Desktop vs. Laptop

[Stefan]

Originally Posted by bryant

Same here. Although I have been using the ,aptop from time to time with no ill effects except for a very rare hoster freeze-up, which is usually associated with Virtual DJ up and running at the same time and playing videos in between songs.

I have an acer mini backup laptop as well that is even less power than the Dell XP laptop, but runs okay too. Probably very lucky here.

Get VDJ 6 pro. It seems to have fixed the crashing of Hoster

[bryant]

Originally Posted by Stefan

Get VDJ 6 pro. It seems to have fixed the crashing of Hoster

Thx, just got it yesterday and started playing with it last night.

What the crash was Stefan; was when I would play a video with VDJ, then forget to "De-activate" VDJ's video.
VDJ would seem to take some kind of priority over the second "extended" monitor, and if I went to a song in the playlist then Hoster would crash.

The other problem was when I used "SBDJ's" slideshow plugin (dosn't make pictures "FAT" like VDJ's slideshow does), even when I WOULD deacivate the video following it's use, Hoster would still crash, but randomly, as if VDJ still had some kind of priority over the second monitor even after deactivating.

Is this the kind of crashing you are referring to as well?

I did read that one of VDJ6.0's improvements was better video control with 15% less memory requirement, and some patches to fix some of the video freezes on certain Nvidea video cards, of which I have one of.

[Stefan]

YEp. I don't have to disable video in VDJ 6 anymore. So far so good. I have an ATI video card and use a IBM Thinkpad T60. Lovely.

[bryant]

Originally Posted by Stefan

YEp. I don't have to disable video in VDJ 6 anymore. So far so good. I have an ATI video card and use a IBM Thinkpad T60. Lovely.

So let me get this right:
1) Someone is done singing a song, and you bring up VDJ, activate the video(if not already activated)and play a video. Video plays well.

2) After video is over, you bring up Hoster and hit play for the next singer in the playlist, and the song lyrics come up quickly and easily on both the computer and secondary screens, right.

Just like that, and then back to VDJ video, then Hoster again, back and forth all night with no intervention like activating or deactivating VDJ video.

[Roy Dennis]

If you just show a video as a fill in while waiting for a singer, why don't you use Hoster to show it and still display your singers order on screen. Would save a lot on system resources.
I can understand if you are doing a disco and wanting to mix video and music seamlessly.

Roy

[Stefan]

In my show, if the singer is not ready they miss their turn. Because we have a singers display there should be no excuses for a delay for the next singer. The more singers to get to sing the better the business becomes. I have at least the next 6 singers listed on the screen and also make announcements who is comming up. I have educated them to be ready and waiting so the show can cruise without delay. It is working well and has built the business well.

I use VDJ before the Karaoke show, However, when doing a private party, it is best to Video DJ with VDJ because you only get a singer now and again and would have breaks between singers. Hoster is not designed for DJing unfortunatley.

[bryant]

Originally Posted by Stefan

In my show, if the singer is not ready they miss their turn. Because we have a singers display there should be no excuses for a delay for the next singer. The more singers to get to sing the better the business becomes. I have at least the next 6 singers listed on the screen and also make announcements who is comming up. I have educated them to be ready and waiting so the show can cruise without delay. It is working well and has built the business well.

I use VDJ before the Karaoke show, However, when doing a private party, it is best to Video DJ with VDJ because you only get a singer now and again and would have breaks between singers. Hoster is not designed for DJing unfortunatley.

Exactly, and VDJ is not designed for karaoke. On the VDJ forums I try to subtly get them to try out Hoster for karaoke-ing, as many think VDJ can do it well, but it just doesn't.

[Roy Dennis]

Originally Posted by Stefan

I use VDJ before the Karaoke show, However, when doing a private party, it is best to Video DJ with VDJ because you only get a singer now and again and would have breaks between singers. Hoster is not designed for DJing unfortunatley.

Yes I use a different program for my DJ only nights, I realize Hoster is not as good for DJing but I tend to only use one or the other. I thought it sounded like you keep switching from one to the other in a show. When I do a show with Hoster I have a music player playing continuously and just fade in & out of that if I need a bit of fill in music or just slip a few videos into the Hoster play list if it's a bit quite like at the start of the evening.

Roy.

[bryant]

Originally Posted by bryant

So let me get this right:
1) Someone is done singing a song, and you bring up VDJ, activate the video(if not already activated)and play a video. Video plays well.

2) After video is over, you bring up Hoster and hit play for the next singer in the playlist, and the song lyrics come up quickly and easily on both the computer and secondary screens, right.

Just like that, and then back to VDJ video, then Hoster again, back and forth all night with no intervention like activating or deactivating VDJ video.

I tried the above last night at a show, Stefan, and Hoster would freeze as expected. Are you sure you were using a second monitor while playing videos in VDJ, then went right to hoster and played a song w/o doing anything on VDJ? I do know that VDJ still takes "priority" over the second monitor as it always has and doesn't allow another program to get on it (second display) until it is deactivated.

[JonPyle]

Well I'm going to run my first show Wednesday night. In my test run it sounds great, from my laptop (Compaq Presario) which is ran into a Behringer PMP2000 Powermixer to two Peavy 115 speakers... I am concerned about my video quality and may need some upgrades. I'm using a Sabrent PC to TV converter which is fair, but not for video shows. Any suggestions?

[KenKelley]

Originally Posted by JonPyle

Well I'm going to run my first show Wednesday night. In my test run it sounds great, from my laptop (Compaq Presario) which is ran into a Behringer PMP2000 Powermixer to two Peavy 115 speakers... I am concerned about my video quality and may need some upgrades. I'm using a Sabrent PC to TV converter which is fair, but not for video shows. Any suggestions?

I use LCD monitors with VGA connections (VGA out of my laptop to a VGA Splitter to the LCDs).

With the shopping season coming up you just may find a bargain or 2 out there.

I found 2 new 32" LCDs (720p) for $250 each last year and use them for the audiance.

Hope this helps!

[Roy Dennis]

Originally Posted by JonPyle

Well I'm going to run my first show Wednesday night. In my test run it sounds great, from my laptop (Compaq Presario) which is ran into a Behringer PMP2000 Powermixer to two Peavy 115 speakers... I am concerned about my video quality and may need some upgrades. I'm using a Sabrent PC to TV converter which is fair, but not for video shows. Any suggestions?

I play a lot of video in my show using a VGA to RCA video converter with quite acceptable picture quality output to 40" + TV sizes.

If you have HDMI connectors on both your laptop and Monitor this gives you excellent picture quality although you will need to disable the sound going through the same connection.(Read how to do that here http://forum.mtu.com/showpost.php?p=108439&postcount=7)
One draw back with this set up is if the connection is to a monitor fixed to a wall the connections are usually at the back and hard to get to which is one reason I stick to the RCA video in, which is normally located in an easy to access place.

[Joe Nieves]

Hoster also freezes and crashes with Hoster Micro Studio, I now play singers disc using Micro Studio as suggested by Amin and I get the same problem...I've also asked for this problem to be looked at several years ago while using VDJ program...