Like all of these threads the replies boil down to "my daddys DAW can beat your daddys DAW" pretty much. But it isn't that straight forward.

I'll repeat myself that for myself I either start my stuff with Ableton (a looper groovebox on steroids) or Cakewalk (a multitrack recorder on steroids) and mixdown often on Reaper (an uncomfortable audio toolbox on steroids).

But I'm not about to say this is for everybody, use what you like.

 

Thanks for all the advice everyone. I will be checking out Reaper & S1 in the next few months. Appreciate everyone's help in talking me through DAW's, their strengths & weaknesses. I will see if the grass is truly greener or the other side I suppose.

 

Studio One for anything other than orchestral scores, Cubase for that. If possible professional versions of each.

 

Oh my Dear...try............BITWIG! There is no better DAW out there, believe me!

 

I use Cubendo most of all. But (if you're starting from scratch?) I'd recommend not falling into the expensive trap of Steinbug. Not when Reaper does more, quicker and better. Albeit in a rubbish interface that doesn't look like Adobe? Which may be to your liking?

Anyway, the main problem w/ Steinbug is the constant niggles and some pretty serious bugs. Also hella expensive. Around $600. Also for flipping updates! Especially .0 updates. Which are basically beta tests. And cost $100 as upgrade / subscription, twice yearly. Whereas Reaper costs ~$60 in total. I honestly keep thinking: why the hell did I fall for this!? Then I remember how I've been sucked into the workflow.

If I was starting again, I'd defo pick Reaper, it's kinda crazy how the scripting works. You're often left to "hack it yourself in xml" w/ Steinbug.

 

Well... If you asked this question to a Cubase user, he would most likely recommend Cubase. Same thing for the two other DAWs of course.

As of me, I have been using S1 for more than six years now but there's no way I will recommend it to you since I have no idea who you are.

Bottom line: nobody can choose at your place since we just don't know how you work and the only way to sort this out is to try all three then choose the one that you prefer.

Obviously, that requires you to do a bit of homework instead of relying on the opinion of strangers.

 

s1 is more to easy and simple learning curve daw yet production quality guaranteed..

reaper is more to not easy learning curve but almost fully customizable daw yet production speed and quality guaranteed.. if u're not going to do any scripting go for s1 cuz scripting in reaper is the main gem to go for it..

 

Bitwig.

 

i own cubase and know it in and out.

but i would still, always recommend going for ableton.

a daw's purpose is to help you lay your ideas down as quick as it can. theres nothing better than ableton when it comes to this.

lfos that can control any parameter, macros, and live use if you ever reach there. i am very envious of ableton users lol, as i am now too familiar to cubase to leave it.


i have reaper as a backup always, as you need a dongle for cubase, and god forbid i ever lose that pos. i started out with reaper, but honestly it lacks a lot. yes its customizable, but shit, you'll find yourself looking for options and customizations more than making music. it gets old. it lacks the high end tools and the ui is awful, and trust me, you need a comfortable ui otherwise it just kills the drive.


i also tried studio one, and it doesnt compare to cubase 11. cubase is a beast in features.


all in all,

go for ableton. you will never look back. theres nothing it cannot do. only thing it was missing is comping, and now you have it in v11.

 

It might. What are your specs? I run a LOT of plugins, some very old 64-bits - I was thinking just this morning that this may be the main cause of the sluggishness, in COMPARISON to S1 and Reaper. One thing also that may influence your decision - while we're all pretty much running on 64-bit OS's these days, Reaper is the only DAW I know that still has (AFAIK), A: a 32-bit launcher option, and B: NATIVE support for 32-bit plugs if you actually still use them (I have a few, but avoid them if I can). You can look for J-bridge or MetaPlugin and experiment with those in all other 64-bit DAWs to handle 32 bit plugs.

Also consider this: There is a lifetime, 4-tires-and-a-steering-wheel, free version of S1 that PreSonus calls "PRIME" (I first tried it when I knew I was getting the FaderPort16, and kinda liked it right away)... You'll be made well aware of what's available in their more robust versions: "ARTIST" (becomes free when you purchase ANY PreSonus Hardware), and their "PROFESSIONAL" - fully loaded with almost 100 GB of plugins, loops and "Sound Set" instrument packs that are yours for life from their website, all with an in-program downloader and manager. I highly recommend downloading their free "PRIME" version and give it a try for starters. It's free after all, and like I said it's pretty good. IF you upgrade from there, DON'T make the same mistake I made - make sure you have ONLY ONE PreSonus/Studio One 5 install folder. Things will get messy otherwise 8-)

As far as Reaper goes, they let you legally use their full package free -- for 60 days, then they ask you to purchaser a common-use license - for a WHOPPING.... $60.00. You can still use it for free AFTER your 60 days is up, but you'll have that rotten feeling, and hey - it is THE BEST $60 you will EVER invest on anything DAW-related period. One thing - one month later, I'm still getting my FaderPort16 to work comfortably with Reaper. It is a struggle, maybe I've been looking in the wrong place. That's my mission today along with plugin-cleanup lol...

Also about Reaper, it's HEAVILY community driven. A great group of people you can interact with on forums, who build extensions like themes, "Action" scripts, and modifiers that really work well to enhance Reaper itself, on top of it's HUGE settings customization menu. Again, like S1 Prime, it doesn't cost you a thing - for 60 days, and I highly recommend giving that a go as well. Only thing - this guy ain't like the other DAWs, you WILL have to invest some time in learning it's routing structure - it is... different. For starters, it is possible to record MIDI, then audio, then video, then add a VST(3)i ....... all on the same track. Crazy!

OK there ya have it! Again, good luck!

PH

 

I never thought about that. It makes sense but I'd have to do a backup first as I'd be too afraid I might screw it up and I hate doing backups.

 

I understand people trying to make an educated decision buying any software, and DAWs tend to be pricey licenses.

But some posts make it seem that it is like changing an OS or converting to a new religion. (Although I do think MOTU has its own active cult). There is nothing wrong with having more then one available for use if you had the extra ssd space. Especially if you do Collab work or take clients, you can always just bounce stems out to whatever daw you are comfortable working in.

 

But Nuendo has a built in dolby atoms render

 

Studio One.

 

For me, a DAW's CPU efficiency is very important.
In my experience, on mac, both Cubase and S1 are quite CPU hogs while Reaper is amazingly CPU efficient.
Also, Reaper never crashes on me, can't say that for Cubase.

Just my 0.02.

Intel Mac Mini 2018, OSX Monterey 12.1, latest versions of Cubase, S1 and Reaper.

 

I've simply dropped a Zenith/Gatekeeper to the prefx slot of Patchwork(and saved as def. preset) instances and "remote controlling" Zenith instances through Patchwork (as a MIDI proxy)

Patchwork has PDC supports multicore has own inner routing system so seems usable, effects slots: I'm using Fab plugins which ones have own modulation system, so can't see why I would need AL (hopefully on one day Bitwig gonna get a better PR ... but now Cubase is far more usable if no needs superdeep modulation)

ps. Cubase has workspaces which able to restore plugins states too (positions open/close states) which is AFAIK missing from S1

 

Last edited: Dec 22, 2021

I left Ableton for Reaper and never looked back.

 

Sooner or later you will come back to ableton. We will forgive you.

 

I really doubt it. I did try it once more after about 8 months, but I closed the program almost immediately. it just sucks as a program.
It's great for kids. it's easy to use it can sound great, but who cares it doesn't work well on my computer and I'm I won't pay for a fucking i9 to run it on. If you (not YOU personally) can't make a decent track with freeware and 60euro reaper... well sorry.

 

Reaper doesn't even record during metronome count-in. I think it has recording during preroll but that's not very useful. I think it's a major oversight and apparently they are never going to fix that.