Rane Empath SL at Winter NAMM 2012?

Could it be…….yes, finally we will be able to get our hands on the mythical Empath-SL mixer in 2012?!

Well, maybe and maybe not. The fact is, nobody knows except for the parties involved at Rane and Serato. The Serato forum has a rich history of Empath SL speculation and pleadings directed toward the companies involved. There was a glimmer of hope leading up to NAMM 2010, but that glimmer was dulled by the release of the $2600 behemoth know as the Rane Sixty-Eight.

So, will NAMM 2012 be the year Serato and Rane announce the combination of an SL3 interface in the legendary Rane Empath mixer? I personally would love to see this happen. In fact, I’ve been hanging on to my TTM-56 / SL3 combo and holding off on upgrading to a TTM-57SL until after this year’s NAMM.

In the meantime, I’ve been doing a little research to examine the probability of an Empath SL at the Winter NAMM show in January 2012. I figured the best way to do this is to take a look back at past NAMM shows and the releases from Serato and Rane.

2005 – This was THE year Serato Scratch Live came on the scene at NAMM. The official release of the product was in May of the previous year, but the 2005 NAMM show was where DJ A-Trak provided an amazing demo of this amazing new product.

2006 – Another great year for Serato and Rane. The Rane TTM-57SL was released and featured at the Winter NAMM show.

2007 – Scratch Live 1.7 was released at NAMM, featuring key lock and bpm detection.

2008 – Video SL and Scratch Live Version 1.8 is released at NAMM.

2009 – Time for an Empath SL yet? Nope, just Scratch Live version 1.9 with a sample player and loop roll. Later that year in April, the SL3 was announced at Musikmesse in Frankfurt, Germany.

2010 – With the SL3 released last year, and 4 long years since the last mixer release, surely we’ll see an Empath-SL released. Wrong again, Rane and Serato jump straight to 4 channel mixing with the Rane Sixty-Eight.

2011 – We don’t see the Empath-SL here either. Instead we see the SL4 released, with the SL2 release following in April at Musikmesse.

In my research, I also discovered that the contract agreement between Rane and Serato is rumored to expire at the end of 2011. Could this be why we’ve seen a slew of boxes (SL2, SL3, SL4) and only one mixer (Sixty-Eight) in the last 5 years? Or, is the dynamic duo saving the best for last? Or…….is Rane going to release a Scratch Live mixer so awesome and popular at the end of their “last” year together that Serato will have no choice but to sign another agreement with Rane?

I’m hoping for the latter. Rane is an awesome company, but without the partnership power of Serato and Scratch Live, I’m guessing that their product sales would plummet. Rane would be stupid to not want to keep Serato as a partner. Releasing an Empath-SL at winter NAMM 2012 would be the right move to keep the partnership strong. Serato’s only other option is to partner with Pioneer for future mixer releases, but they are already in with Traktor.

So my official prediction is this: YES, WE WILL SEE AN EMPATH-SL (or possibly and updated TTM-57SL) AT WINTER NAMM 2012!