SL4 Announced. I Nearly Faint.
If you’ve gotten me talking DJing and particularly DJing gear in the past year, you’ve probably heard me fondly describing Rane’s absolutely gorgeous SIXTY EIGHT mixer. And while the on-board effects and trigger cues are all nice to have there, what really excited me was being able to control more than two inputs in Serato (you could in fact control four turntables with a SIXTY EIGHT). Also throw in a second USB port that would allow either easy switching between DJs or a two laptop tag set, and basically I became fixated on getting this mixer.
Alas, the cost of the SIXTY EIGHT reflects the awesomeness of the product. Dropping over $2,000 on a mixer when I have a perfectly awesome Empath never worked out in my mind. But I still wanted that functionality.
Well according to Turntable Lab’s blog, Rane has announced that the SL4 box will be shipping in April and not only will it have 2 USB ports, 4 phono/digital inputs but it’ll have a fifth input for using with the Bridge or recording. And the best part is… $899 suggested price, which I could see stores dropping down to $600 or $700. Well within striking distance.
A small caveat. I’m assuming this announcement is coming out of The 2011 NAMM Show which is taking place right now. However, as of this time Rane has nothing posted about the SL4 on its site. I’m assuming Turntable Lab knows they’d be pissing off a lot of people by making this up for the sake of a joke, so I’m trusting that they just got the early jump. I truly want to believe in this.
If the SL4 is real, this is going to change a lot for me. Watch out 2011.
