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Bandlab #8 in Music Radar Best DAW poll.


kitekrazy

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https://www.musicradar.com/news/the-best-daws-2020-the-best-music-production-software-for-pc-and-mac

 

Definitely #1 in best free DAW of the century.

This is always the poll where some DAW users get butthurt and suffer insecurity issues.   I think we are just happy the Sonar lives and its still developed. 

Meanwhile FL is still the king and I agree. Odd that I got introduced to FL from my Sonar Home Studio 2002 disk. 

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Before the events of 2017, I might have been annoyed that SONAR wasn't higher, etc.

However, after taking advantage of a few of the crossgrades offered at that time, I have discovered that every DAW has great potential, which of course includes the potential to frustrate me.

Getting back to the poll, they include the pro/con sections of the reviews.  As the Con for Bitwig, they listed "Ableton Live still casts a shadow...",  Not only do I find that irrelevant , but there are a lot of legitimate cons they could have listed such as no support for REX files or the inability to audition MIDI clips.

They also listed "no Mac version" as a con for Cakewalk, which I don't see as a drawback.

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Most write ups i've read about Sonar and Bandlab seem to come from a user who has installed it and used it for 15 minutes. They seem to complain of features they googled vs. something they've actually tried.

I think each DAW offers its own unique set of tools and while some may offer more features in some areas and focus more on certain things, i believe we can all agree that a DAW is much like a shoe. Some of them fit us better than others.

I honestly believe we are musicians for a reason, we are drawn to music in some way from an early age. Daw's are really no different, we are drawn to a certain DAW for a reason. Sometimes its because of convenience, possibly the first DAW we used so we are content with knowledge we already have in our bag.

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Using @chuckebaby's shoe analogy. I have more than one pair of shoes.

I have legit licenses for 7 of the 12 DAWs listed and 2 that are not (Digital Performer 10 and Mixbus 32C). I don't own #1, 3, 7, 9, or 12. And likely never will.

Like shoes, some  sit in the closet for long stretches while others are for used for certain tasks (collabs) and one or two are for daily use.

But one is for sure the most comfortable for my current workflow.

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15 hours ago, Rooooooo said:

FL is number 1? .. can guess their fanbase,have you ever tried to record audio into it?

Sonar rocks! always has,Bandlab have done a great job .. long may they reign  :)

  Yes.  It caters to the EMD crowd.   If the poll were best DAWs for film it wouldn't be up there.

  I switched to FL when Sonar's GUI was getting cluttered and it was a very different way of doing things.  The only Sonar licensed I skipped was 6.  When one tries FL's workflow it's not easy after using linear DAWs.

 I think for a DAW that is free and PC only, #8 is pretty good.  Most free DAWs have a history of being limited or totally sucks (PT Free).  If I go broke Bandlab and FL are the only two I could use.

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21 hours ago, Magic Russ said:

Before the events of 2017, I might have been annoyed that SONAR wasn't higher, etc.

However, after taking advantage of a few of the crossgrades offered at that time, I have discovered that every DAW has great potential, which of course includes the potential to frustrate me.

Getting back to the poll, they include the pro/con sections of the reviews.  As the Con for Bitwig, they listed "Ableton Live still casts a shadow...",  Not only do I find that irrelevant , but there are a lot of legitimate cons they could have listed such as no support for REX files or the inability to audition MIDI clips.

They also listed "no Mac version" as a con for Cakewalk, which I don't see as a drawback.

Bitwig is like a subscription.  I got the free CM version and I just don't care for it.   I also look at the long term cost of having a DAW.  

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7 hours ago, chuckebaby said:

Most write ups i've read about Sonar and Bandlab seem to come from a user who has installed it and used it for 15 minutes. They seem to complain of features they googled vs. something they've actually tried.

I think each DAW offers its own unique set of tools and while some may offer more features in some areas and focus more on certain things, i believe we can all agree that a DAW is much like a shoe. Some of them fit us better than others.

I honestly believe we are musicians for a reason, we are drawn to music in some way from an early age. Daw's are really no different, we are drawn to a certain DAW for a reason. Sometimes its because of convenience, possibly the first DAW we used so we are content with knowledge we already have in our bag.

People treat them like religions.  Once offended over their choice of DAW they start jihad.   It's as bad as a Linux distro forum.

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2 hours ago, kitekrazy said:

Bitwig is like a subscription.  I got the free CM version and I just don't care for it.   I also look at the long term cost of having a DAW.  

Like but not quite.  You buy, you get 12 months of updates, you keep the latest version that they updated in those 12 months.  If you don't like the direction they are taking, you can always sit out until you feel they are addressing your needs.

 

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IMO this comparison by Musicradar is not more worth than toilet paper! There are so many arguments that are important for DAW choice and there are not 2 people that weight them in the same order. It is red-top press style to show a simple order without real detail comparison. I prefer extensive detail comparisons for buying/using anything, because it allows me to choose the criteria that is most important to me!

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I have touched 3 DAWs.  2 of them have no Musicradar "review", one of them was not mentioned at all (Tracktion, I still believe it is the simplest for beginners and they have free version too). Some "pro" and "cons" are questionable: Ableton has NO cons? really?; "does not come with loads of plugins", first that is not right (this does not comes with soft synthes, but the number of plugins is not small, especially when someone knows that JS is  plug-in format), second they write best DAWs not best Bundles; "Mac only"/"No Mac version"... where is "no Linux version"? I do not think someone on Mac care about Windows and reversed.

For 2 DAWs I know good, the "text" is useless. For Cakewalk they write nothing about DAW at all. For REAPER they mention questionable points: the interface has responsiveness problems at the moment (in "high" display) and the reason is deep in design. And it is not "most affordable" DAW: it is not free, commercial price (they mention "From ...") is relatively high.

I understand finding deep technical advantages and disadvantages is not easy. But in any serious ranking there must be at least some meaningful information.

So in case someone ask "should I check Musicradar when searching for a DAW?" I will answer using original words they write about Cakewalk: "you've got literally nothing to lose by..." reading it. And I will add "but you will learn almost nothing".

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4 hours ago, marled said:

IMO this comparison by Musicradar is not more worth than toilet paper! There are so many arguments that are important for DAW choice and there are not 2 people that weight them in the same order. It is red-top press style to show a simple order without real detail comparison. I prefer extensive detail comparisons for buying/using anything, because it allows me to choose the criteria that is most important to me!

For example, there's no mention of video. Mixcraft has better video editing options than any of the DAWs mentioned, including Pro Tools. If all you care about is recording a song and getting it up on YouTube, Mixcraft is "best." But what this tells me is not so much that Music Radar doesn't know anything about video, but that none of their readers care about it, so they didn't vote for it.

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39 minutes ago, Craig Anderton said:

For example, there's no mention of video. Mixcraft has better video editing options than any of the DAWs mentioned, including Pro Tools. If all you care about is recording a song and getting it up on YouTube, Mixcraft is "best." But what this tells me is not so much that Music Radar doesn't know anything about video, but that none of their readers care about it, so they didn't vote for it.

That's because a majority of Music Radar's audience is in Europe.  There's a larger base of EDM and Mac users.   FL and Live will always be in the top 5.

Once you get into that Mixcraft food chain I've only paid $29 for an upgrade. I know of some who flocked from Acid Pro was Sonay wasn't developing it anymore.

I tend to look at licensing as a major factor. 

I'm not surprised where Studio One is #2.   I've been on other forums where they ditched Cubase.

If I was just starting in this Bandlab, hands down.   The bundled effects are no slouch.  Few DAWs have a midi player.  My favorite thing is to audition midi files and synth patches at the same time.  

 I often wonder what the owner of Bandlab is doing.  They own Music Tech and surprised this app in not on the DVD, or do I see any promotions. 

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8 hours ago, kitekrazy said:

I'm not surprised where Studio One is #2.   I've been on other forums where they ditched Cubase.

From what I understand, many Mac people who would have started with Pro Tools because it's the "industry standard" went to Studio One instead, and other Pro Tools users who didn't want the subscription thing switched as well. I can understand that, I like Studio One  way better than Logic.

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  • 4 months later...

Cakewalk-Bandlab has great customer service, and that's even more noteable for a now free DAW; I had glitching and latency issues which they helped to completely resolve via quick emails of instructions and suggestions.

I did install an old bundled version of Cubase and learned it thinking the Cakewalk issue was not solvable, however now that Cakewalk is working again, I think Cubase will stay mostly in the closet with my dress shoes.

BTW, for users who had similar latency issues using the Tascam Celesonic 20x20 audio interface and blamed it on Tascam's drivers, the fault is not with Tascam drivers (Cubase with the Tascam Celesonic works flawlessly). The fault is not with Cakewalk Bandlab, either. My Cakewalk bandlab config file mysteriously got bloated with other ASIO driver's references I had uninstalled but never got removed from the config file, so I copied my Config file from my old Sonar Platinum which solved the problem (Cakewalk now also works flawlessly with Tascam Celesonic). I'm wondering if resetting config file to default values would have had the same positive result, which is smooth, glitch-free recording and playback with no latency jumping or latency drift. I still have the bloated config file (renamed) for reference purposes.

One thing about Cubase compared with Cakewalk, processor use is greater with Cakewalk. Also the Celesonic can be set as low as 4 samples which Cubase can handle pretty well. Cakewalk can only handle 16 or more samples. I don't notice enough latency at 16 samples to bother me.

My system is core i7, 3.5 Ghz not overclocked, 16gb RAM. Using USB 3.0 with Celesonic, but 2.0 works just as well from my own anecdotal tests.

I'm a Cakewalk user since 1998.

Back to more song creating...

Binney's AUD-Sonar Platinum using Tascam 20x20 ASIO driver.txt Binney's AUD-Cakewalk Bandlab using Tascam 20x20 ASIO driver.txt

Edited by Binney Stone
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