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Topic: why have Technics given up on the next generation of dj's?

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Technics used to be the industry standard & leading brand for djs.

The technics sponsored dj competitions helped elevate their status as every participant had to use common equipment.
.......Technics was the industry standard & very influential in the dj world.


I was a loyal technics customer & i remember when every other competitors turntable used to mimic some feature of the sl1200, but i was also critical of their inflated pricing & reluctance to evolve.

In the mid 90s pioneer ,vestax & stanton broke the monopoly with high quality cdj players & turntables offering more features & value for money across all budget ranges.... vestax also sponsored their own dj competitions fragmenting the dj events so the consumer benefited.

I gave up on technics in 2006 but i think the market need technics to encourage innovation & more competition.

ie Compare the Numark v7 controller to the discontinued sl dz cdj 1200 originally released in 2005... Technics was way ahead of the competition in design.

I recently checked their website for new developments & little has changed.Technics are offering basic dj products with minimal innovations while their competitiors evolve.

why has Technics neglectd the next generation of dj's?

A technics sl1200 cost about 30 % more than it did 20 years ago, dj competitions are now predictable , boring & in decline so why are technics reluctant to embrace the future?




Comeback Technics & represent ........... dont be shy
 
Posted Mon 14 Jun 10 @ 7:37 am
The answer is simple. Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd. which has become Panasonic Corporation discontinued all Technics products years ago except for the 1200 series turntables, which they have also finally discontinued after keeping them going basically strictly for the DJ/Nightclub market which made them the industry standard in the first place.

So the answer to your question is that the Technics brand name does not exist anymore, that is why.
 
Shame, hard to believe something could be so big and then just disappear.
 
Technics is still industry standard. Industry standard is something that can take abuse and last along time and thats why most clubs still have them. Technics may stop producing turtables but that doesnt mean that the 1200's wont be around. The turnatbles are built so well that many djs buy them used from previous owners. I know djs that have technics from 20 years ago and they still work perfect. Technics may stop producing but the 1200's are clearly visble everywhere. People buy another set to replace the broken but the old ones havent broke yet.
 
Technics are great. once i can finally afford it im selling everything i got and buying a technics setup to last me the rest of my life

can't wait

_____________

ADJF - http://www.ausdjforums.com

Australia's Premier DJ & Producers Forum
 
what a revelation...

Technics dealers are still selling mixers ,headphones & merchandise along with turntables ,it can't all be redundunt stock as the costs would be lower & not inflated & what about warranty? It's hardly a unique selling point.



Quick history lesson.....

Theres a official mix cd by Grandmaster flash on the strut label & in the liner notes he reveals the frustration he had finding a proper turntable with good torque in 1975 /76 .. He tried so many models & also got his friends to steal expensive club turntables .He eventually ended up using the original Technics 1200 mark one which was released in 1972.This enabled him to develop the key skills every scratch mix dj uses.

The 1200 mk 2 was released in 1978 & has hardly evolved since then.

So the definng dates are 1972 & 1978 for technics hardware.. The dj culture & events take care of everything else.

I always thought technics was a dj friendly company from the dj events but get the impression that technics was never really interested in dj's, It was just a coincidence that influential dj's adopted technics home turntables & the competition never had much chance because of the industry standards,This would explain their inability to evolve & failure to compete in the cdj , controller & mixer market with real competition.

They were probably not making enough profit to justify it

RiP technics
 
Technics missed the boat with CD Players,

They launched some very highend CD players in the late 80's for Night Clubs and radio stations, not much cop for mixing on.

Then after Pioneer launched the one and ONLY CDJ Technics had another go at launching a DJ CD player, that went down like a lead baloon!

Though built and engineered well, It never came close to a Pioneer CDJ, and not many good thing were said about it....

I think that was the final straw, farewell Technics RIP....
 
@ johnnysh thanks for jogging my memory.



Johnnysh is referring to the technics slp1200 & slp1300 cd deck released in 88/89. It was the size of a 1200 turntable & mostly used for broadcasting. you couldn't scratch on it but you could mix & stutter using a small jog wheel & pitch slider .It cost over 1k & i still see them in use in recording studios.

scratching was very difficult to implement in those days on a cdj , it took pioneer many years to perfect.
I recall mixing & setting loops on Pioneer CDJ-500 in 1993 & used many other pioneer cdjs units before they released the cdj800 & 1000 models & technics had the dodgy dz1200

so we have the market leaders developing & releasing 3 cdjs in 17 years ..... this gets worse

I thought technics were the leaders but after researching i'm surprised technics lasted so long in the industry

They were so nonchalant & fortunate

it all makes sense now.
 
I still have 3 cassette decks from Technics. I hardly use them for obvious reasons, but they remain in view.
 
It is interesting to read a great deal of comments about Technics. I suppose Technics did not move with time and technologies and is left behind to disappear.
 
Here is my 2 SL-P1200 Decks Still working fine in my studio

Though the contact on the CD flap door was always a poor design and can cause problems





The quality of technics build back in the 80s was very hard to beat, I still have 3 or 4 high end technics hifi amps from the mid 80s, again still going strong, there great.

In theory, Technics were the 1st to design the most advanced CD player for the industry, back when DJs were crazy over the SL1200/1210 turntables, you can see the 1st serious Technics CD Players above.

Though these CD players was mainly for studio / radio, I bought mine in 1988 and paid over £1200 each, 4 of them went back because of problems with playing mini CD's, the 5th replaced SL-P1200 can be seen in the above photo.

There was also a company that modified these players and added some pro feature (company name ASC)?? they added Balanced Outputs, XLR Sockets and a few other features

Is real shame Technics did not continue with there R&D to give Pioneer a run for there money, as I have always said Technics Build quality is far better that Pionner.

But after DJing on the new Pioneer CDJ2000, Technics would have a long way to go to catch up Pionner, the CDJ200 is a marvel and trully amazing.

I think we all need to shut our eyes think back to the Very Best Decade Ever ..... the 1980s and remember one of the very finest HI FI companys that put DJ's on the map.

My Dear Dad use to say to me,

John .... NOTHING LASTS FOREVER, and it does not.....

RIP Technics (respected forever)
 
I was old school turntable from 1980 until I first learned cd mixing on the slp1200 in 1988 when I worked at the Paladium in San Francisco. In 1993 I got the 3rd & 4th cd-500s to come off the line and I never looked back and barely have touched a turntable since then. When Pioneer came out with the cdj-700 I was in absolute heaven...it had a memory cue AND had 2 loop points....by 1998 I discovered laptops and BPM Studio and have been a mouse guy from then on through PCDJ Red, PCDJ FX and the best of them all Virtual Dj.

I still have my original Technics Turntables, a 1300 and a 1500 modified so I can cue and slip start just like the later to come 1200. I was told the 1300 and 1500 were discontinued in 1977 when the 1200mkII came out, don't know when they were originally produced. My 1300 and 1500 still work flawlessly after 33+ years.

The company name may be gone, but just like 2 Pac their creations live on forever!
 
Short answer: the laws of supply & demand.

SL-1200 is the undisputed champion of vinyl turntables, but there's just not that much demand for turntables because everyone and their mother has gone digital.

As for other Technics DJ-products...well, they just weren't that great. SL-DZ didn't have a chance in hell to compete with Pioneer CDJ's and the few mixers they produced were compiting in already over-saturated product segment.
 
 
I recommend everyone visit the vintage technics website..& note the timeline of their turntable releases .. They were releasing new units very frequently like a record company.

output stagnated in the late 80s possibly after cd players became more affordable & the sl1200 carried the brand.

That's an amazing & illogical feat from a business perspective because the sl1200 mk 2 turntable is a home audio product adopted by dj's & they have always been expensive.

scroll to the direct direct drive turntables 1975-1983 & you'll see many frequent releases of turntables which have a lot of the 1200 mk 2 characteristics like the distinctive platter & adjustable tone arm.......Pay attention to the sl1300 sl1400 sl1700mk2 & sld1

For the scratch djs......I remind you all that the sl1200 mk 2 was released in 1978 & was adpoted by d'js not designed for the dj as Grandmaster flash & Grandwizard theodore began developing the turntable arts in 1975... but.............

In the 1983 wildstyle movie an unidentified Technics model is the common turntable used by every dj featured... check the adjustable tone arm

whiz kid & jazzy jay are also using some unidentified technics ( possibly sld1 ) on a jessica jason youtube clip

Dj cash money on muzu ( dmc tv ) being interviewd by cutmaster swift mentions using the Technics bl01 belt drive turntables before meeting jazzy jeff for a battle so it's very likely cash money may have used them when he recorded the very influential Doctor Funkenstein - scratchng to the funk.

The battle was cancelled, but it was Jazzy jeff who introduced cash money to the sl 1200s mk2 around 1985.


Technics turntables have been the scratch dj's choice far longer than most people realise....
 
 
johnnysh wrote :
What a great site

here is the link for anyone who needs it....

http://www.vintagetechnics.info/menu.htm

Everything you DID NOT KNOW about Technics gear.....


WOW, great find guys. Didn't know my 1300mkII and 1500mkII were broadcast and "disco" tables. Because of the automatic and semi automatic feature (which I had disconnected for real mixing work) I always thought they were just high end "audiofile" tables.

Anybody know of a site that appraises and/or buys classic audiogear? The one linked from this site only does repair now. I would be curious to see what my tables are worth and maybe sell them as I don't use them anymore except to practice once in awhile incase I ever do another vinyl gig (which I don;t ever see happening).
 
Hi

I am actually spending many hours ripping all my DJ vinyl in to my PC, and if the pressings are good I can get the same results sound wise as CD quality, its amazing how good some pressings are !!

But you also need a good turntable with low wow and flutter, thus my Technics SL12010 MKII

Though there are lots of very bad pressings, I think it was pot luck as to where you were in the que at the time the records were pressed, though you were goverened by the record shops batch of records.

That said I will always keep my SL1210 in the studio for that very reason to rip vinyl to PC, I also use the orange ortofon Night Club MKII e Stylus and a very high end mixer, the audio results are great.

But the key to all of my high end results are due to my record cleaning machine which I bought in the early 90's, I imported it from the USA (not cheap) but every DJ who uses vinyl should have one and it truly gives me the very best results from vinyl when ripping in to my PC.

Just a very slow process, Cleaning, Ripping, Editing, and then file saving

But I am getting there with the result I want (High Quality Rips), and then I can put my vinyl away for ever...., though will never part with it....
 
It took me over 10 years to get (most) of my vinyl recorded to wav files. Originally I was doing it in 1993 to transfer my vinyl to cd.....halfway through I shifted to mp3 for the software programs so a lot of it never made it to cd. I still have 12 crates that never made it to mp3, some because I aquired them on cd and ripped from there, but the rest I knew I would never spin in a club so i really didn;'t see the point of continueing. I just keep the vinyl because (a) too lazy to look for buyers and (b) although many were not big hits they were personal favorites at the time and every once in a while I will use a sample beat to put behind some boring piece of crap contemporary hip hop to give it a much needed boost and make it palletable.
 


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