Would you still buy Reaper if it will cost you as much as the other DAWs ?

[Mutant]

Yes i would.

[delaiah]

Like it a lot. Had the opportunity to use others DAWs aswell, yet it's reaper that I enjoy using the most. Point is, you don't have to know about all customizations. I don't. I just like to use it, because it's fast, simple, I can use as much customization as I like to + it has all the functionality I need.

[keyman_sam]

Knowing what I know now, yes, I would buy Reaper instead of Cubase.

Simply because I've spent way too much time on it and now am comfortable enough to do anything I want. The first year with reaper was, ehmm.., uneventful. Now I do all my work in it.

[hibidy]

I wouldnt use Reaper if it was free and Cockos offered me cash back to use it.

There are a few reasons so dont ask and I wont tell.

Cheers

Youch

[Xenakios]

Interestingly I find myself saying : probably not. What Reaper costs now is about the price what any DAW software should cost at maximum. (Maybe just a bit more would be tolerable, but not much.) I do like Reaper, but do I like and need it so much that I'd pay 300, 400, 500, 600 euros...? Not really.

I don't want to pay for added media content I wouldn't use, or for advertisements in magazines, which is what the Cubase, Pro Tools etc users are now paying for...(Not to forget the dongle in Cubase, which has to be adding quite a chunk to the final price.)

Now of course people could say that Steinberg and others are investing lots of money into development and whatever, but really I am not seeing much anything in the features those companies have come up in recent years that would justify the pricing. Bring in some real innovation and then we talk about me personally paying more than 200 euros for their software. (Note that the 200 euros is already past the tolerance level I'd normally be willing to punish myself with.)

Buying software is a horrible, absolutely horrible investment. So paying as little as possible is the optimized route to take.

[kev2525]

I demoed it, but I didn't really click. I ended up getting Studio S1 2 for a paltry €150. Granted it's a bit more than reaper, but I got a bunch of very usable samples, NI elements (on it's own it's €40), melodyne integration and in my opinion a better workflow with their elegant drag & drop single user interface. Although reaper is cheap, I think there are other attractive options out there too.

[Luftrum]

I got Live and Cubase 5 before I settled on Reaper after demo'ing it for some 60 days (sorry, Cockos). I'm just comfortable with how it works, it's simple to get into the basics and quite intuitive and lightweight too. Just clicks for me.

I better put my Cubase 5 license up for sale, any takers?

[morelia]

If it was the price of Cubase or Pro Tools probably I would give those some serious consideration. But I've tried pretty much everything other than those and it is my pick of the bunch. Only DAW I prefer is the one those fockers at Mackie threw in the dungeon to rot.

[strangedogs]

I'd go with Reaper.

[liquidsound]

Knowing what I know now, yes, I would buy Reaper instead of Cubase.

I Agree.

Interestingly I find myself saying : probably not. What Reaper costs now is about the price what any DAW software should cost at maximum. (Maybe just a bit more would be tolerable, but not much.)

Maybe not as low but definitely a reduction in prices is in order. I bought Live Suite and man... I can't justify it yet, even though was an upgrade from a free edition on top of a vendor's sale.

I bought Reaper 3 separate times based on how much it and the Cockos business model impressed me. I never got around to doing any serious work with it though because I just love Cubase too much. If I had no choice however I would be more than happy to use Reaper.

That's how I feel with Live and this is why I was looking into Reaper, as an alternative. I do a lot of improvisation and the Session view is a blessing since I left my band back in my country long ago, but I also write a lot and the piano roll in Live is not fluid. I use MuLab for this.
I will give more time again to Reaper and see if maybe I got in with the wrong foot. From Live it is not easy to find an alternative.

I find Reaper really easy to approach. There are many options available, but I tend to ignore almost all of them, to eventually do a very simple thing: push the button and record software and hardware audio.I am old fashioned, and I have a simple mainly real-time work-flow, a few good mastering and analysis tools, some templates and hey presto, most of the work it's done, leaving me to find 'that' special note or chord or melody on the keyboards that I have been looking for.

Maybe I can do the same thing..

Thanks all for your feedback.
Heading for cockos forum for a second look.

[Bladerunner1962]

Reaper's advantage for me was always easy/intuitive handling and also the price.
So, if Cockos would increase the price to i.e. Cubase price level I would
look of another cheaper one which works good for me.
Cause I don't record, working with midi files and so on, I already look for a good alternative in order for easy handling my severel VSTi and the presets via midi with my hardware synthesizer. So for me is live playing/improvising essential in using a DAW.
And Reaper has no (known) answer for me, INDIVIDUAL learning Midi for switching through the presets (next/previous).

Actual I test other DAWs to do so. And I seems they have solutions for that. And they are not more expensive as Reaper; some of them are cheaper.

So I would say, if Cockos would increase the price, they come in a disatvantage on the market.

[Real Grooves Audio]

Would you buy Cubase or Pro Tools if they were $60?

I would go with Reaper. Coming from Cubase Studio 4, Reaper offers better "drag and drop" routing and FX setups, is more stable/crash resistant, and the workflow is tweakable to be as simple or complex as I wish.

And here's the biggest thumbs up I can give it: The level of support and consideration from the developers and the end users on the forum is superb! Got a question? It gets answered. Need something worked into the program that is a legitimate timesaver or workflow enhancer? The developers will take it into consideration.

[chokehold]

Knocking a couple of bucks off Cubase/Logic etc. by pricing only the host software, without all their additional bloat/content, and calculating it against Reaper that actually costs $250 for a commercial ("I make a lot of money with this") license which Cubase/Logic etc. already bring with them, then I guess Reaper actually already IS the same price as all the others.

It's the lower price-range, that makes things interesting.

Everybody wants "the best", even if they're a wonky backstreet musician, that's why (some!) people start downloading illegal software instead of just getting Zynewave's Podium Free or LMMS or the likes, or just paying a couple of bucks and being happy with a shitty amateur version.
Because "the best" hosts always cost a whole lotta cash, even if the people using it don't necessarily MAKE a lot of cash with it, if at all.

Cockos treats ("us") low-income musicians/engineers differently, and offers their product to us for a much lower, to us much more realistic price.

Which means that we don't need to buy these crippled half-developed cheap-o knock-offs of other "the best" hosts, like Cubase Essential/Sonar Home Studio/Samplitude Producer, and we don't have to become ill eagle pie-rats - but we DO still get "the best" host which offers just about all the professional features we could ever need or wish for ... except for content-bloating samples, virtual instruments and "analog looking" FX plugins.

Their approach helps spreading their software, maximizing profits and fighting piracy.
Because they don't separate their clients into "classes", beginners/amateurs/professionals, and they don't offer their clients differently crippled software according to what "class" they can afford to buy themselves into.

Cockos have the right approach - ONE product, TWO licences.
1) "You make serious cash? You pay serious cash."
2) "You make f*ck-all with it? Well, give us something to show your respect."

They don't let people pay for stuff they don't want. WTF would I, a guitarist and bassist, do with virtual guitar/bass plugins?! WTF would I need a 1/2 synth, 1/2 sampler string "thing" for?! Multiband compressor?! External effects?! Don't need all that stuff.

Cockos gives us low-income musicians the possibility to still access the biggest and best (because only) version of their host, but charges us less so we can get the virtual instruments and FX we REALLY want or need.
And I am REALLY thankful for that.

So... in the end, I couldn't say.

If I made some serious cash with Reaper, then I could definitely justify spending the full $250 on purchasing it.
As long as I don't ... I can't, and I won't.

But as long as I don't NEED to... I'm happy as can be and <3 <3 <3 Reaper all day long.

I tried, I really tried, getting friends with other Hosts, specifically Sonar 8, Logic 9 and Samplitude 11.

NONE of them felt as "right" to me as Reaper did. I deleted the Sonar demo, gave the MacBook with Logic back to my buddy and sold Samplitude 11 (classic) again.

[Bladerunner1962]

Would you buy Cubase or Pro Tools if they were $60?

NO! Cause Cubase i.e. is for me personally too complicated. Reaper has too important advantages for me, like
- easy load VSTi and play
- easy Midi-Handling
- Project-Tap-Function; selection via midi learn

[chokehold]

Would you buy Cubase or Pro Tools if they were $60?

Only if they came with all their content for that price, because their additional bloat is the only "advantage" over the rather "naked" Reaper.

But then, if Cubase/ProTools/Logic etc. were that cheap, I'd also get a copy of Reaper because I know and like it a lot better.