My opinion on the Kambar decks
12 Dec 2003 12:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
karohemdGood bits:
- They actually read CDs, but slowly which makes it a bit tricky if you need to swap CDs quickly.
- The sound quality is better than that of the old ones. Zion came out really well.
- The eject button is locked when a CD is playing (as with the old ones).
Annoying bits: Fiddliness
- Having to reset settings for single/continuous play and Track Time every time you put a new CD in. This takes time you could spend cueing to the spot you want.
- The buttons are relatively small, close together, some of them are the same colour as the casing or very dim, and the markings aren't very clear to see. There are buttons in the way that shouldn't be there and it's relatively easy to press one you don't want.
- The buttons aren't very responsive, either. A quick jab won't do, which is what you want.
- The CD trays close after a while. You take out a CD, put it back, and by the time you found the next one, the tray will be closed. Again, wasted time.
- I also had one of the decks reset randomly to the first track of the CD.
- The display was clearer and better to read on the old ones
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naranek said "Cue means rewind" on these decks. Fine. However, what I want is to be able to set a cue point that isn't the start of the track so I can quickly jump back to it (to skip an intro, to find the first beat, etc.)
- Despite claims to the opposite, they skip, especially when hitting the bottom left light switch.
In short, you spend a lot of time getting the actual track going. Time you could spend cueing up and timing it properly. I didn't even consider trying to mix/beat match during my dancy set because of this. Maybe after I'm used to them.
The fact that you have to keep switching on the lights doesn't help.
This means that during a track with an average run time (3-4 mins) you're almost constantly fiddling about.
Another old Kambar problem is that the monitor volume on the mixer is independent from the output volume. You only notice that a track is louder/lower than the previous one when it's out there. It would be nice if you could adjust the volume by comparing the two tracks on the headphones.
I'm a muppet and didn't write down the exact model to possibly look for documentation online. There might be a way of making it remember settings.
- They actually read CDs, but slowly which makes it a bit tricky if you need to swap CDs quickly.
- The sound quality is better than that of the old ones. Zion came out really well.
- The eject button is locked when a CD is playing (as with the old ones).
Annoying bits: Fiddliness
- Having to reset settings for single/continuous play and Track Time every time you put a new CD in. This takes time you could spend cueing to the spot you want.
- The buttons are relatively small, close together, some of them are the same colour as the casing or very dim, and the markings aren't very clear to see. There are buttons in the way that shouldn't be there and it's relatively easy to press one you don't want.
- The buttons aren't very responsive, either. A quick jab won't do, which is what you want.
- The CD trays close after a while. You take out a CD, put it back, and by the time you found the next one, the tray will be closed. Again, wasted time.
- I also had one of the decks reset randomly to the first track of the CD.
- The display was clearer and better to read on the old ones
-
naranek said "Cue means rewind" on these decks. Fine. However, what I want is to be able to set a cue point that isn't the start of the track so I can quickly jump back to it (to skip an intro, to find the first beat, etc.)- Despite claims to the opposite, they skip, especially when hitting the bottom left light switch.
In short, you spend a lot of time getting the actual track going. Time you could spend cueing up and timing it properly. I didn't even consider trying to mix/beat match during my dancy set because of this. Maybe after I'm used to them.
The fact that you have to keep switching on the lights doesn't help.
This means that during a track with an average run time (3-4 mins) you're almost constantly fiddling about.
Another old Kambar problem is that the monitor volume on the mixer is independent from the output volume. You only notice that a track is louder/lower than the previous one when it's out there. It would be nice if you could adjust the volume by comparing the two tracks on the headphones.
I'm a muppet and didn't write down the exact model to possibly look for documentation online. There might be a way of making it remember settings.
