I think the #1 problem to solve is being able to find your tracks. People have varying opinions on this, and it will also depend on how you want to mix. Are you the type of person that wants to create a set list, prepare those tracks, and mix those tracks? Or are you someone who want to get on the decks without any real plan and just go with the flow? Either way, you’ll want to know where your tracks are, and this might influence your decisions.
Some DJs only mix one genre, and they store their tracks logically related to when they find the tracks. So you might have folders like 2025-01, 2025-02, 2025-03 … and you store the tracks you find each month in its own folder. Many people can keep track of when they found songs, esp when related to other tracks they’ve found. This also has the benefit of preventing you from having thousands of tracks in a single playlist/directory, which can improve performance.
Other DJs may mix multiple genres, and rely heavily on Smart Playlists that evaluate Genre tag, and could still follow the previous example when saving their files, or just dump them all into a single directory.
Either way, over time, you’ll likely want to create custom curated lists of different vibes or style. Unfortunately Engine DJ OS is lacking a lot of features that will help you curate and develop your library over time.
In addition to finding your tracks, your storage medium will have an impact on how you organize or export your collection. For example, if you’re using the Prime 4+ with an internal SSD, you don’t need to be as careful as if you’ve only got a 128GB USB or SD card.
One of the goals of these softwares is to allow you to have a large collection of tracks, split them up and organize them, and export subsets of your collections to different storage medium. So if you only play Techno, but you have 200GB of Techno, you need a way to determine which of that Techno you export to your 128GB drive. Is it the newest Techno or Techno from the past three months? Maybe a label likes your mixes and starts sending you promos so you want to create a drive with just that label’s tracks… etc.
or maybe you play House and Techno. Does it all fit onto a single USB? Do you split and put House on one USB and Techno on the other?
These are the types of things you need to think about now so that over time you’re able to accomplish your goals effectively.
Another thing to consider is where you plan to perform you sets. If you’re at home and never plan to play at the club, you have less to worry about. You mention you’re just getting started, so this may be some time away, but some people play on other equipment than their own, which takes additional consideration.
For example, if I use Rekordbox to manage my collection and export to my drive, I can go to the club and play on Pioneer gear, or I can stick the stick into my Prime 4+ and it will convert the Rekordbox collection to an Engine DJ collection on the fly for me.
If I use Serato, I get a lot of flexibility, but I lose the ability of using my hardware standalone. That would mean I’d always need my laptop with me. Many people don’t mind that and prefer the flexibility of Serato over standalone.
Pioneer has near-zero incentive to play nice with Denon, so if I use Engine DJ Desktop to create my USB, it has no compatibility with Pioneer and it’ll be a long time before that ever happens, if it does ever happen.
Unfortunately, Denon hasn’t provided us with many on-device features that allow us to manage our libraries or take notes as we perform live. On-Device Color, On-Device Play Count and On-Device Rating have not been implemented in Engine DJ Desktop nor Engine DJ OS. This means that regardless, you’re going to need to carry around a notebook and pen to take notes until these basic library management features are implemented. As a forum member, you can vote on these features if you believe they would improve your experience in Engine DJ.
As someone new, I’d recommend you work in Engine DJ Desktop at first and get a few sets under your belt using it. This will help you to make sure you are successful, and don’t run into any odd issues complicated by other software. Once you have a few sets in, you’ll have a better idea of if there is anything more you need. You can come back to the forum with your specific questions and see if anybody has any suggestions.
As for CUE, I won’t argue there is zero benefit, but I will say that because I can see the full waveform of the tracks, I don’t feel the need for adding CUEs to my tracks. That being said, I do believe that the new Rekordbox does have functionality to auto-CUE your tracks for you.