Ortofon Concord DJ S. Lets have a look!

0:00 On something that looks like

Alright folks, loads of people have been asking for demos, tutorials, a bit of information on the needles, the cartridges, the styli that DJs will use. So, what I'm going to do is over maybe a week or so, I'm going to do individual videos on different types of needles, cartridges, styli. The first one is on something that looks like that. It's from a company called Autofon, it's known as the Concord DJ-S. The reason I'm doing this one first is because I used to have a set of these years ago. Okay, you can use them for scratching purposes but mainly they're for sort of bedroom or nightclub use etc. Now very briefly as well there's probably quite a few people over a period of time who will watch this video and other videos I do on needles, cartridges, stylite and they probably won't even know what I'm on about. So for everyone out there who knows what a needle, a cartridge, a stylite is I suggest you go to the toilet or maybe make a cup of tea. If you don't know what I'm on about here we go.

2:06 Something like this as well

That there is a vinyl turntable. The needle, the cartridge, the styli is the part of the vinyl turntable that will pick up the sound from the record then in turn it goes through the arm That there is a banana cartridge. Or, more importantly, it's known as a Concord cartridge. Probably a few people out there will say, yeah, the banana ones are yellow. Well, when I started DJing and when I found out about these, a banana cartridge was similar shape like that. So just tell me if I'm right or wrong there. Are they banana cartridges or are they Concord cartridges or are they banana and Concord cartridges? Right. Let's have a look at something like this as well. Now, if you buy a turntable, quite often you will have a cartridge with it. If you get something that looks like that, you've basically got, yes, it'll work, it will play music, but it's cheap and cheerful. Now, let's just put that there. Let me show you something. Well, that part there is known as the head shell. That part there is known as the cartridge.

You've got a small, tiny little arm that sticks out. Now at the end of that arm is the needle. The needle is made out of a very, very tiny diamond. That is the part that will vibrate in the groove of the record and it will transmit that vibrating all the way through here, through the arm, through the arm, all the way through in there. So basically a lot of people think, very quickly as well, that there's a lot that goes on in here. Well, to be quite honest, there's a lot that goes on under there. But all that happens here is the signal of vibration is travelling from here through some cables, very, very thin cables, through there and then through this cable into the back of the mixer where it's amplified. Basically, this is where all of the workings will happen, not necessarily here. Whatever's put...

3:54 Difference, the

On this record will be exactly the same all the way through here. It's when it comes to this point here, this is when the DJ can start twiddling about. Alright, now these guys here, the blue ones, in my eyes they're fantastic for bedroom use, for nightclub use etc. Alright, you can scratch with them but there are other cartridges, other styli-needles that I'll be looking at in the near future that are mainly for that sort of purpose. Right, whatever you do, don't sneeze because I've got the camera at an exceedingly dodgy angle. Right, what I'm going to do now, I'm going to give this guy here a run for its money along with, hold on, if I just move that there, that's it, it's more in view now and we're going to demo it next to this guy here. Alright, there's really no comparison but it'll basically show you the difference, the audio difference.

Now bearing in mind as well, you may not be able to hear the true audio difference because I've got a speaker over there and that the sound is going to travel from the speaker into the small little microphones in the camera, then through the camera workings into my PC, out of my PC, onto the web, off the web, into your PC, from your PC into your speakers. So you're not going to get the true audio sound. Alright, what I'm going to do, I'm going to make sure that all of the levels here are flat. We'll put the needle on the record and if you notice I've got the treble, mid and the bass set to 12 o'clock. I've got the gain control set all the way down. I'm going to move as well the master volume down. So what I'm going to do now is I'm going to start to increase the gain control on this channel. And I'm going to increase it so we're just tapping into the amber. There we go, that'll do. Now what I'm going to do is I'm going to increase the gain control. Turn that down a bit.

Put that there. Let's have a closer look at that area. Okay, let's do a comparison now. What I'm going to do, I'm going to take that off, take that one off and I'm going to put this cheap and cheerful one on. And let's see the difference. Now, bearing in mind if you could just maybe rewind and make note of what the LEDs were doing. Alright, straight away we can see there's less signal coming through. So, you know, at the end of the day, we've got more, we've got a stronger signal coming from that guy there. Alright, a bit of a review. I mean, these guys here, if let's say you're a scratch DJ turntablist, maybe these aren't for you. But, if you're into mixing, nightclub etc., bedroom DJ, then maybe you need to look at these, alright? I've got these from Dex.co.uk. So this is the first video on

There will be more to come, so watch out. Practice and enjoy!

This transcript was produced automatically from the audio of the video and may contain mistakes.