PIONEER'S NEW TOP FLIGHT CONTROLLER

'Fresh off the Press" news from NAMM sees Pioneer release not one but two new products aimed at the digital DJing community. First of the bunch and hot on the heels of the release of the DDJ-SB Pioneer’s entry level two channel Serato DJ controller comes the DDJ-SZ their new top-flight controller for channel Serato DJ. The DDJ-SZ is a four channel controller that looks very similar to the DDJ-SX but with a whole heap of extra features and improvements. The improvements are vast and sexy as hell because many of the new components have come straight from the CDJ-2000NXS making this controller the closest to a CDJ player yet. Both the mixer and the deck sections have had a complete overhaul and the result is a truly top end all-in-one professional DJ controller that is going to have DJs rushing to get their hands on this badboy

The mixer section of the DDJ-SZ has been redesigned and looks like the traditional DJM mixer style layout’s that DJs will be familiar in their DJM900 Nexus mixer range, this is a definite improvement compared with the mixer layout on the DDJ-SX which was ok but not brilliant. The big new additions to the mixer include colour sound effects with a dedicated control knob on each channel including the master, there is a proper microphone channel on the control surface, a new oscillator function that is assignable to individual channels or the master channel and the track browsing and loading functions have been move from the mixer to the deck sections giving a cleaner and more professional layout. Possibly the most exciting new feature the DDJ-SZ has to laud over the DDJ-SX has been taken directly from the CDJ-2000NXS, namely the platters. These new platters are almost identical to the ones found on the CDJ-2000NXS the most obvious difference is the colour which is silver and the edge of the platter has a slightly different design, but the screens in the centre of the platters are the same, they both have LEDs around the top edge of the jog wheels and the stiffness and stop time control knobs have also made their way from the CDJ2000NXS to the DDJ-SZ’s deck sections. 

Hitting the shops for a gob smacking £1749.