As a professional wedding and open-format DJ, I gave the SC Live 4 and Engine DJ ecosystem a real shot — but after extensive testing and gig use, I’ve decided to return it.
The deal-breaker? Beatgrids and tempo reliability.
If you use transition tracks, wordplay edits, slams, or segue tracks — anything that shifts tempo or breaks out of a 4-bar loop — Engine DJ just doesn’t handle it well. The software assumes every track has a static BPM, and without flexible beatgrids (like Traktor or Serato offer), the system frequently slips mid-mix. You can’t delete grids on the fly, and even locked grids sometimes get overwritten or misinterpreted.
This led to:
Lighting shows falling out of sync (SoundSwitch relies on Engine’s grids)
Tracks drifting when mixing by ear
Hours of prep undone because Engine tried to “fix” already-prepped files
No true workaround unless you hard-prep everything in Traktor and export with locked dummy grids
I spent weeks trying every workaround — Lexicon, Traktor prep, manual locks — but Engine’s limitations made the system unreliable for high-pressure, cue-specific sets like weddings.
For club DJs playing standard house or techno sets, this may not matter. But if you’re a wedding or open-format DJ who mixes across genres and tempos, I’d hold off until Denon/Engine adds proper beatgrid flexibility and better tempo handling.
Polite heads-up for anyone considering it. The hardware is solid — the software just isn’t there yet.
Engine dj has flexible beat gridding. Not automatic yet, but you can adjust it to match the real tempo changes.
You can’t delete the bit grid on the fly, but you can adjust it to match what you need.
Engine lighting will follow the tempo of your beat grids as good as you made the grids.
I use Traktor very often too, and I have to say, that Traktor beat grid is actually less accurate than engine. Even on simple techno tracks.
Track drift when mixing by ear - that comes down only to your skill. Many users don’t have this problem. I never had a drift when mixing by ear even on very first Denon prime decks.
As for weddings, I know many wedding / corporate event djs, that use prime 4 and sc live 4 for their gigs, and they never had a smallest complaint about the beat grids or engine lighting.
Also when it goes for some druk and bass (where beat is less predictable for the software), there is not many things to correct.
It’s worth to get more in depth how engine analyses the tracks and how it grids it. Selecting proper analysis ranges is also very important. When you will understand what and why it does, the workflow will get much easier and the program will do exactly what you want.
Sounds like you need to re-grid your tracks in Ableton or similar or buy quantized versions from Mastermix. Fluid beatgridding isn’t here yet for most softwares so you have to workaround yourself if you want everything with a perfect tempo.
I perform bookings (including weddings) with my Live 4 & Prime 4, and the beatgrids were never an issue for me, unless you blindly rely on the Sync button without proper beatgrid preparation. While I mix these gigs mostly by ear, I have Sync active for my video sets with my Skarmask, and like you, I rely on 100% matching lighting. For these hybrid sets, I prepare my playlists more carefully than the tracks in my main library, and yet I still stick with simple tempo sync rather than going full beat / bar sync - an old habbit, but it can prevent audible off-phase issues in case your beatgrid is ever so slightly off. Maybe this works for you, too - let the system do the tempo matching, while you keep control over the phase matching by ear.
As NoiseRiser stated, Engine DJ has robust flexible beatgrids for a long time (since v1.6) and you can set anchor points just like in Serato DJ. I have some mashup tracks that have two completely different speed sections, e.g. 95bpm <->128bpm and back. No problem.
One point what is yet missing to Engine DJ (but AFAIK most other software, too) is fully automated flexible beatgrid analysis. DJ Pro Ai brought it, calling it Fluid beatgrids. It’s very powerful and it would be a nice game-changer, certainly.
Sorry, but this is a bit of a comedy post at this point.
You posted one thread basically admitting you don’t know how to use engine to edit beat grids (it works exactly the same as other software, contrary to your claims here).
People offered you advice on how to do it, and why live music tracks are often misaligned (I even did a test across various software using a similar track to the one you complained about) and you chose to ignore it.
Now you’re here giving people a ‘heads up’ that the gear won’t work for people in your space (wedding DJs), despite the fact it is your own lack of knowledge and unwillingness to read the manual that caused your issues in the first place.
Cheers man, I just wish people would listen to the advice of some excellent members on this forum, not putting myself in that bracket but there are some really knowledgeable people here.
I agree, but sometimes the tone of topic starter or topic respondents don’t quite match..
As regulars we need to try to be a bit less “all-in” and a bit more “open-minded”. That way more people will join and stay in the community and all will get more knowledgeable in the process.
Agree on that Reese, but on this occasion I feel most of us were trying to be helpful on the other thread, and also trying to solve the problem for the guy.
It seemed to me (and was actually written by him) that he didn’t understand how to edit beat grids, or that live music doesn’t grid up very well.
This thread is just misinformed and comes across like none of the advice/help given in the other thread was taken notice of, which is then kind of wasting everyone’s time, whilst also having yet another rant on here about how the ecosystem we all use is unusable.
I can’t contribute to the thread, but I had a question about grid editing in engine. Is there a good tutorial for the fluid grid anywhere? I have the problem that my grid is changed at the beginning, for example, when I edit the bar in another part. Despite the marks. I also have the feeling that I can’t edit errors at the beginning of the track if I have already introduced two new sections.
I think, also as we became very much embedded to the gear we use, most of the things started to be very obvious and natural to us, and that when a newbie asks a relatively “dumb” question, we are mostly surprised, how/she came up with this idea. We are no longer looking from a perspective of a new guy, that has no idea what to do first (despite the obvious R.T.F.M. ).
Indeed we (all veteran members) should take a step backwards and have a look on how we can improve our help towards new members and still be the same bunch of chillout, nice people
We need more compassion and understanding of another human in this society.
it’s our never ending story and you will find different posts here in the forum at different places.
Pls. be so kind as to have a look at page 53 of the manual (user guide for DENON OS / gear) theme: “Beat Grid Editing” or in general page 37 of the manual (user guide for ENGINE DJ / Desktop program) theme “Beat Grid”.
I hope, these two hints will help you a little, but pls. be aware it takes some skillness to handle this item.
Brgds from HAM BeatMaster
here is one example in this matter and pls. feel free, to vote for it
I have the problem that my grid is changed at the beginning, for example, when I edit the bar in another part. Despite the marks.
Hmmmm this shoudn’t happen. When I edit tracks with flexible beatgreads, I set an anchor point quite early, and the next one again right -before- the bars start to drift/change, to lock the ‘correct part’. Then you can change everything behind without the beginning getting shifted. I think in Serato the behavior is very similar.
).
Indeed we (all veteran members) should take a step backwards and have a look on how we can improve our help towards new members and still be the same bunch of chillout, nice people 
We need more compassion and understanding of another human in this society.