track management systems (being made b a dj playing 195+ material), and one of them lacks the foresight or ability to capture BPM speeds employed by many many subgenres, OR a system that has no problem capturing said data, it’s no longer a hard choice. RB may not be the ultimate standard but it’s what a significant number of people use hence are used to (cf. image for RB analysis options.

  2. Hardcore dance music is maybe the least populated dance music sub genre , but just last week, dj set streaming extraordinaire Boiler Room announced a knew ‘hard dance’ component. (I was convinced it was fake until some digging, but I have t imagine there’s some correspondence between the creation of a Hard Dance component and those that want to use media players to play hard dance music.)

  3. Online digital distros like Undergroundtekno and Toolbox records (not to mention Bandcamp) regularly sell significant inventory that is above 1965.

I have to run but i thought I’d start there.

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I still haven’t seen this feature changed to accommodate for higher BPMs above 195 and it is a few years since it was on the radar. I would like to see the BPM range up to 250 available on the Engine OS, I have a Prime 4 and play a lot of stuff over 200bpm which is read as 70bpm or other random bpm values.

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lol seems like only yesterday plus four years ago i was super hopeful about this feature. :frowning: but…awww, seeing classic Denon DJ forum staff almost makes me a little nostalgic: chloe_denondj and paul_denondj…i hope they are doing well, and thriving in whatever respective life trajectories they find themselves on. keep the dream alive

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Was it ever put into a vote-able request? There’s 3 people in this thread alone who look like they’d vote for this request if it ever got a form written up. There is a forth person in this thread “rich rich” but he’s just asking for editable bpm rather than faster-than-most-music-genres bpm detection

InMusic seem to be prioritising requests where it would benefit say 95% of users worldwide, than a feature that might only benefit 5% or users worldwide.

But hey, if the feature request was in a vote-able feature request form and hundreds of people voted for it, it might get more traction for devs to lift the upper limit.

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I have added seperate requests for Google Drive and OneDrive support, so I don’t want to add more currently. You are most welcome to add the request for the higher BPM feature though.