Audio Methods
If you enable Ableton Link, or OS2L it will disable all other methods.
We have successfully tested Ableton Link with VirtualDJ and djay Pro. Rekordbox and Serato DJ Pro both support Ableton Link as well. Behaviour does vary between applications and versions, so watch the message log and confirm the tempo is arriving and following before you rely on it live.
OS2L is mainly supported by VirtualDJ at this time, but it does work very well.
Direct Audio Detection
Direct Audio Detection listens to a sound input on your computer, tracks the tempo, and watches for kick drum and heavy bass events, adjusting your lighting effects and their timing as the music moves. You can use a microphone, but room noise and poor sound quality will give noticeably worse results and we strongly recommend against it.
Most people want DMXDesktop to listen to the music already playing on the same machine. It can do that on its own on both platforms, with nothing extra to install.
On Windows:
Tick Include Outputs (Loopback) on the Audio settings tab, then pick your normal output device, your speakers or your interface, from the Audio Device list. Stereo Mix still works if you already use it, but it is a fallback rather than the way to do this.
On macOS:
macOS 14.2 and later can capture system audio directly, described below. On macOS 14.0 and 14.1 you need a loopback driver such as BlackHole, which you can also install with brew install blackhole-2ch. Once it is installed you can combine it with your real output in the "Audio MIDI Setup" app, usually found in Applications > Utilities, then select that device from the Audio Device list.
Direct Audio can be combined with Ableton Link or OS2L, so you can take a perfectly beatmatched BPM from Link or OS2L while Direct Audio tracks energy and volume, which is what drives dark on silence and auto strobing.
Where a direct beat source is available, Ableton Link or OS2L is still the most reliable way to lock to the beat, because nothing about it depends on the sound reaching a microphone or a loopback. Live tempo detection is considerably more accurate than it used to be, though, so Direct Audio on its own is a perfectly sound choice when there is no beat source to take.
ASIO low-latency input (Windows)
New in v1.0.51
On Windows you can capture audio through an ASIO driver for low-latency input from a professional audio interface, or from a loopback driver such as ASIO4ALL, FlexASIO or Voicemeeter. Install an ASIO driver first, then in Settings → Audio open the Audio Device list and pick your device from the ASIO section.
For ASIO devices a Configure ASIO… button appears, which opens the driver's own control panel where you set the buffer size and channels. Input gain is handled by the driver, so the volume slider is disabled and the loopback option doesn't apply. If the device is already in use elsewhere, DMXDesktop lets you know so you can free it up first.
macOS system audio capture (macOS 14.2+)
New in v1.0.51
On macOS 14.2 and later, DMXDesktop can listen to your Mac's system audio directly, with no third-party loopback tool such as BlackHole. Choose your normal output device in Settings → Audio and DMXDesktop captures what is playing, while your audio stays audible as usual.
This brings macOS level with Windows rather than ahead of it. Windows has captured system audio through its own loopback for about a year; what has changed is that a Mac no longer needs an extra driver to do the same thing.
Note the version gap. This needs macOS 14.2, while DMXDesktop itself runs on macOS 14.0, so on 14.0 or 14.1 the option will not appear and BlackHole remains the way to do it.
The first time you use it, macOS asks for permission to capture audio and for microphone access. Grant these once and you are set. Only real output hardware is offered, so virtual and aggregate devices are filtered out of the list.
Auto Strobing
When Direct Audio Detection is enabled, the Strobing option will also be available. From here you can configure the global settings for the Strobe On Peaks function, which can be activated per effect cue.
Choosing your input and output devices
New in v1.0.52
There are two audio devices in DMXDesktop and they are easy to confuse. The input is what DMXDesktop listens to for beat and audio detection, and it lives in Settings → Audio. The output is where the music player sends audio, and it lives in DJ Mode settings. Both are now labelled as such, each one points at the other, and both note that with ASIO a single interface usually cannot do both at the same time.
Every audio device list in the app now groups devices the same way, so ASIO, loopback and ordinary devices are easy to tell apart wherever you are looking.
Several long-standing annoyances have gone. Device lists no longer come up incomplete, missing your inputs entirely, until you press Refresh Devices. Output devices are listed whether or not the music player happens to be running, which is exactly when you would be configuring it. Refresh Devices keeps working instead of responding only to the first press. And changing the input while detection is running switches to it immediately instead of waiting for a restart.
If a device is unplugged, goes to sleep, or drops out over a remote desktop connection, DMXDesktop now recovers instead of going quietly silent, and it tells you plainly when a device is unavailable.
Choosing ASIO channels (Windows)
New in v1.0.52
On a multi-channel interface you can now choose exactly which Input channels are captured, and which Output channels the music player plays to, instead of being stuck on channels 1 and 2. The lists show the real names your driver reports, such as "MAIN OUT L", so you can tell which socket is which.
The same ASIO options, including the button that opens your driver's own control panel, are now on the Live Wire tab as well as the audio settings pages.
If audio detection and the music player are both pointed at the same ASIO interface, DMXDesktop warns you. Most ASIO drivers allow only one program at a time, so one of the two will not start.
Audio cannot be switched off underneath a running feature
New in v1.0.52
Live Wire, which is available on Standard and Pro, needs both Audio Capture and BPM detection. Either could previously be turned off while it was running, leaving it enabled but deaf. That can no longer happen, and the same protection covers OSC, the mobile and remote interfaces and Stream Deck, so a remote button cannot silence a running feature either.
Changing the audio device also no longer flashes "Audio Capture has been disabled" at you before succeeding. The three places you can pick the input device, Settings, the Audio and BPM panel and the Live Wire tab, are three views of one setting and now stay in step with each other.
Live tempo detection and BPM Confidence
New in v1.0.52
Live tempo detection is significantly more accurate on difficult material: ballads, acoustic sets, brushed drums and live bands. House and techno were never the problem and behave as they always did.
Alongside the reading is a BPM Confidence meter, which tells you when the tempo can be trusted. It is worth watching as closely as the number itself. A low reading is the app telling you it cannot hear a clear pulse, which is useful information in itself on a quiet acoustic set.
Detection now takes a couple of seconds longer to settle at the start of a track. That is deliberate.
Also fixed: the reported tempo jumping every couple of seconds, and the four-bar tap tempo box appearing alongside the live audio meters when a cue with a fixed BPM started.
Half and double tempo
New in v1.0.52
Running the rig at half or double time is one setting. The desk, MIDI pads, OSC and the mobile remote all read and write the same value, so they cannot disagree about what speed the rig is running at. The detected tempo itself is never changed.
Settings has its own Tempo Control card holding Half Tempo, Normal Tempo and Double Tempo. On a MIDI controller the three pads behave as one group, with exactly one of them lit at a time.
