If ever there was a difficult time to put out some DJ technology news, it’s probably just after a revered DJ brand relaunches one of the most iconic, loved and recognisable products in history. But that’s what DJ software developer Mixvibes has done, announcing a big update to their mobile Cross app on both iOS and Android.

There’s bee the usual slew of improvements on both sides, with the big news on the iOS side being that both the tablet and phone apps are now unified into one, so you don’t need to buy twice anymore. There’s a new audio engine to improve efficiency along with a redesign to add some new workflow features.

On the Android side, they’ve made MIDI devices much more plug ‘n’ play, added full support for the latest version of Android, Marshmallow (or M), including… wait for it: multichannel audio, which finally lets you you have both cue and master outputs in stereo!

Here’s the full press bumf:

Paris, France – 7th of January, 2015

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Mixvibes Cross DJ 3.0 for iOS & Android: Universal, redesigned.

Cross DJ for iOS just got a new audio engine and a fresh new look but above all, it is now a universal app. Meanwhile, its Android counterpart now works with Android M.

Cross DJ for iOS

New audio engine

Cross DJ for iOS audio engine has been re-engineered. From a user standpoint, this translates in significant improvement of the battery consumption, better audio quality and optimized recordings.

A redesigned app

Cross DJ for iOS has been redesigned to achieve a greater consistency across both platforms. It namely brings the following benefits:

• Change the color of each deck (7 colors: blue, orange, red, yellow, green, purple & pink).
• Portrait mode: switch the device orientation to access a single-player portrait view.
• Vinyls: choose between big & small covers.
• Notification when a loop, an FX, a sample or an EQ is active.
• Small buttons are easier to tap.

Universal app

Before, you could:

• buy Cross DJ for iPhone, and possibly run a stretched version of it on your iPad.
• buy Cross DJ for iPad to enjoy the iPad-only layout.

Now, you can simply buy Cross DJ once and use it on both your iPhone and your iPad while enjoying a specific layout for each device. And you are not charged twice for it.

Cross DJ for Android

• Cross DJ now run smoothly on Android M devices.
• On those devices, MIDI control in Cross DJ is now plug and play. Supported controllers are U-Mix Control 1&2, U-Mix Control Pro 1&2, Pioneer DDJ-WeGO 2 & 3 & Pioneer DDJ-SB.
• Multichannel audio for devices running Android M, providing for dual-stereo output. Users now can now pre-cue in stereo, while having a stereo master output at the same time.
• Many bug fixes.

Pricing and availability

iOS

• Cross DJ Pro (regular price: $9.99/€9.99)
• Cross DJ Free

Android

• Cross DJ Pro (regular price: $5.99/€5.99)
• Cross DJ Free

About Mixvibes

Mixvibes has been making professional DJ software and apps for 15 years. Downloaded by millions worldwide, its flagship app Cross DJ is now available on Mac/PC, iOS and Android. Mixvibes has also developed Pioneer’s rekordbox™, the worldwide club standard music management software.

My thoughts

So, there I was reading through another press release from Mixvibes about their mobile version of Cross: “redesigned”. Yup. “Version 3.0”. Cool. “New audio engine”. Hooray. “[…] now run smoothly on Android M devices”. Oh, nice for those that have it. “Universal iOS app”. Always useful. “Multichannel audio for devices running Android M…”. That’s ni… WHAAAT? This is (in my opinion) a huge bit of news: Proper master/cue output using an audio interface, working in a DJ app.

Having spoken to someone at Mixvibes, I can confirm that they’ve got multichannel audio working across generic USB audio interfaces. Here’s what they said, straight from the horse’s mouth:

“Cross DJ + Android M allow for stereo pre-listening (precueing with dual stereo outputs) with most audio interfaces / soundcards. We have tested it with the Mixvibes UMix 44 + Zoom c5.1t. This allows us to think that the audio interface implementation in Android M is good.

“Latency on Android is getting better and better and Android M is definitely a big step for DJs wanting to play on their Android devices. That said, it all depends on the device you use, which prevent us giving any set-in-stone figures.”

I’ll definitely be testing this out ASAP.

The rest of the changes are definitely about refinement and evolution. Having had a go on the big name DJ apps on Android, I do feel most comfortable with Cross. It’s interesting that there’s now a universal iOS app, rather than dedicated iPad/phone apps, as the Android version has had that since it launched (as far as I can remember) and I always thought the landscape/portrait view change was nifty. It also seems like the design of the app came from the Android side first, which is unusual.

Your thoughts

Have you had a go with Mixvibes Cross 3.0? Do you think the iOS universal app will be useful? How about the multichannel audio in Android M?

You can grab Mixvibes Cross for both iOS (£7.99/$9.99/€9.99) and Android (£4.99/$5.99/€5.99) on their respective app stores.