Mixxx 1.7.0 Beta 2 Released!

The Mixxx team is pleased to announce the release of Mixxx 1.7.0 Beta 2! This is primarily a bugfix release that addresses issues from our previous beta.

We also recently discovered a critical issue in an external software library which affects Mixxx users on Ubuntu 9.04. Please see the note at the bottom of this post for more information.

Some of the changes in Mixxx 1.7.0 Beta 2 include:

• Fixed missing MIDI bytes under heavy load on Linux.
• Fixed vinyl control input for users with multi-channel input.
• Fixed vinyl control channel selection bug
• A slew of SCS.3d improvements and tweaks.
• Hercules MK2 and RMX improvements
• Stanton SCS.1m support
• Internal control engine optimizations
• Fixed several crash-on-startup scenarios
• Fixed library rescans not finding new files added in subdirectories
• Fixed Ubuntu menu shortcut
• Fixed missing Ubuntu package dependencies
• Added Universal Package for OS X 10.4+ (Special thanks to Brian Jackson for leading the effort to put this together.)

Mixxx 1.7.0 Beta 2 is available on our downloads page.

Formality aside, this list of changes doesn't do the last few months justice. After our last beta, we received dozens of helpful bug reports. Some of those brought new problems to our attention, while others shed light on old ones. With your valuable feedback, we managed to not only fix your most pressing bugs, but we were also able to track down and fix some other very tricky bugs. The result of your great bug reporting and our team's commitment to fixing bugs is the most stable, polished release of Mixxx to date, and we couldn't have done it without you.

Thank you to everyone who's been testing our beta releases and reporting bugs. You've made a valuable contribution to open source and the whole Mixxx community, and together we're going to continue to make Mixxx the best DJ software we can.

As usual, please report any new bugs or regressions to our bug tracker. If you want to get in touch with other Mixxx DJs, show some love on our forums!

Stay tuned for our final 1.7.0 release!

Important note for Ubuntu 9.04 users:A flaw has been discovered in a library provided by Ubuntu 9.04 that can cause critical hangups in Mixxx. Ubuntu 9.04 users are advised to install the version of PortAudio from Ubuntu 8.10, available as .deb packages here:

• PortAudio for i386
• PortAudio for amd64

Hercules releases GPL Linux MIDI drivers & Mixxx 1.6.1+Herc is released

On Feb 16th, Hercules released GPL Linux MIDI drivers for their DJ Console / DJ Control series of MIDI input controllers ( Mk2, RMX, MP3 Control, DJ Control Steel ).

Mixxx is proud to support Hercules' great contribution by releasing Mixxx 1.6.1+Herc (Linux) and the +Herc MIDI mapping update packs (Windows & OSX). All are available for download now at http://mixxx.org/

Hercules users are encouraged to download these updates and visit the Mixxx Hercules documentation page at http://mixxx.org/hercules/.

Release Notes

1.6.1+Herc

• This release is geared towards better support of Hercules devices only, it is functionally identical to 1.6.1.
• Windows and OSX Hercules users should download the +Herc pack and read the docs at http://mixxx.org/hercules/.
• Linux Hercules users should download & install the Hercules Linux MIDI drivers, then 1.6.1+Herc packages on this page and read the docs at http://mixxx.org/hercules/.
• All Hercules users should read the docs and then look for help on the forums and IRC if they have issues.

Hercules DJ Console Mk1 users will have to wait until usbquirks is modified in the Linux kernel to remove the quirk for Mk1.

Hercules DJ Control MP3 in Linux

Robin, one of our newer developers, has been working hard on improving our support for the Hercules DJ Control MP3 in Linux. I did some work on this myself last year, but unfortunately certain things were broken at the kernel-level and I wasn't able to get the LEDs working. After many attempts by several people, Robin managed to make a kernel patch to solve the remaining issues.

"Yuck, a kernel patch!", you say? As Robin writes:

This is all very hacky, but hopefully it won’t be in the future. I’m going to see if I can get that patch put in the kernel proper, which will solve the most annoying part of the problem. It would also be good to get Mixxx supporting both legacy mode and the newer one at the same time.

However, we’ve heard from Hercules, and they say that some time in the first part of this year, they’re going to try to get some Linux drivers out. Hopefully they’re open source, and turn the Herc devices into MIDI devices, which would make life a whole lot easier for support.

It looks like there's light at the end of the tunnel for Hercules users. Read more on Robin's blog.

Note: I should add that the Hercules MK2 and the Hercules MP3 Control are both supported very well on Windows.