If you really want to appreciate Tracktion...

[kL]

Do a project in Sonar.

That should be enough said, but I'm in a loquacious mood. (Read: venting.) So I'll carry on.

I bought Sonar Producer 3.0 on a crossgrade offer a few years ago, basically as a cheap way to get OMF import/export. I tried to use it... just look up "awkward" in the dictionary and you'll see that Cakewalk symbol. Oh, and call the exterminator. But they mean well over there, and definitely work hard.

So I bypassed 4.0, ignoring countless "extensions of special offer" "last chance to upgrade at special price" emails. Let that upgrade go right by.

And I had done the same with Sonar 5, through quite a few similar come-ons. Then finally they got me.

What was it this time? V-Vocal. And to be honest, V-vocal is pretty damned cool. It wacks the sonic quality of the signal pretty hard, but if you need to fix a vocal and having someone sing it again or getting a better singer is not an option, it's the best thing I've used.

But no matter how many "workflow enhancements" they throw at this thing it takes about twice as long to do the same thing as in Tracktion. And they have some good additions: folder tracks, show/hide, tracks, etc..

But for example: a simple copy/paste operation requires dealing with two -- count 'em -- dialog boxes. And you can't zoom with the mousewheel. And the screen is busier than a twenty dollar hooker when the fleet is in port.

There are so many places in which Tracktion assumes correctly what your intentions are -- like automatically copying a selection after itself, snapped to the grid over and over, to name one -- In Sonar nothing is ever assumed. And if it is, the assumption is generally wrong.

Every softhsynth track takes two tracks -- that's right, one for midi; one for audio. And rendering a softsynth track is an incredibly lengthy operation involving selecting two tracks, a dialog box with tons of choices, and an import operation (what Tracktion does with the "render track/replace or add" choice). And unfortunately, you have to do this all the time: that old "gapless, efficient audio engine" shuts itself off all the time at about half the load and twice the latency of Tracktion.

I could go on, but why? I've probably offended someone already; which is not my intention.

Besides, choir-preaching is an essentially silly activity. But really: give it a try. Download the demo and give the "other" paradigm a shot. I dare you.

[flanneljammies]

choir-preaching...

a-MEN brutha.

[zOap]

Well, you ARE preaching to the choir here.

But I couldn't agree more.

[kp]

I have downloaded Tracktion. It stayed on my machine about 15 minutes - totally illogical and dreadful workflow. And as for the UI...

TO ME (well, and to everyone else who I've shown the GUI to).

[Mr. Tingle]

Kp - I think 15 mins is maybe a tad short for gaining a useful insight into a program. Tracktion has a basic idea:

-left of screen = input
-middle of screen = content (audio or midi)
-right of screen = manipulation of content
-lower screen = context sensitive panel for selected item.

its very simple really, and once you get used to it (maybe an hour or two) it flows.

Those with an hardware mixing desk background may find it strange at first.

[audiobot202]

I love Tracktion and I introduced it to a mate of mine, who I was sure was going to love it. He hated it for much the same reasons as above. He called the GUI 'Mickey Mouse squares and blocks'...the way things moved elastically confused him and found doing the simplest things hard. Horses for courses I guess.
I gave up on introducing him to new stuff after that. He's too much of a stick in the mud. So I sarcastically suggested he go use Cubase, as it's complexity might be simpler for hm to grasp and it's UI with nested menus might really spin his wheels....


It's funny, because it took you 15 minutes to hate it and it took me 15 minutes to work it out and discover that I loved it.

[zOap]

I can't say what apps you are used with, since you say it's totally illogical. Over the years I have used
Cubase/Nuendo, Logic, Sonar, Protools,
FL Studio, Kristal, DP, Reason and probably some I forgot. Of these above, Tracktion is the one which gets you up and running in the least amount of time. And everything is right there, no bogus windows and hundred and alot of menues to scroll into before you find that little thingy which should be right there...

When it comes to workflow, how can you say after only 15 minutes?

I'm sorry to say this, but is it possible you are being a troll?

Just because it's different to what you know, it doesn't mean it's illogical. Maybe it's the one you prefer which is illogical?

[jens]

knowing both sequencers from the inside out I can clearly say that on large projects Sonar is to me much easier and faster to work with than Tracktion (I did hours of music (different genres - from funk and rock to both mainly synth- and sample-based electronic music) with both...)


I just can't stand the look of Sonar - to me it's so damned fugly...

[flanneljammies]

It's funny, because it took you 15 minutes to hate it and it took me 15 minutes to work it out and discover that I loved it.

I was about to say the same thing. I downloaded the demo (1.5 or something) and within 20 minutes I had the whole thing figured out and had realized that it blew away everything I had used before. As for the GUI. I like that it's simple and gets out of the way. Who cares what it looks like if it supports what you need to do? Oh, yeah and it doesn't look like hardware. (Cue mixer flame war... )

[Jafo]

I like both of them, actually; they both have amazing strengths.

I began with Multitrack Studio in demo mode, rendering individual tracks which I'd recorded in Jazz++ (midi) or Audacity (audio), and then mixing the whole project in Audacity -- talk about complexity! It reminded me a lot of C programming, with all the layers of doublethink you have to go through. And then there's Buzz, the assembly language of hosts...

Anyway, a buddy of mine bought Sonar and asked me to record his band. Neither of us knew how to use it, so I learned it as we went along. Sonar offers a bazillion choices for everything, and requires you to make them, but once I got past that hurdle, it was pretty easy. We only recorded audio with some basic effects, and it worked well for that. I never tried midi -- which is just as well, because it looks scary in Sonar. Still, it performed admirably and gave me all the choices I could ever want.

I was going to buy Sonar, but that was at the end of 2003, when Trackiton was given away free for a limited time.

I found Tracktion to be weird and difficult, hard to use -- at first. Its workflow is very simple, streamlined, and efficient, once you get used to it. It has fewer options, but they're usually the right ones. The only real adjustment I had to make, was getting used to a program that did what I wanted. A lot of its conventions are weird, but make complete sense after you've used them. Obviously it was designed by musicians for musicians.

I like the complexity and control of Sonar, but Tracktion just does the right thing. Err, the Right Thing, for all my fellow geeks. Tracktion is the Python of hosts -- just faster.

[rockstar_not]

To me - a guy used to using patch cords and such just for experimentation purposes, Tracktion made sense nearly instantly. I'll tell you the only thing that confused me about it at first was the end-to-end terminology. I still don't understand that nomenclature.


But if you can imagine a signal flow path in your head, it's not too hard of a stretch to bang it out in a Tracktion rack. The fact that things stretch and connect and almost read my mind are part of the delight of using the program over other hosts (I don't have a very long list - PowerTracks Pro Audio, Magix Music Studio, Cmuzys, Cakewalk Home Studio.)

This is likely the same as the nerd arguments between RPN and Algebraic calculators. To me, Tracktion is the Algebraic notation calculator of the sequencer world, while the others are like RPN.

-Scott

[rpc9943]

i moved on from adobe audition, which I loooove still - but find rare use of it because t2 fits the bill. When i first saw tracktion, i laughed and laughed. I had assumed tracktion was kind of like a PC garage band. Nope.

I'm still trying to figure out where to fit adobe audition into the picture, but still find it as a perfect tool for destructive editing when I need it (which is not too often!)

anyways i say the best audio programs would be adobe audition and tracktion! Yes! But that's speaking from lack of experience and me latching on to those programs very very tightly. I say again use tools that suit you.

For instance I greatly dislike creating sequences with my mouse, so I use revisit vsti to sequence everything in step.

RonC

[Mr. Tingle]

I'll tell you the only thing that confused me about it at first was the end-to-end terminology. I still don't understand that nomenclature.

e-to-e : allows the signal to flow from one end of the signal chain to the other end. input>fx>output

[kp]

By the way, apologies for jumping in and responding on the Tracktion forum - I thought it was in the Hosts forum. I don't mind arguing hosts in there but don't want to argue about the host a specific forum is dedicated to.

Must stop having so many tabs open at once and getting confused :-)

[Beardedone]

My experience is the opposite. I have used Sonar successfully countless times. On the other hand I have started at least 30 projects in Tracktion and hit the wall creatively every time going back to Sonar or Fruity. I just can't get this application to do midi like I want it to. As I have yet to do any audio comps with it I can't comment. I haven't tried because Sonar is so easy.