Tonium Pacemaker

Launch price £480.00

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Stuff says

It won’t mix the tunes for you, but for those who can beat-mix or are prepared to learn, the Pacemaker is a dream come true

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Back in our 2007 Cool List issue, we described the Tonium Pacemaker as having ‘the potential to revolutionise the DJ world’. We’ve had to wait for what feels like a decade to see if it can fulfil that promise, but a finished sample has finally landed on our doormat. Let the micro-disco begin.

For the uninitiated, the Pacemaker is the first and only pocket-sized DJ rig. That doesn’t mean it lets you spin tiny coin-sized vinyl – inside its sub-PSP-sized metallic form beats a whopping 120GB hard disk on which tunes galore can be stored. Hook it up to speakers and a pair of headphones and you have an ultra-portable Djing setup.

On the button
The Pacemaker’s controls are kept to a minimum and as a result, each performs a number of functions. The thumb-friendly ‘P-switch’ on the side acts as a two-way Shift key, swapping between different modes.

The lozenge buttons select left and right channels, while the touch-sensitive crossfade mixes between them and also handles monitoring. Tune selection, channel volumes, EQ and effects are controlled by taps, linear sweeps or circular motions on the trackpad. It works well once you get used to it, but all these multiple functions mean you’re just one false move from cutting a track dead.

Your tracks are held on a 120GB hard drive, which will take around 14,000 six-minute 192kbps MP3s. It’ll also accept M4A, AIFF, FLAC, WAV, Ogg Vorbis and SNDs. There’s certainly plenty of space, but we’d love to see a skip-free solid-state version.

Learning to mix
So how do you put a mix together? It takes some practice but, like a musical instrument, you’ll be rewarded if you put in the graft. Setting up the tracks is simple enough – you select the channel, load up the track and match the tempos by holding the P-switch up and moving your finger around the rim of the touchpad.