@the musicians on here: sequencers, pros and cons

[Ferrao10]

Hi there,

I been thinking about re-animating an old hobby of mine; using the pc with a sequencer software.
I been into that some 15 years ago and I had good fun for the approximate 5 years that I focused on it.
Back then I worked with Cubase. There only was Logic as a true alternative anyway.

I have been gathering as much info as I could/wanted on pretty much all of the sequencers that are commonly used nowadays.
Now I'd like to ask you guys about your experiences and/or suggestions before I enter a store.

I'd probably use the prog to do roughly 20% analog (live) stuff, 50% hard-/soft-synth, and 30% sample based.
I have a fast i7 with 16GB ram, sufficient soundcard (Delta 1010) and an old hard-synth+sampler.

So, what do you guys work with? How long have you been working with it? What do you use it for? And how satisfied are you?

I'm not thinking about professional level, so Nuendo or such is definitely out of range.
I'm leaning towards Cubase because I already know it. The GUI/flow didn't change over the years as it seems to me.
But I'm also a little curious about Ableton. Hadn't heard of it until I was looking into this realm again after the absence. Sounds interesting for it's sample based possibilities. How's the MIDI handled?
Pro Tools stil seems to kind of suck at the MIDI implementation?
And, as off guard, what do you think about going the Reaper way. A sequencer for free and all the money for VST/VSTis?

Thanks in advance.

[seremtan]

sibelius

[Ferrao10]

Sure, nice thing.

[brisk]

I've pretty much tried every DAW available and Ableton is my favourite. It's a little weird to get used to at first, but it'll soon click. Automation and effects are amazing. Use it.

[Ferrao10]

Hi Brisk,

what is your primary factor on a DAW?
Like I told mine would be like, 20/50/30.... what do you use it for, in relation? And what made you choose Ableton in the end?
I read Ableton is not superior to Cubase when it comes to MIDI; controller-matrix, etc. So, what do you think?

EDIT:
with the 20% analog (live) I mean recording and implementing live analog instruments "on the fly".

[brisk]

Primary factor is being comfortable with the working environment and everything doing what the fuck you want it to. Ableton can be easily routed to any device you own and it's by far the most user friendly in this regard. I rewire from Reason to Ableton and it's literally a case of making an audio channel and choosing Reason from the drop down menu. Then you can can record/automate/whatever on the fly.

Give it a try. I fell in love with it almost immediately.

[plained]

i'm going to fire up my dual amigas with dual sunrize ad516's

soon i hope

they are so fucking awesome

[ALMighty]

I've only used Cubase, never felt the need to try anything else.

[mrd]

Same here, been using Cubase 3 for ages. Granted, I don't do much sequencing... but it does everything I need it to with flying colours.

[Ferrao10]

So I guess you own the suite version.
And you compared those VSTis to those from Cubase 5 or 6.
Can they catch up to that?

I love NI, especially for Massive. Unfortunately they don't sell it as single VSTi anymore; just in the bundle with Reason. I'd love to use 3 or 4 instances of it within one mix.
But I have to keep an eye on costs as well. So the 500€ mark is definitely the "hurt zone".

[brisk]

Massive is part of reason now? I really need to update to 6, it has some really nifty new features from what I saw of it. AFAIK, version 6 integrates with Record too, so Reason now has a proper sequencer, even though they said they'd never do it.

I'd probably still rewire into Ableton though, simply because I prefer it for sequencing and need proper VST support, mainly for Kontakt and a few other plugins I rely on.

[Ferrao10]

My bad, got it mixed up. It's not sold in bundle with Reason but only in the "Native Instruments Komplete 8" software-bundle. Which "alone" is about 475€ .

[Ryoki]

Don't worry, brisk will pirate it anyway.

[scared?]

worst thread ever...