iLounge

The Tonium Pacemaker. The iPod for DJs?

By Dennis Lloyd

Publisher, iLounge
Published: Friday, March 28, 2008
Category: Backstage

While purchasing music over at beatport.com yesterday I stumbled upon a hot new gadget I must have. The Tonium Pacemaker. I can’t believe I haven’t seen this thing before. All those DJs out there that wanted an iPod with pitch and mix capabilities, the Pacemaker may be your next purchase. After telling my DJ friend Pete about the Pacemaker, he said, “Hell, I could stand at the bar and DJ a set.”

The Pacemaker is a hand-held device with a 120GB hard drive and includes a Line out Crossfader, a Headphones Crossfader, Bend, Pitch, DJ Pause, Cue, Loop, EQ, Filter, Sound FX, Headphone Jack, Line out jack and a USB 2.0 connector. It supports MP3, VBR, AAC, WMA, WMA Lossless, OGG Vorbis, FLAC and WAV, but not iTunes protected AAC. If you’re like most DJs, you won’t care about iTunes protected music as most use high bit rate DRM free music in their virtual crates. I’m currently building a DRM free library of music just for mixing purposes.

The Pacemaker will be a fun way to build your sets on-the-go. It will compliment your current set-up, but not be the primary device. I use Serato Scratch Live, two Technics and a Vestax PCV-275 for mixing at home.

I haven’t been so excited about a new gadget since the iPhone was released. At about $750 bucks, it’s steep, but it packs a lot of tech any serious DJ or bedroom DJ will dig. Pacemaker.net has a lot of video tutorials where you can learn how to use each of the features.