DJ Tech : Check Out The Rane Sixty-One and Sixty-Two Mixers

Rane and Serato have worked tightly together for eight years pioneering practical DVS systems. The TTM57 is definitely showing its age, though, and has now received a modern update.  There are 2 models of mixers: The Rane 61 and the Rane 62 depending on what your flavor of mixer is.

We thought actually talking to the minds behind the products would be pretty interesting – and we were right. Check out the above beautiful-looking interview shot by Zach in the most coincidentally aesthetically pleasing meeting room in the world.

Refined Design

A lot of the developments that came about through the design of the Sixty Eight have been carrried forwards in these new mixers. Perhaps two of the most exciting are 32-bit floating point audio throughout and two channels of full USB 2.0 connectivity. The faders are all Rane’s patented magnetic design, one of the many design decisions that is predicated upon the Sixty One and Sixty Two being scratch DJ orientated mixers.

The Rane Sixty-Two

The buttons on the Sixty Two are a somewhat unique design. They’re not dissimilar to the ones on the Sixty Eight, but they’re definitely different. They’re a very hard plastic, with almost no travel. Rane explained that there are two reasons for that choice: the longevity of the actual buttons is somewhere in the order of five million presses, and ergonomically there’s a strong case to be made for lining the buttons up above the channel faders in what is ostensibly a scratch mixer. For a start, leaving the fader area free is imperative to scratch DJs, and also being able to stretch fingers from the fader section up to the buttons and press them with almost no resistance is great. Of course, if you don’t like them, the Sixty One’s more spartan design may be for you.

The Rane Sixty One

Capabilities

Both mixers have a hardware filter, and feature adjustable resonance. Whilst the Sixty One more or less stops there when it comes to dazzling features, the Sixty Two has a whole host of extras. The Sixty Two’s hardware effects:

• Filter
• Flanger
• Phaser
• Echo
• Robot
• Reverb

One of the big developments about the effects on the Sixty Two is their simplicity. There’s a depth knob, an adjustment dial, and the ability to manually select BPM (should you not be using Scratch Live, for which the effects are all pre-synced to the internal BPM), and that’s all. Of course, the Scratch Live effects can be configured in software, and as the controls are all MIDI it’s possible to assign controls you don’t use much (perhaps mic control, for instance) to their parameters. The Scratch Live insert is available on the Sixty One too, as are external effect send/return, and they’re all stackable. All effects are totally post fader too, which is a big plus over Pioneer’s efforts; cross fader and line faders are all post.
Want to see DMC 2011 World Champion DJ Vajra tear it up on the Sixty-One? Your wish is Serato’s command.

THE BOTTOM LINE (SO FAR)

The Sixty One is the simpler of the two mixers, designed to be a less feature heavy and thus simpler version of the two; it’s more a Scratch Live enabled version of the TTM-56S than a two channel Sixty Eight. The Sixty Two on the other hand is a behemoth of potential, and if you like the design you might see yourself finding reasons to spend the extra (prices are to be confirmed, but I don’t expect either to be cheap – definitely not the Sixty Two). I’m not 100% sure where I stand between the two yet; I love the effects of the Sixty Two but at the same time I have existing tools to manipulate DJ software, so I doubt I’d use the buttons for the majority of the performance.

Z-Trip's Limited Edition Rane Sixty Two

For more information on each of the mixers, including complete tech specs, visit the extensively in-depth Rane product pages for the Sixty One or the Sixty Two. It’s also worth showing off the above version of the Sixty-Two Z-Trip’s Limited Edition Sixty-Two Z Mixer, which features:

• Face plate design by Shepard Fairey.
• Purple and yellow accents.
• Includes custom purple cables