Vestax

The Vestax Corporation of Japan began in 1977 as a designer and manufacturer of electronic guitars. In the 1980s Vestax introduced a series of cassette-based multitracks, including the Vestax MR66, to challenge established products from Fostex, Yamaha and Tascam's portastudios.

Competing in the turntable market

During the late 1990s Vestax launched a new flagship range of professional DJ turntables. The PDX models had higher specifications than the two market leading products from Technics and were priced in direct competition with the Technics SL1210/SL1200.

However, the industry standard Technics SL1210/SL1200 models remained the favourite of DJs worldwide. At the time they were an established brand with a twenty-year head start. There have also been some build quality issues reported throughout 2008 and 2009.

This pattern of events has been replicated by other DJ equipment manufacturers such as Numark, Gemini and Stanton. These turntables have either a higher specification or lower cost, in sheer numbers sold they are still dwarfed by the various versions of the Technics SL-1200 & SL-1210 series.

Expanding range

In 2006, Vestax entered the digital DJ market with the release of the VCI 100, an all-in-one DJ controller for use with digital DJ software. The controller combined jog wheels and a mixer in a compact unit, a design that subsequently adopted in many later DJ controllers. helping to re-establish Vestax expanded its controller range with models including the VCI-380 and VCI-400.

In the 2010s Vestax focused on high-tech musical electronics, creating signal processors, DJ Mixers, professional turntables and CD players. The company also reduced its range of turntables, but kept the PDX-2000mk2/2300mk2 for mainstream DJ use, and the PDX-2000mk2pro/PDX-2300pro with a new tonearm suspension system for increased skip resistance. In conjunction with DJ Qbert they have also released the QFO and QFO LE models. These turntables have built-in mixers, and a portable turntable/mixer

Debt troubles

In mid-October 2014, many websites reported a speculative piece investigating reports from the Japanese news source "Teikoku News Online", that Vestax was ceasing operations. Retailers in the US closed shop, and there was a lack of representation or new products being revealed at trade shows. On 5 December Vestax started bankruptcy proceedings with a debt of 900 million yen (roughly $7.5 million USD).

Technology

Vestax was the first manufacturer to release a vinyl cutting machine for home vinyl cutting of new mixes / dubplate, in 2001.

Vestax innovated with their turntable using a straight tone arm, which gave greater tracking force; useful for complex DJing maneuvers such as scratching or beat juggling. This has been adopted by virtually all other turntable manufacturers, with the exception of Technics. Some maintain however that the straight arm increases wear upon the record. This is based on the premise that the original 's' shaped tonearm is so designed as to naturally gravitate toward the center of the record. The straight arm will not do this, and so will theoretically drag more as the record rotates, wearing down the grooves. Vestax however have consistently denied this.

Mixer Models

PMC-05 Series

PMC-05Pro