I had never seen this video I just came across that shows some of the hidden features within Serato.  Most of you guys had probably seen the feature that hides your track names, but I never knew you could play Pong!

Here’s something cool for all you Serato dj’s out there to check out.

Pete Rosenberg, along with Cypha Sounds, recently featured “the serato guys”, meaning Serato’s Executive VP’s of Product R&D on their radio show, and discussed the principles and development of Serato.

Some pretty cool stuff, check it out yourself.

Download: Juan Epstein: The Serato Guys

Aside from a few improvements, and some direct hardware support, the new release for Serato isn’t anything major. Here’s a snippet from the ScratchLive site:

Thursday 22nd May 2008. Auckland New Zealand.

Serato Audio Research is pleased to announce the release of Scratch LIVE 1.8.1.
This is primarily a maintenance release to improve performance and stability and also introduces support for the following 3rd party controllers:

Denon HC-4500
Denon HD-2500
Numark DMC2

Scratch LIVE 1.8.1 includes changes and improvements to the following areas:

USB performance
iTunes Library support
External Midi control
Offline Player
Deck and playback controls
Library Crates and Tracklist
Preferences and setup options
Video-SL integration

Go here to see the full list of changes.

Vestax has partnered up with Serato to create the VCI-300, a dedicated DJ USB MIDI/Audio system that builds upon the success of the VCI-100.  The controller/mixer comes equipped with a built in audio interface with a 4 in/out soundcard, an extra channel for headphones, and of course the Serato DJ software.  A useful feature on the VCI-300 is a ‘emergency thru’ switch which keeps the music playing if your unexpectedly freezes.  It can control more than 90 parameters and functions of the Serato software, and has a new weight reduced JOG wheel with an adjustable wheel torque mechanism that helps avoid vibration from low frequency feedback.