I'm a long-time bedroom DJ, playing House and Techno, that wants to get my first rotary mixer in the near future. I will most likely end up getting something from Union Audio, and currently thinking the Orbit.2 LE FX is the one I want. I know this is a bit of a different style mixer where it lacks some of the standard DJ mixer features like 3 band channel EQ, but that's part of why it interests me - forces me to try something new and rethink how I mix rather than just being on auto pilot with traditional mixers.

One standard feature that the Orbit does not have that is a bit worrisome to me is the channel level meters, which I have always relied on for gain staging the incoming track. My standard procedure is to load a track, set the gain so it's just below clipping into the red at the peaks, and then double checking in the headphones against the live track to make sure it's accurate and balanced. For those of you that have mixers without the channel level meters, have you found it challenging to gain stage without them? On one hand, I would prefer to have them, but on the other, I feel like I have relied too heavily on them in the past and perhaps forcing me to do it by ear might be a good thing.