I have Reason 11 Suite (not moving to 12), and a license for Reaper as well as Cakewalk by Bandlab with all the SONAR Platinum content available in it.
My concerns with each of what I own already:
Reaper
- A very capable and resource light DAW, it has an EXTREMELY dense interface. Kenny Gioia has done dozens of helpful videos, but still it's not very intuitive - at least to me
- Right now I have $60 invested, but if I eventually want to put a shingle out, it jumps to $225 which while not bad is MORE than what I can get Studio One 5 for right now.
- Zero instruments included except JS plain Jane stuff.
- Although free and frequently updated, it is very old code and may not translate well into 21st century music production (which I am attempting to self teach)
- The interface is really complicated with tons of menus, options and possible layouts. Kills creativity at times
- Rather limited in terms of synths and such.
- It seems to me that this product is the honey being used to entice people into their music collaboration software which I have zero interest in. Think Alihoopa
- This is by far the most fun and intuitive interface out there IMHO. However, it is dated in terms of graphics unless I pay ALMOST as much as I can get Studio One 5 for, and that is for an unfinished product
- I hate subscription models with a passion. I know Presonus has one as well, but they have also put considerable time and energy into a user interface that is sleek, drag and drop, high quality graphics and even scoring with Notion. By contrast, RS seems hell bent to drive everyone to Reason+ by putting out an unfinished product and raising the prices on upgrades. No bueno
- Although it supports VST2, it is still lacking VST3 and while I have a butt ton of Rack Extensions, they are useful in only one DAW. Mea Culpa.
- On the upside, I can use all of that in another DAW via RRP which is a Godsend for me if I jump ship
bxbrkrz wrote: You forgot to list the pros and cons of Studio One.
Well, off the top of my head...
Drag and drop interface. One window (or not) workflow. Scene presets and automation. (Seemingly) Decent set of mastering tools. (Seemingly)Decent built in synths (but Reason rules there). Mixing seems intuitive and making parallel channels with a compressor (for example) on one with dry on the other looks to be a snap. But too, Reason's way isn't rocket surgery I suppose. Melodyne is built right into the interface, not a separate plugin (as does Reason with Pitch Edit).VST 3 support. Composer interface with Notion that follows MIDI note population in real time..
So what I am asking is this; What kind of warts does Studio One 5 have? Any? Is it a resource hog (I only have a n i5 Ivy Bridge box, but it also has SSD's and 28 GB memory so it runs really well)? How are the built in effects? They claim a one stop shop form idea to publication -- is that just hype or is it really so?
TL;DR: The biggie though is this; given this opportunity and in light of my misgivings on current DAWs I own -- is it going to be a step up or simply sideways?
Any input is appreciated.
Best,
Steve