Hercules DJ Console RMX Review

Overview:

This is the Hercules DJ Console RMX. Its a MIDI control surface for DJ’s with a built in 4×4 USB audio interface, and so far, it rocks.

Background:

I’ve been a bedroom producer / DJ for going on 5 years. My tool of choice is Ableton Live, but for a while now I’ve realized that my DJ skills were being severely limited by the lack of a proper DJing sound-card. I’ve been using the M-Audio Firewire Solo, which has been a great piece of equipment for me, but lacks the two separate stereo outputs required for cueing DJ mixes. I’ve played a couple of parties with my setup, but inevitably screw up a few times as I was basically “playing blind” (or rather, deaf) by not being able to listen to my tracks before I played them for the crowd. That needed to change.

I started looking for 4×4 USB soundcards, and soon realized that their were a couple of sound-cards with built-in MIDI controllers specific to DJing. I’ve been using an M-Audio Axiom 49 to control things so far, which is another great piece of equipment, but its not exactly tailored to be the ideal DJ setup. Initially I was looking at the Hercules MKII, but was turned off by its cheap build quality and cramped space. I also came really close to purchasing the Behringer BCD-3000; luckily before I bought it at Guitar Center the guy let me take it out of the box to get a feel for it. In doing so I found that all of the controls felt pretty chintzy, and one of the jog wheels was even sticky in a spot and wouldn’t turn smoothly! I’m so glad I turned this down, as compared to the RMX, the Behringer is a POS.

After many more hours of online research, I found that Hercules had a new product coming out, the DJ Console RMX, which promised “pro” quality and build. It just came out last month, so there was a dearth of reviews (besides this Dutch review that I can barely understand even with Google translator). Normally I’m a very cautious consumer, and read every review possible before shelling cash. This time though there were none available, but despite this I decided to take the plunge anyway. Someone has to be the first reviewer, right?