Is Rekordbox better on PC or Mac? – Experience from a PRO
I’ve used Rekordbox over the years on both on my Apple Macbook pro and later switched to Windows.
Although Pioneer claims that the Rekordbox the same is on both Mac and Windows, I have a different experience.
When it comes to functionality and User Interface, the software is identical.
However…
My experience
I ran into multiple issues on the Mac.
It sometimes didn’t respond to my user input.
It also took sometimes ages to start the software.
Pioneer support suggested to reinstall the software.
This indeed helped the problem.
This was back in 2016.
But the software did fit the 15″ monitor on my MacBook.
I took me a while to figure out that buttons on the right side of the screen weren’t visible in full-screen mode, because it lacked space to show them.
I had to drag the screen to the left to reveal buttons for “related tracks” and “info” and “tags” weren’t visible.
Very annoying.
After this experience in 2018, I’ve spinned 1 DJ gig with a Pioneer DJ controller and Rekordbox on a Mac in the Performance Mode.
The software got sluggish and sometimes unresponsive after 2 hours.
It got worse and worse, till the point that I had to restart my laptop.
That meant that I didn’t have music for a full minute.
That was a one-time experience I prefer not to repeat.
So I never used Rekordbox for DJing anymore for gigs.
From a programmers point of view, I’d suspect a memory leak.
I can’t imagine that I was the only person on the planet to experience this issue.
Pioneer might have fixed the issue in the mean time
In 2020 I switched to Windows as my main driver laptop, so also for Rekordbox.
I haven’t experienced the same issues on Windows.
The performance seems solid.
But I have to be honest that I never spinned a gig with Rekordbox on Windows out of ‘fear’.
I simply don’t trust the software anymore for live gigs.
This experience was in Apple’s Intel processor days, before the M-chips were a thing.
Conclusion
I prefer Windows over Mac when it comes Rekordbox.
But make sure to check the minimum system requirements in Pioneer’s website.
