Considering new DAW

[LLL]

Grabbed some Waves plugins during the sale: CLA-3A, CLA-76, J37 tape, and SSL EV2 channel. Most excited about the channel one. Dead duck's was fun, but this one has a ton more features.

I mostly use UAD stuff now but I still have my full Waves stash.

Some Waves plugins that I dig:

L1 Limiter: Great low-overhead (CPU) limiter to put on the two. I use this all the time until I'm ready to slather on the fancy mustard (UAD Shadow Hills Mastering Comp) for finalizing.

Abbey Roads Plates: Great EMT140 emulations

API 550 A/B, 560, 2500: API Waves EQs and comp

GEQ Classic / Modern: excellent graphic EQs

H-Delay: killer delay ("H" IIRC stands for "hybrid") and convincing echoplex sound

IR 1: used for convolutions (reverb, etc)

Kramer Tape: cool for adding tape satch or tape delay

PuigTec EQs: when you gotta have a Pultec

Q1-10: another great EQ

Scheps73: when you gotta a Neve 1073 preamp

etc

 

[NegativeEase]

I use Harrison Mixbus professionally for certain kinds of productions.

It's a super stable and great DAW

Head to Head testing, it clobbered Reaper for most things.

 

[Mincer]

The Waves Renaissance suite is pretty remarkable, too.

 

[Securb]

I use Eventide Anthology X for plugins. I have never had any issues, crashes, or freezes. I am considering upgrading to Eventide Anthology XII soon.

 

[LLL]

Head to Head testing, it clobbered Reaper for most things.

Have a few examples of how?

Only way to directly compare the two ***sound-wise*** is by testing their included plugins (respectively), not 3rd party plugins. Myself personally, not interested in that kind of comparison as I already have a huge library of pro plugins.


I find combining Reaper with killer 3rd party plugins (Universal Audio - my Apollo 6x, Waves, Eventide, Soundtoys etc ad infinitum) does the trick.

Minus any included plugins, and barring any functionality & GUI differences between DAWs, these DAWs are really just a "wrapper" for the plugins you're using - "colorless" (tonewise) software that relies on plugins to add any flavor.

I can see functionality & GUI differences, however. That much is obvious.

All that being said, I'm always on the lookout for new DAWs just to keep up with things. Harrison Mixbus looks intriguing. And I'm tired of the ProTools bandwagon.

 

[NegativeEase]

Have a few examples of how?

Only way to directly compare the two ***sound-wise*** is by testing their included plugins (respectively), not 3rd party plugins. Myself personally, not interested in that kind of comparison as I already have a huge library of pro plugins.


I find combining Reaper with killer 3rd party plugins (Universal Audio - my Apollo 6x, Waves, Eventide, Soundtoys etc ad infinitum) does the trick.

Minus any included plugins, and barring any functionality & GUI differences between DAWs, these DAWs are really just a "wrapper" for the plugins you're using - "colorless" (tonewise) software that relies on plugins to add any flavor.

I can see functionality & GUI differences, however. That much is obvious.

All that being said, I'm always on the lookout for new DAWs just to keep up with things. Harrison Mixbus looks intriguing. And I'm tired of the ProTools bandwagon.

yeah let me clarify -not in "sound" both are quality in that regard. i am talking -stability, architecture, using NDI and Dante -using Cloud instance etc etc

Reaper is great for stand alone recording but once you get into large scale tracking, live or llve contribution with mix minus, IFB, and such -Mixbus is way better

 

[Securb]

I did my analysis on Waveform. It is a very stable application If anyone wants a deeper analysis PM me and I will send you the full reports.

 

[LLL]

yeah let me clarify -not in "sound" both are quality in that regard. i am talking -stability, architecture, using NDI and Dante -using Cloud instance etc etc

Reaper is great for stand alone recording but once you get into large scale tracking, live or llve contribution with mix minus, IFB, and such -Mixbus is way better

Speaking of Harrison, UAD does their 32C EQ as a plugin (same EQ used on Michael Jackson's Thriller):

https://www.uaudio.com/uad-plugins/e...rison-32c.html

 

[NegativeEase]

Speaking of Harrison, UAD does their 32C EQ as a plugin (same EQ used on Michael Jackson's Thriller):

https://www.uaudio.com/uad-plugins/e...rison-32c.html

Also, I should add, people concerned about the "quality" of the sound of their DAW probably shouldn't be -DAWs should be about the functionality and features. The sound quality of your music is more related to the source, mic, pre/ADC, plugin effects, ADC and compression quality and format from bouncing. Even the pre isn't a big deal unless you are using the pre as part of the tracks sound.

 

[Securb]

GI/GO is the fundamental principle of computing.

 

[Mincer]

I did my analysis on Waveform. It is a very stable application If anyone wants a deeper analysis PM me and I will send you the full reports.

I've found it to be very stable in use. Once in awhile a 3rd party plugin would crash, but it won't take Waveform with it.

 

[LLL]

Also, I should add, people concerned about the "quality" of the sound of their DAW

...should have their ears checked. No. brains checked.

 

[DankStar]

well this took a strange turn....

 

[Securb]

I've found it to be very stable in use. Once in awhile a 3rd party plugin would crash, but it won't take Waveform with it.

Yep there is only one critical core (messy sector) I am trying to figure out is where the API for the VST plugins lives. But yes all in all a very clean application.

 

[Securb]

Looking at all of the files surrounding the plugin manager and VST interfaces they look very stable and are unlikely to be buggy. The "header" files which are typically in the worst shape in legacy codebases are immaculate. I am not seeing any circular dependencies. I would suspect if anyone is having issues with VST plugins crashing in Waveform it is the plugin causing problems not the DAW. I would check to see if you have the latest release of your plugins.

 

[Mincer]

Looking at all of the files surrounding the plugin manager and VST interfaces they look very stable and are unlikely to be buggy. The "header" files which are typically in the worst shape in legacy codebases are immaculate. I am not seeing any circular dependencies. I would suspect if anyone is having issues with VST plugins crashing in Waveform it is the plugin causing problems not the DAW. I would check to see if you have the latest release of your plugins.

Thank you for the confirmation!

 

[Securb]

I use Harrison Mixbus professionally for certain kinds of productions.

It's a super stable and great DAW

Head to Head testing, it clobbered Reaper for most things.

I can see how you would come to this conclusion. By design, a DAW is signal processing software. Even if you have everything set neutral your level, trim, gain and the EQ on the channel will all affect the sound. The algorithms in these products to manage EQ are distinctly different. Add to that every different product is uniquely coded for the way it interfaces with your audio interface. If different software is processing that signal you will get different results. More and more DAW software publishers are trying to get a more "analog" sound out of their product, each using different algorithms and technics. The overall texture and timber of the DAW will vary from software factory to software factory. Lastly, each DAW will have different ways of managing and interfacing with VST plugins. For this reason, not even the best of plugins will sound the same from DAW to DAW. Is it noticeable to the human ear? Probably not in most quality DAWs but it is different.

Even when using a plugin, the signal still passes through the channel. The trim, gain, level and EQ will all affect the tone. Even with the EQ being set the same in different DAWs, you will get different results. Like analog mixers and amps, DAWs have their own tone stacks. Every company thinks its algorithm for EQ is better, faster and smarter. This technology is copywritten and protected and not the same from DAW to DAW.

There are some DAWs that are built on the same open-source code. That is where it ends; each is unique in its own way.

I find it mind-blowing that people feel a curly guitar cord will give a drastically different sound than a straight guitar cord. However, signal processing software that is written with totally different code and different software languages sounds the same.