Cakewalk 2022.11 by Bandlab more efficient than PT 2022

[JnTuneTech]

One of the deciding factors for me with DAW software, pretty much from when I started as a (typically broke) musician, migrating from physical mixers and reels and cassettes of tape (I still have one of the old Teac 144 PortaStudio units, in storage now), was not just affordability, but flexibility. For many years, that which became PT was Mac only, and required dedicated hardware, if I remember correctly. As it happened for me, I waited things out until PCs became capable and popular enough to start offering (and attracting development of) serious AV production capabilities. Yes, they also had dedicated hardware requirements on many AV systems integrations, but as we still see today, there were far more options allowed for PC integration & programming, than there were for Mac. It is just a fact, and I know the arguments about that will go on forever, but it is a design, support, and of course marketing choice for the involved IP holders. (-In my day job, I work on Macs & PCs as needed, I just want things to work - regardless, -anyway, enough about that!).

I actually started using Cakewalk software when I was toying with different sound cards & music software for my PC, and there happened to be a bundled Sonar edition with a SoundBlaster card, which had some great internal MIDI playback that interested me at the time. I took a liking to the staff view of MIDI that Cakewalk had in Sonar, and off I went. (As it is today, I still love to have the staff view window for some of my projects with MIDI floated independently so I can play to it live if needed. -Not that I can read very well  , but it still is a great visual cueing tool for performing live with backing tracks sometimes.)

Of course hardware still makes huge differences, especially I/O and DAC quality, but on the software end, I still find huge differences in flexibility and downright choice, not mention affordability, between DAWs & the associated environment they support. PT for me is still restrictive, and I know they have reasons, -quality control always being one of the original (and often Mac-based philosophy/requirements) reasons behind this, but apps developed like Cakewalk have always appealed to me much more than PT - simply because they expand & try to improve more often than not, and allow for so many possibilities (even if sometimes those possibilities result in failure) and as a musician first, and an engineer second, that really works for me with Cakewalk.

As for the choice of interface design, I am not so impressed with the look of PT myself, but that is just a personal preference. And the information in the previous posts will show that Cakewalk is very flexible there too, comparison-wise. I also agree with those who like to use a physical control surface, at least for faders & panning, as sometimes no matter how good the screen design is, you just can't use all your true human interface devices (you know, fingers, feet, what have you - when I see the computer term HID, I always chuckle) to control a running mix for instance. Cakewalk seems to work with that quite well, and I didn't have to buy some highly-priced AVID gear to do it easily. (It does take some fiddling though!)

And yes, performance - Cakewalk has always performed quite well, at least when I wasn't trying something I knew to be experimental (but at least I can when I want to!), even on some cheaper systems & hardware interfaces. Those choices can be daunting though, and if you don't want to go through as many pitfalls, then yes, get a Mac & PT (doggone, I thought i might have been done with that subject - sorry!). That again is wide open to personal preference.

-One thing I am still working on - understanding all the technical stuff with audio conversion - file conversion in particular. Cakewalk still has their own dither options for exporting, and I have been trying to listen to those. -Mainly, I get put off by successive bounce quality notes, I don't envy the idea of something akin to tape loss (even though we buy tons of plugins now to re-enact just that!). -I also understand now from the post above, that Cakewalk has a good upsampling engine, and since I work primarily in 48K 24, maybe that helps with the multitude of instances where I use software primarily programmed for 44.1 environments?

In another post I did here recently, I mentioned this: One odd thing - I recently noticed there was a slight, but important difference to me, in the stereo field and some of the EQ, when I exported a few parts I had created using Kontakt drums directly in Cakewalk, on my particular system. -So, since I have the option of recording directly to USB from the output of my playback on my audio interface (RME UFX), I just recorded exactly what I was hearing that way - and integrated that back into my mix! Took some work, but I got the sound I wanted.  And that, of course, is what it really is all about - right?

That about sums it up for me on using any choice of musical instrument or DAW, - though of course it is always highly weighted by financial concerns. I am still trying to justify buying one or two of the Rickenbacker classic guitars I somehow think I still want...  

[Lord Tim]

23 hours ago, Starship Krupa said:

 

😢 An exported WAV would be a product of offline rendering, though, which I'm positing could be different from playback in the same DAW. People try the null test; I tried the null test with Cakewalk and Mixcraft (they didn't null completely, but they weren't off by that much, either). But the null test is done on rendered files, not the output of the DAW's playback.

That's why I also mentioned this:

On 2/25/2023 at 11:44 PM, Lord Tim said:

To take that one step further, set up 2 computers and have one recording the output of your audio interface while the song plays back in realtime from the DAW. That will definitely introduce more differences, but so long as you're sample accurate, with a decent interface I'd wager the difference would be tiny.

Like I said, I have no doubt if anything is panned it likely wouldn't null completely because of the different pan laws, and there'd be dithering, and you'd have to make sure your tracks are exactly the same level, no effects running, etc, etc, which obviously isn't a real world thing, but it's focussing on how the engine is summing the tracks only.

Doing a live recording to another machine or audio recorder would definitely introduce more variables into the mix (your interface definitely would come into play a lot more here for a start) but I'd still wager that with a good interface and good drivers, even doing this wouldn't be enough to be particularly audible to anyone without teenager's ears and good speakers.

Genuinely happy to be proven wrong if anyone wants to give this a go and finds other repeatable results, though!

But I'd really suggest there'd be more of a backlash against a lot of DAWs if they were changing your audio in some way unknown to the user, either in a good or bad way. Surely we can't have been the first people to go "Heyyyy... hang on, what if I test this?" and tried out the stuff I've mentioned. (Shh! Don't tell my ego, but I don't think I'm smart enough to be the first to think of this idea  ) 

[GreenLight]

As there was some discussion about gain staging techniques... do you guys use Gain/Trim plugins? I've managed well without those for decades, but recently realized that they can be convenient for making easily reversible (and visible!) changes between versions. But mostly I guess people use them to compensate so that they can set their faders at zero, where they have higher resolutions.

As far as I know, there is no Gain/Trim plugin supplied native with Cakewalk, right? (Maybe Channel Tools could do it...?)

I downloaded Blue Cat Audio's Gain Suite some time ago, which is free and works well but maybe looks a little dated.

[scook]

7 minutes ago, GreenLight said:

As far as I know, there is no Gain/Trim plugin supplied native with Cakewalk, right? (Maybe Channel Tools could do it...?)

I downloaded Blue Cat Audio's Gain Suite some time ago, which is free and works well but maybe looks a little dated.

Of course, Channel Tools may be used for this. 

An empty FX chain can also work.

 

The BC Audio Gain Suite provides a couple of extra features such as the ability to place the plug-ins in groups and very large gain adjustment. 

BC has alternate skins for the plug-ins.

[Lord Tim]

I only really use the Input Gain to set mine, but a plugin isn't a bad option either if you want something bypassable. That said, sometimes it's nice to use some other plugin last in the chain to automate the level instead of (or in addition to) the volume slider.

[GreenLight]

15 hours ago, scook said:

Of course, Channel Tools may be used for this. 

An empty FX chain can also work.

 

The BC Audio Gain Suite provides a couple of extra features such as the ability to place the plug-ins in groups and very large gain adjustment. 

BC has alternate skins for the plug-ins.

Thanks, very good points, scook! 👍 I'll look into the skins, the default isn't very sexy... 😆

[Starship Krupa]

On 2/28/2023 at 10:32 AM, GreenLight said:

do you guys use Gain/Trim plugins?

Sure. One of my favorite uses is for reality checking plug-ins or chains of them that boost level. Everything sounds better louder, so it can be hard to tell if my processing is really doing something good or if I'm being seduced by a simple level boost. It doesn't help that so many plug-ins' presets toss a bit of boost in there.

[GreenLight]

On 3/2/2023 at 10:39 PM, Starship Krupa said:

Sure. One of my favorite uses is for reality checking plug-ins or chains of them that boost level. Everything sounds better louder, so it can be hard to tell if my processing is really doing something good or if I'm being seduced by a simple level boost. It doesn't help that so many plug-ins' presets toss a bit of boost in there.

Yes, that's a good practice. 👍 And I'm annoyed by processing plugins without output trim controls (Soundtoys Radiator, I'm looking at you!).

What do you use for Gain/Trim?

[Starship Krupa]

14 hours ago, GreenLight said:

Yes, that's a good practice. 👍 And I'm annoyed by processing plugins without output trim controls (Soundtoys Radiator, I'm looking at you!).

What do you use for Gain/Trim?

Yes, output trim controls are a must for anything that can raise or lower the level. It looks like Radiator has an "output" control, is that something different?

[Starship Krupa]

15 hours ago, GreenLight said:

I'm annoyed by processing plugins without output trim controls (Soundtoys Radiator, I'm looking at you!).

What do you use for Gain/Trim?

It looks like Radiator has an "output" knob, is that not a true output trim?

Yeah, anything that can change the level needs some way to control the output.

I use kHs Gain, which is part of Kilohearts' free Essentials bundle. If you don't already have this bundle, I highly recommend it. A collection of 31 useful mixing and creative FX. Before Kilohearts came out with kHs Gain, I used BL Gain.

I also like to put an instance of kHs Limiter on synth tracks when I'm auditioning patches. Keeps loud synth sounds from slamming the meters.

[GreenLight]

On 3/5/2023 at 4:27 AM, Starship Krupa said:

It looks like Radiator has an "output" knob, is that not a true output trim?

Yeah, anything that can change the level needs some way to control the output.

I use kHs Gain, which is part of Kilohearts' free Essentials bundle. If you don't already have this bundle, I highly recommend it. A collection of 31 useful mixing and creative FX. Before Kilohearts came out with kHs Gain, I used BL Gain.

I also like to put an instance of kHs Limiter on synth tracks when I'm auditioning patches. Keeps loud synth sounds from slamming the meters.

About the Radiator output knob: I thought for long it wasn't a "true" output knob, but re-reading the manual now I guess it actually is. 🙃 What fooled me is that the VU meter shows lower levels when dialing back the output knob, and since the VU meter indicates how hard you drive the unit (or does it?!) I thought it simultaneously dials back the effect. But maybe it isn't? (It's interesting that the manual also notes that the output knob is also a source of overdrive/distortion, so that will obviously not be available if you reduce it.)

Good tips about Kilohearts' bundle, will definitely look into it! 👍 Yeah, I also sometimes place limiters on my synth tracks for safety. Often also a compressor on the audio preview bus for the Browser, when previewing loops (for melodic techno) that can be loud/harsh.

[Starship Krupa]

40 minutes ago, GreenLight said:

It's interesting that the manual also notes that the output knob is also a source of overdrive/distortion, so that will obviously not be available if you reduce it.

It's possible that what they mean by that is if you turn down the Output knob and crank the Input knob, you'll get more coloration.

This is a job for Plugin Doctor!