Mackie d.2 Mixer Integration with Live? DJ advice needed

[helixx]

I recently played a live dj set and had some issues with glitching and popping and it got me thinking that I should look into different hardware that would integrate with Ableton Live as a potential solution.

In my search I ran across this:
Mackie d.2 2-Channel DJ Mixer
http://www.musiciansfriend.com/product/ ... sku=634278

I'm looking for a sanity check from you, the pros.

During my recent gig, I had to provide the complete sound solution (no in-house hookup) so I needed an interface with Audio-outs and my own speaker solution.

here was my setup:
Powerbook G4
Ableton Live 6.0.5
BCF2000
Alesis Multimix8 Firewire

After about an hour of heavy use (and running perfectly), Live starting getting this digital static which got louder and louder and eventually required me to quickly mix in my backup iPod for about 2 minutes while I restarted Live. Restarting Live fixed the problem but it happened 2 more times throughout the night and I have no solution for it. It happens randomly and I can't reproduce it at will. I suspect that the Alesis is the culprit for my problems.

Anyway, the point of this isn't to highlight tech woes, but to propose a potential (and not horribly expensive) short term solution until I get to the bottom of the glitching.

I'd like to use the Mackie as a way to handle the crossfading and cueuing while also giving me the ability to handle the audio in/out to circumvent reliance on the Alesis. The problem is, how will Live cueing work? I imagine I'll have to cue like "normal" by previewing the track in the "off" channel and then handling the crossfade via the Mackie faders.

Does anyone use a hardware DJ mixer like this? Any tips? Am I barking up the wrong tree?

TIA,
h.