What's Your DAW of Choice?

[aoVI]

SO, could you guys give me some ideas on what I could use, that would be more suited for my needs? I hear ProTools is good...

With ProTools 9/10 I had a period of getting it nice and stable on my system; about a month or so. Just ironing out all the wrinkles, making sure everything played nice with each other. Once I got it there I have had little to no trouble with the DAW itself, other than the fact 10 is 32bit, and I bump my head on memory here and there. PT11 is 64, and the performance is supposed to be great. I am probably not going to make the jump to 11 due to the AAX format (was always a pain finding RTAS plugs, but there is ReWire for using VST though!) and the fact I feel Avid is moving away from small-time customers like me and putting focus back on the large studios.

I found using ProTools to be fairly intuitive for me. I am a graduate of a recording school (back in the days of tape though, and I never really worked professionally due to life circumstances, but...) and things just seemed to make sense in the PT layout. I didn't really comparison shop though, I knew PT was considered a standard and did an impulse buy.

I love PT10, but if I had it all to do over again, I might have chosen Studio One or Cubase instead. I have since demo'd both and found each to have a unique appeal. My workflow/focus may be a bit different than yours, however.

[S1gnsOfL1fe]

I just got Digital Performer 8 since i'm doing a lot of film composition type work and it's apparently great for that but i still haven't got through the learning curve. Are there any other DP users here? If so, is it worth struggling with?

DP8 user here! Surprised? Read my above posts in the thread. Digital Performer is definitely "that DAW" if you know what I mean. Not many people use it, or think about as their first choice, but it can do EVERYTHING and it's users are loyal, hardcore, and devoted to the company that makes it. After throwing myself into Pro Tools 9/10, I had to "relearn" DP a little bit...more like brush up on the more advanced features. It's so feature filled it's ridiculous. But what DAW in the industry these days comes with a 800 page softcover manual? Not many. Stoked to hear you're trying to join the cult though! :hypnotized:

If you need any help, just let me know.

Cheers,
-S1gns

[Luftrum]

Ableton Live: First DAW, didn't really work for me, more a DJ tool than a DAW in my opinion. Now my Live 5 box (or was it 4?) is just collecting dust.

FL Studio 10: Bought it, never used it, collecting dust on my HD. Still wonder why I bought it in the first place, was it just GAS?

Cubase 5: Got a full license offered to me by Steinberg when working on presets for Padshop Pro. Extremely powerful DAW... still fire it up once in a while but in general it's too complex to my needs.

Reaper: This is it, love it! Light on CPU and light on data - not bundled with tons of effects and instruments, just an intuitive DAW that clicks with me and works the way I want it. Try it. There's a full working demo. Admitted, I demo'ed Reaper for some 60 days before buying the license. Will never switch. This is my DAW.

[rabbitsquirrel]

Way back in the day, I used Cakewalk (whatever version was available in the late 90s), and that was my first main DAW experience.
Since then, I have switch, and primarily use Audacity for all of my final mixing, as well as the majority of my sound creation and manipulation. I have played around with some others, but there is something I love about the absolute simplicity and lack of structure, and that it doesn't try to impose or suggest structure. The only other DAW I ever use is Ignite, and that was mainly when I was testing/exploring it (I have been working on the UI of the software).
As for my source sounds, a lot of what I make is based on sine, square, sawtooth waves and noise generated in Audacity and then manipulated/layered. I will also do field recordings (normally using my phone if I am out and about), or sample toy keyboards. I also generate sounds in different iOS apps, but usually then manipulate them past recognition (especially if I am adding drums or some sort of rhythmic sequence to a piece). If anyone is interested, I can do a rundown of app I use, and their relative strengths/weaknesses (most are free, and I usually go for the intentionally lofi, especially since I am on iPhone and not iPad). As for other software, I have played with some different things, but the only other thing I will use consistently is CoagulaLight1666, an image to sound converter (which I used on one of my AO Podcast tracks, so you guess which one is based on a cast photo of Saved By The Bell).
As for things I don't own, but am curious about, I have thought a lot about Ableton, especially because the Push is such a pretty, pretty piece of hardware, and I am interested in trying to figure out how to perform/create live (there is a really active experimental music scene locally, so there could actually be a chance to play out).
Hope that was at least a little interesting :D

[MetaDronos]

Field recordings... CoagulaLight1666...

Me too :highfive:

[windspace]

:biggrin:

Reaper: This is it, love it! Light on CPU and light on data - not bundled with tons of effects and instruments, just an intuitive DAW that clicks with me and works the way I want it. Try it. There's a full working demo. Admitted, I demo'ed Reaper for some 60 days before buying the license. Will never switch. This is my DAW.

+1. Absolutely love working with Reaper and the new midi updates in 4.5 are excellent. Haven't had any gripes with audio editing in Reaper either. Tried CubaseLE which I also liked a lot, but didn't really want to fork out for the full version after discovering Reaper which I actually prefer. I also still use Ableton which was my first step into DAW land, but that's more for designing sounds with clips in session view than arranging tracks. I'm also working on a live performance set with live which is where it really excels imo. I don't get on much with live's arrangement and midi editing.
Also used FLStudio for a brief period but that program is just a mess to me and some things, particularly the way it works with patterns just don't click with me at all, though I'm aware it's a fully capable DAW.

Thing with DAWS these days is that they're all very good, it just comes down to preference and what you find most comfortable to work with.

I'm another Reaper guy. I've got the free Live 8 Lite and I can see the attraction. I particularly like seeing all the effects in a 'rack' instead of in different windows. But I'm not trying to launch clips in a live setting, just mix field recordings with plug-ins. I admit it - I was originally attracted to Reaper for the pricing, but the more I use it and gain comfort the more I like it. It seems a complete solution for my needs. I have also recorded a hardware synth and from my iPad, and then applied effects chains in Reaper. works great! I admit also, that I'm still amazed that one can buy software that will do so very much today, for such a relatively low price compared to hardware solutions from years ago. We're spoiled!!! :biggrin:

As for iOS DAWs, I tried Music Studio and was pretty frustrated with it. I now use Auria LE and I'm very happy with it. I have not tried any of the in app purchased add-on's though.

[Utu Lautturi]

Some very useful insight here, gets me thinking...

In these other DAWs mentioned, is it possible to indefinitely rack plug-ins and assign their parameters to be influenced by other plug-in's automation curves? This is something I can't really imagine making sound design without, and in Ableton it's super easy and practically without restriction...

[Heaven And Hell]

For financial reason I recently made the switch from Cubase to Reaper, but I wasn't all that inspired by Reaper, so I tried out the Studio One demo. I immediately started writing new music and got on better with that than anything else I've ever worked with, including ACID Pro 7, so with some of my wedding money I bought it.

Very happy with my purchase.

[Seva Randeep]

I only use FL Studio.

[Negative Spectrum]

Way back in the day, I used Cakewalk (whatever version was available in the late 90s), and that was my first main DAW experience.
Since then, I have switch, and primarily use Audacity for all of my final mixing, as well as the majority of my sound creation and manipulation. I have played around with some others, but there is something I love about the absolute simplicity and lack of structure, and that it doesn't try to impose or suggest structure. The only other DAW I ever use is Ignite, and that was mainly when I was testing/exploring it (I have been working on the UI of the software).
As for my source sounds, a lot of what I make is based on sine, square, sawtooth waves and noise generated in Audacity and then manipulated/layered. I will also do field recordings (normally using my phone if I am out and about), or sample toy keyboards. I also generate sounds in different iOS apps, but usually then manipulate them past recognition (especially if I am adding drums or some sort of rhythmic sequence to a piece). If anyone is interested, I can do a rundown of app I use, and their relative strengths/weaknesses (most are free, and I usually go for the intentionally lofi, especially since I am on iPhone and not iPad). As for other software, I have played with some different things, but the only other thing I will use consistently is CoagulaLight1666, an image to sound converter (which I used on one of my AO Podcast tracks, so you guess which one is based on a cast photo of Saved By The Bell).
As for things I don't own, but am curious about, I have thought a lot about Ableton, especially because the Push is such a pretty, pretty piece of hardware, and I am interested in trying to figure out how to perform/create live (there is a really active experimental music scene locally, so there could actually be a chance to play out).
Hope that was at least a little interesting :D

I was fooling around with Audacity today and just realized it has Paulstretch as a built in effect

[windspace]

I was fooling around with Audacity today and just realized it has Paulstretch as a built in effect

Yes! I notice that it also present in the Mac version of Audacity now too. :thumbsup:
At a point in the past it was only available in the Windows version.

[seismic1]

I was fooling around with Audacity today and just realized it has Paulstretch as a built in effect

That's how I built the basic track for Axis Part 1

http://www.ambientonline.org/forum/s...mbient-beatzzz

[Thought Experiment]

Some very useful insight here, gets me thinking...

In these other DAWs mentioned, is it possible to indefinitely rack plug-ins and assign their parameters to be influenced by other plug-in's automation curves? This is something I can't really imagine making sound design without, and in Ableton it's super easy and practically without restriction...

I haven't actually tried this myself (but I might do now ;) ), but I think you'll be able to do this in Reaper with the routing matrix. Reaper is my DAW of choice too, after ditching Sonar (no technical/workflow problems with Sonar, I just grew to resent the annual upgrade fee, which seemed to offer less and less value for money) I still very occasionally use Project 5 for transition fx, risers etc - such a pity Cakewalk dropped it...:(

[Seva Randeep]

Always been curious about FL Studio. It will probably never come to Mac as a native application. For those interested, here's why: http://support.image-line.com/knowle...hp?id=&ans=114

For them to do that, it sounds like it would be a complete rewrite of the program from the ground up. Wonder how long that would take? :razz:

As from today there's a FL Studio Mac Public Beta. This is a custom Crossover wrapped version of FL Studio for Mac OSX and so is bit-identical to the Windows installer.

[deepstasis]

Hi

NIce to see another fl studio user. I use Fl Studio along with I have tried Cubase wich I also like but really like the workflow in fl and the way the mixer is setup. also have a extra hardware based setup using 3 roland vsr 880's my main mixer are two cascaded Roland vm 3100 pro's my favorite mixer .