Whats Your DAW and Why?

[mindwalker]

Been trying Reaper here as well but since I'm using a Mac I might give Logic a spin very soon (in some Apple Store) to see how well it integrates with the OS. I find Reaper to be quite powerful but many times I find myself having to look it up on the Internet how to do something simple

for example just yesterday I was trying to record a simple MIDI loop starting with a kick and snare and then I wanted to do a second dub to add a hi-hat but it was adding a new take and then I didn't seem to be able to merge the two. I'm sure there's ways to do this but again.. it's just an example of how sometimes I wish it would be simpler. The menus and options are really so exhaustive that many of them you don't even understand what they mean. I also couldn't get the pinch to zoom to work on the MIDI editor although I've changed the corresponding action on the actions list to act to MultiZoom but well...
And that reminds me.. before you try to use Reaper on OSX you really should change the default horizontal / vertical scroll actions to the trackpad swipe gestures otherwise as soon as you try to swipe vertically on the track view you end up zooming in... which is fine for many but after you get used to OSX is really not what you expect (and the same for the horizontall scrolling not being inverted by default.. something that can be changed too on the Actions though)

But for tracking guitars it's really easy.. although I find take comping still more intuitive in Logic from what I've seen in videos. With Reaper you still have to split the takes and then manually pick these building blocks from each take to make it your final cut.

But yeah Logic is a much bigger beast and can hog the system down I would imagine.. although I've ran GarageBand and Reaper and for both MIDI work and Guitar Amp modelling with monitoring they seem to be on par in CPU and memory usage (GarageBand is supposed to run on the same engine as Logic so I guess Logic will have a similar foot print)

But Reaper is so customizable.. that's undeniable! But I personally don't want to customize too much.. I just want to use the darn thing I tried a couple of themes for Reaper but I always end up going to the Default one... the icons aren't pretty but the rest is all there and fully functional (I found themes sometimes to remove vital buttons such as the monitor button from the track lane ?)

 

[Dommak89]

Since there is such a variety of DAWS and even a variety of versions of one DAW I'm always a little confused.

I tried Reaper, and it was cool, but at all intuitive. Maybe that's because I'm a beginner and don't know too much about recording, frequencies and so on.

A friend of mine uses Cubase 6, which is really cool, and I find it a little easier than Reaper, but it's freaking expensive.

So after reading the thread I still couldn't say which DAW would be simple to use and also be affordable. Any suggestions?

 

[wookie606]

I use Reaper.
I have been looking into other DAWs because I am bored but Reaper has practically everything I need.

 

[Aewrik]

I use Studio One 2, but would've probably gone cubase if it wasn't twice the price. I haven't used Cubase since SX3, so I can't make a comparison, but really like S1. Reaper probably has the best comping, though, which is important to me (I suck : p).

There are alot of awesome features in S1, though (but I hate all the "why did I change to S1" videos, where they basically switched because it sounds so good scratch and for the melodyne integration, which can be bought as a standalone vst).

Reaper is really good, but I felt I didn't get the visual feedback I wanted when recording, and since S1 Pro cost the same as the vst plugins I'd looked at, I just got it instead.

When FL Studio gets better support for multiple meters, I'm going back there. I love the layout and workflow of FL Studio, but my head goes numb when recording because 15/16 over 4/4 ...

 

[BeeG]

I use Sonar. Why? Because I was young, got it, spent years learning it, and don't feel like learning a different one.

 

[stuglue]

Studio One.
I've been using it since v1.65.
It was missing a few key features, but I could see its potential. It is fast, I could have it started up, added a few tracks armed and ready to record whilst cubase was still scanning its plugins.
I had been a cubase guy since SX but my patience iout at version 5. I was sick of plugins which worked fine one day crashing cubase the next, all because of an unknown error. I found I spent more time trying to remedy an issue, browsing forums for fixes than getting any work done. Now I don't mind using forums as long as its to learn something, not how to bug fix or learn a workaround. The Presonus forum is full of helpful friendly users.
I couldn't get on with reaper as I was overwhelmed with menus and options.
I can say that I've settled on a after never being content for so many years. Version 2.5 features a lot of great new functions and its a free upgrade, and best of all no dongle.

 

[Frank_Domine]

I've always been using Sonar, the last I used was 8.5. Then I switched to Cubase 5, and nowadays is that I stay with. Simple and effective tools, convenient interface, so great

 

[slowro]

I have reaper
I only have a pc or I would try logic.
Reaper does me fine just now but I've not even started any real mixes

I wanted plug and play with ezdrummer and some vsts and it works fine most of the time. It goes a bit latency crazy sometimes for no obvious reason but I'm sure that's my hardware