I'm still puzzled how vdj is not respected in the industry but rekordbox is with them $#itty@$$ stems. Totally embarssing for a pioneer product. S/O to the team at VDJ for delivering on a consistent basis.
To my ears Virtual DJ sounds the best However, like you say, djay pro, Serato and Virtual DJ now all sound very good, to the point where the differences don't really matter anymore. So except for on Rekordbox, I really consider real time stems separation a solved problem in the DJ software that have those features - just like master tempo/time stretching, where I rarely hear discussions anymore on which one is better. They all just work
Virtual Dj, but i can hear leakage from other channels/instruments, underneath. Others were just too compressed for those used to studio quality audio. They'll get there. From NZ.
I still find if bafling how rekordbox can be so far behind everyone else in this. I switch to serato on my FLX10 from time to time and the difference in quality almost makes me want to switch entirely, it could be SO useful but the leakage is just so much worse than seratos
VDJ has been Sublime for 2 years or more. I have a whole eco system of remix songs, it's been that good since the introduction of Stems 2.0. Combined with all the other things you can do with VDJ, I will never look back.
I can't believe VDJ is the only one that offers kick-only separation. The problem for me is that many times when I'm mixing in key, I would like to keep the bassline and the percussion going, but I wanna turn up the upcoming song. I kinda sorted it out on the FLX10 by applying a HPF for the drums only, but that already takes away the whole color fx section because you cannot use anything else but filtering, and beat fx is also limited because you can only use it for drums, as long as it is selected. With VDJ it's just a push of a button.
Virtual DJ's stems CDJ Export function is hands down the best option in any software. Also Virtual DJ has 5 stems instead of the others that have 4 or 3. I use Serato DJ as my daily driver, but stems on Virtual DJ is unmatched.
I’ve found that stems on Serato sound better when an original track is played, opposed to a Dj edit. especially the vocals and drums. Same with Serato Studio
While mixing with STEMS, is there a FX you can apply to the acapella to make it sound even better? I sometimes use the echo, reverb and the recycler on 1/4 or 1/2, but anything else?
I can hear SO MANY James Hype opportunities being created and taken advantage of with this STEMS feature. It's the best thing the DJ industry has ever developed. Upwards and onwards from here on... 🙌🏻 🙌🏻🙌🏻🙌🏻🙌🏻🕺🕺🕺🕺🕺🕺🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥🔥
like you said, Serato, Djay Pro,and VirtualDJ sound very similar, except for acapela, i think VDJ's approach is definitely better. For sure rekordbox is unusable.
I have been using stems a lot in a the past year but now more and more come to the conclusion that even the best stem separation like RipX just ruins the sound quality to a degree that I don’t want to use it anymore. It just doesn’t make sense to split stems from a mastered track.
Long time Serato user: couple things… 1. As long as the drums won’t clash with what’s being blended, leaving the drums in with the acapella really helps the warbly sound. Otherwise it takes alot of eq’ing and reverb etc to try and get a clean vocal. 2. I haven’t been able to use anything higher than ver 3.0.2 on my 2020 MacBook Air (16gb ram/1tb SSD) because of the increased demand of gpu on video processing…Something that’s not widely discussed and I had to do some experimentation and reading between the lines on the recommended optimization found on Serato’s website. To run anything higher than 3.0.2 efficiently without lag or freezes, you need at least a 14 core gpu (which my 2020 only has 8 cores). Bit of a bummer when the 3.1 stems algorithm sounds cleaner but oh well… 🤷♂️
I would be more than happy if InMusic decides to deploy the stems technology from their Akai line of products. It is offline (before playing any track) but on the machine itself and apparently with decent quality. So basically it stores the 4 stems as separate files. Memory is so cheap now that this is could be a viable option for self contained controllers like the prime 4 and sc4 (they use the same chipset as the akai products anyhow).
Virtual DJ was the first to develop the feature and bring it to market, which is why the development of the software is the most mature here. But if you only want to use an iPad as a DJ platform, you can't avoid DJAY Pro
Agree on most things, especially the vocals. But one thing struck me instantly:.Serato kept so much more of that bass in the instrumental and drum & bass versions. All other contenders swallowed way too much of that.
Inhave no headphones on, and on my phone i can hear that Serato is best, and for those saying VDJ, if you listen closely it included the horns with the vocals, which will be bad if you dj via KEY…
Would say VDJ and Djay Pro were equal with Serato coming in a close second,, Only thing I would give VDJ over Djay Pro is the biliary to have the extra stem separation.. I use Djay Pro and that plus their Fluid Beat Grid makes it the standout,, Obviously Pioneer is still industry standard and Djay Pro is probably 4th when is comes to Djay’s choice out of the 4 software platforms but for me personally, I don’t rely on club gear anymore so it doesn’t affect me as such…
Great Video Phil. Can you let us know if your laptop used a dedicated video card? I know that it is required for Virtual DJ to use the better quality Stems 2.0. I use Virtual DJ and love their stems, but I agree Serato and DJ Pro all sounded great in your demo. They have really stepped up their game.
Ugh, I hate that Rekordbox's stems suck so hard. I bought the FLX10 at launch and the stems in RB still suck as hard as they did at launch, 10 months ago. If it weren't for the fact that I don't like using Serato for other, more dealbreaking reasons I'd use that. And it's unfortunate that Pioneer DJ only included 3 buttons on the FLX10 as well. Only drums & bass stems would be nice. I kinda hope RB still gets 4 stems and you could double tap or shift tap on the Instruments button to have only the "instruments" removed but keep the bass.
As well as been a DJ for some 41 years and owning an IT/Tech company for 20 years, probably see me posting as athomepc as well, my two Pennys worth as I get many Dj's buying kit from me and I am in a fairly unique position to add to debate, I see hundred of peeps asking about which laptop, GPU, CPU etc, simple advice from me is buy a Mac, I am not an Apple fanboy, I am tech company owner and been a DJ for 2/3 of my existence and now produce and remix as well. An older refurbed Mac either Air Or Pro have Apple M1 chip 8-core CPU with 4 performance cores and 4 efficiency cores 7-core GPU, 8-core GPU, 16-core Neural Engine reference, not only that they have a 20 hour battery life, will interface with your iPad or iPhone, (Yes apple) and VDJ as a remote which is immensely useful when at the bar. A typical M1 refurb will cost approx about £700, hope this helps from a two prong perspective. A Mac will give you those juicy stems without breaking into a sweat.
You can't upgrade a Mac and you have to pay the extortionate Apple tax to get a workable amount of RAM and storage. I've recently upgraded my 2018 HP laptop with a 2TB SATA SSD next to the NVME boot drive. Imagine paying 920!!!!! EUROS extra on an already 1200+ costing laptop just to have a bigger SSD. I paid 135 euros or something for my Samsung 870 QVO. Ok, a slower SATA SSD drive but still, the SSD's Apple uses aren't THAT expensive to justify an upcharge of 700 euro's! And my 2016 laptop already has 16GB of ram. Apple asks... 230 EUROS! for 8 gigs on top of the original 8. Suddenly your 1300 euros MBA is 2500 euros... Just because you want a 2024 specced laptop. You can't defend this shit. 🤣 My laptop costed me 1000+135 euros in total. Fuck Apple. And yes, my 2018 laptop runs realtime stems fine.
@@IanDeVos From a DJ that uses one every day and Phill uses one, don't get mixed up discussing ram and performance, Macs use and borrow memory or whatever is needed and operate seamlessly , next question is, have you tried one, if the answer is no, you are not qualified to answer, I am, I own tech company and DJ and Produce
@@IanDeVos Also, I would not pay for Apples extortionate costs on storage, I use an external USB C NVME drive. Show me a Windows laptop that does 20 hours battery life.
@@discopauli I use an Apple MacBook Pro for work. And I had my own MacBook Pro in 2008. Until 2014 when I switched back to PC's. (Desktop with 32GB ram) In what way was my comment creased or whatever? Just because I said Apple sucks? Apple is a shit anti consumer company. They fuck their customers over and they keep swallowing it. And I don't want to use external hard drives. That's another thinking that can get stolen, broken, forgotten or fallen to the floor. And no, my laptop doesn't do 20 hours but it doesn't need to fit my use case. I never said ARM processors suck. But Apple as a company sucks. I don't give money to asshole companies like Apple.
100% agree with you… if your playing on a huge system it sounds crap…I’ve tried… thankfully I can get accapellas & instrumental version of the stuff I play… the sound is so much cleaner. Using RIPX works… but far to much shit to do to get a decent stem.
To me Serato stems is much clearer in sound where as VDJ has a muffled sound but i have a mac book pro and windows And it sounds better on window than MacBook pro my opinion
So this is a good point. We use an M1 MacBook Air, which we think is a good representative laptop to test on - but agreed, different computers and specs may well affect sound quality.
Thanks Phil for this comparison. Except rekordbox, they are all good. Stems quality also depends on the type of tracks you are playing. For this particular track VDJ was leaking some of the instruments. So not very good here. But in my Library i have found vdj to be better most times. You cant go wrong choosing either of the three for stems. Thanks again Phil! Im going to NAMM! Lol very exited.
![Which DJ Software Stems Sound Best? [2024 Edition]](/img/logo.svg){kind=logo}
