I started paying attention to this recently after a few posts on the Polish DJ group about console freezing.
During a party, after 2-3 hours of playing music, I and other users noticed the console’s performance slowing down.
Waveforms can stutter slightly, and searching for songs and switching sources also slows down. When discussing with users,
the problem particularly affects people who have consoles in a fitted case. So the problem may be related to the console overheating.
Many users have confirmed that after briefly turning off the console, the problem disappears for another 2-3 hours.
Hi, another possible cause that’s been discussed here is large album art leading to performance issues… some people have found that having really high res artwork tied to their files is causing the units to stutter.
Can you check your artwork sizes to see if anything is say 30/40mb.
Yes, my entire library is first made for me via mp3tag, where I change the album covers.
All the tags are removed, only the artist, title and cover remain. Then I upload everything to Engine DJ.
If it were a problem with the covers, the console would be slow from the start. After turning it on, it’s fine for the first 2-3 hours. Everything works smoothly, searches quickly, switches between sources, etc. After that, it starts to slow down. It looks like Chinese tablets with low RAM.
Fair enough. It might be to do with your coffin case then, and ventilation.
Just an FYI, there is a way of having your logo displayed on the Prime 4 jog wheels whilst retaining the correct artwork on the file. It involves loading it to the root folder of your performance drive.
there’s a possibility there’s a few potential causes. Many users have no problems with using them in a case but others have had similar issues with heat building up as the air vents don’t circulate air efficiently. It’s a strong possibility but I’m unsure if a quick reboot would be enough to cool the unit down again to continue so it the problem is fixed with a reboot then there could be a memory leak or an issue with album art or database management like a corrupted playlist etc. definitely try and clear out any residual data in the Engine DJ database by using the clean up option within Engine DJ settings and keep any drive plugged in as it will do them all together.
I’d definitely try reducing it to 600x600 and see if you can tell a difference. Try removing album art from your tracks and using the logo.png method.
Basically take a PNG copy of your logo and rename it to just logo.png and drop that onto your Engine DJ folder on your music source. This will use this logo over any album art meaning you can delete your album art from your files and still have your logo. You can change this file as often as you like so you don’t have to update all your files each time to tweak your logo.
My album cover isn’t very resource-intensive. Album covers from services like Tidal have higher resolutions, at least 1600x1600px and 72DPI.
The library is clean and newly built, with a 1TB SSD, an MX500, and about 2,200 songs.
This isn’t just me; I started looking into this about a month ago after a user discussion on the DJ forum on Facebook.
Most of us noticed a drop in console performance after some time after turning it on during a party.
I’ll try this logo.png, thanks for the tip, but I doubt it’s a logo issue. I have a homemade case and left enough room for ventilation. Users without a case have also noticed this issue. I’ll try recording a video of how the console performs at the next party.
We were only touting it as a possibilty based on some other discussions here on the forum, it could be a number of things though, it doesnt sound like it is your album art but just wanting to eliminate that as a possibility.
Your SSD certainly looks fast enough too, i use a WD Blue in mine and its rock solid. Do you have several drives connected at once and flipping between DJs?
There is an easily accessible diagnostic menu that shows the amount of available memory (I suspect that is running out in your case) and after a fresh boot my Prime Go+ shows 692.93mb free.
Every time someone posts about it here the details of how to access it are instantly deleted, so maybe contact support and they will tell you how to do it. You can then have the overlay on your screen and watch to see if the memory goes really low during a session.
If you have your unit in a road case make sure your side vents are not covered and place a 6cm GDSTIME USB Blower Fan 6cm n the back vent holes using double sided tape and power it off a spare USB port to get the hot air out.
Same problem with SC Live 4. It starts slightly lagging after 2-3 hours of constant using and really badly lagging after 8 hours. It’s going worse faster when I use streaming platform from time to time. Today I had a sound impacts… After every gig I wonder about going back to pioneer and rekordbox. It was stable all the time even when I was using STEMs. I miss stress free gigs…
I built my own case, and it allows for free airflow, and the holes aren’t clogged with dust. I was considering some modifications regarding cooling and forced airflow, but I would mount the fan inside the case. I’m in contact with a local electronics specialist and we’re looking for a solution.
I recorded a video of the console’s behavior after playing for a while at a party (2-3 hours). It gets worse afterward. Restarting the console helps for a while, but the problem keeps coming back.
There is a new library on the console, a 1TB MX500 Crucial drive - about 2,400 songs (~57GB used), only tags containing the artist and title.
If I post about it on here it will get deleted as I’m guessing they don’t want everyone accessing it in case it causes a problem. Raise a support ticket as I said above and they may allow you to access it to see if the available RAM is running out.
I see that the majority of forum replies here have mentioned your particular flight case your particular prime 4, your particular hard drive etc - and I am very much inclined to believe them. Also watch out for anything else in your flightcase which might be heating up too - power supplies, phone chargers, lighting controllers, radio mic receivers, amps etc.
Are you really really sure about this phrase that I’ve quoted above? I’m curious because any temperature which any component inside the prime had reached only after several hours of usage, would be unlikely to plummet down to cold, when the prime was switched off for a few seconds, and then take 2-3 hours again to hit the temperatures which you think may have caused it to slow down …. As an example, if you turn off a chip for 10 seconds, which reached 95 degrees …. 10 seconds later it’s still going to be 85-90 degrees, not 30 degrees.
I started a few threads on the Denon Facebook forums and described the same thing I described here. The response is good, and most people have similar symptoms to mine. Yes, I’m sure it’s my case, as I tested the console itself, spread out on a table, and the symptoms were the same: it started lagging after about 2-3 hours.
My SSD is a Crucial MX500 1TB.
I understand the laws of physics and know that restarting the console, i.e., turning it off for 20 seconds, won’t cool anything inside from 100°C to 20°C, but it helps temporarily. Therefore, the second option I’m considering is something with software that’s “clogging up.”
