My current laptop for using Serato isn’t compatible with Engine Desktop, so I can’t install the app to see what my library looks like… and I’m not sure how this is going to go when I acquire a SC6000 later this year.
Anyway, I have made extensive use of as many fields that Serato has available, notably the Grouping field (IIRC, the actual tag is “CONTENTGROUP”, not “GROUPING” like iTunes uses). Is this field something that Engine can read/write? If not, is there a way to customize what tag fields are used/shown in Engine OS on the SC6000?
I’m not sure if it matters, but 100% of my library is AIFF’s, so the tags are written to the files and not to Serato’s database.
Sadly the ‘grouping’ tag is not supported in Engine DJ. I also user this tag in other software.
The software only reads and writes to a fairly limited selection of tags.
The user guide lists these:
Title; Artist; Album; Comment; Genre; Key; Track #; Year; Label; Composer; Mixartist
Not sure whether key is written to the files though. I know rating is not.
It was a PITA, but I changed up something I did in the grouping tag field and put that in genre (I don’t really need traditional genre tags). I’m now splitting the tags between comment and genre to achieve what I had done with comment and grouping.
There’s a poor situation for anyone trying to use a discontinued Serato device and up to date versions of Engine desktop.
You have to use Catalina and 2.5.5 Serato in order to connect the Rane devices, but then newer versions of Engine desktop have to be on I think its Monteray because of some funky DB changes made to work that OS versions.
Essentially you can only do one or the other… or buy a Reloop flux and bin the Rane gear:)
Edit: any version of Engine Desktop from 2.4 upwards is no longer usable on Mojave which means Catalina could be the point of having both working, but im sure that a newer version of Desktop is even more restricted, I might be wrong.
I’m on Mojave still, though my desktop is Monterey. I’m not in a huge rush to fully jump from Serato until Engine extends its search functions for Smartlists. Im not buying a SC6000 until I’m able to import AND use all 800+ SmartCrates I’ve created in Serato.
I don’t want to. For music production purposes, I want to keep this machine where it is and not mess with it. It runs all the programs and plugins I need, should I have dig up an old project… and I’ve had to do this because my Mac Studio breaks compatibility with a few apps and plugins.
Yes, the fields you listed are the relevant ones in the EngineDJ track table. ContentGroup (Grouping) is not there and would require a database change to include. It would be useful, since it is supported in Apple Music and stores with the file.
Remixer isn’t even an official ID3 tag (unless you consider it InterpretedBy) and it’s not in Apple Music. It’s useful, but presumably not portable. There is ID3 v2_4 “Mood” which would be useful for energy level. But, that’s not in Apple Music either.
The problem with using an older version is that there are no Smartlists prior to 3.0. That doesn’t help me make sure I can transition from Serato to Engine properly.
Yes that is an unfortunate consequence of not using the up to date OS. Could you not dual boot your laptop so it has the newer OS on a partition?
I was running an old Macbook so i could continue to use my SL3 sound card, but since the flux was released ive completely migrated to an M1 Macbook Pro with Ventura and latest versions of all software.