Can't decide between two DAW-s. Please advise.

[Sylenth89]

Hey there. My real name is Andrija, and I'm from Croatia. I would like you to ask you something and would like your sincere opinion. So, the case is... I'm starting to venture into music production. It's a looooong wanted hobby that I never had a chance to fully enjoy. There was school, there was this there was that, just to distract me from my most beloved hobby. I am almost 25 years old. So is it late for me? I've seen some musicians boomed at 30-es, 40-es. Now, in Croatia we do not have lots of choice for learning music production, but there is one institution in which I enrolled for. Course is Electronic Music Production. Or shortly EMP.

Okay, here is the problem. I cannot settle down with a DAW. I know, they are just tools, and that many things are in you as a person and your skills. Sooo... I tried trails of every possible DAW that exists. Except mac, I do not have mac. And really couldn't decide. After some 6-7 years of installing and uninstalling. Now that I know pretty much basic info about every daw there is I am stucked between PreSonus Studio One Professional & Ableton Live. As software, and as overall experience I find PreSonus Studio1 better, simpler, more user friendly, and more efficient and faster to work. On the other hand, I bought M-Audio Oxygen 49 that is natively built in Ableton, which is not a case in Studio 1. I heard that for EMP (for electronic music) is better Ableton. And the course I will go on teaches primarily on Ableton. But they said to me that which DAW I use is practically irrelevant. I would like to produce electronica, sure. But sometimes I would like to compose ambiental, epic instrumental score, chillout etc. And I find a session view in Ableton confusing.

So my heart is broken in half. One loves the Studio1 for it's robustness and ease of use. (for example manual of S1 has 300 pages, manual of Cakewal Sonar has 2000!!!), but I'm not shooting for the easiest DAW there. Than I would choose Acoustica Mixcraft. I want something professional, but intuitive. FL studio step sequencer gave me nightmares XD

So here once more, as a musician, what would you recommend me? I'm really going crazy and I'm lost. If you could give me your opinion I'd be grateful to you. And yes, take me as a level 2 of 10 in music production.

Cheers!

[Turello]

Studio1 and acoustica mixcraft if you wanna do all (recordings and midi VST)
Ableton if you wanna play live or a dj etc etc
FL studio for midi vst (imo the best)

I make Rock and i use to create the drums and synth with FL Studio (i follow with guitar\bass the composition stream), after i export in multi tracks and (paying attention to BPM), create a new project on Nuendo or S1 and load all the tracks, after some first volume balancing\eq i start to rec bass, guitars vocals, solos etc etc...

Good Luck

[dea-man]

Go with Reaper.

[bluedad]

DAW is irrelevant for genre; you can do any style in any DAW. Go with what's comfortable to you.

[Mivo]

If you take classes, or will be taking classes, it may be worthwhile to use whatever they use during the course (if it's something affordable).

I kind of want to second the recommendation for Reaper. For one thing, it's really inexpensive, and you can even test it for 60 days. After that, it only nags. (But at that point you should just pay for it.) The downside of Reaper is that it's not pretty out of the box. It looks like something straight out of Windows 95. Okay, I'll be kind: 98. But it is skinable and highly flexible, so the first impression shouldn't be all too relevant. What I like about Reaper, besides its very active, very helpful community, and how incredibly resource friendly it is, is that it is very open in a Linux-like way.

That freedom can be a turn-off, but it will "make" you learn. It also doesn't come with instruments, and its native plugins look plain and unspectacular (however, they are competent). This also will "make" you look around at free stuff. It may seem like a downside, but long-term I believe it is an advantage to start with a powerful yet plain tool that requires you to spend time with it and make it your own. (Groove3 has fantastic tutorials for Reaper, and it comes with a well-written manual, too.) I understand the other side of the argument too, and enjoy Mulab for its high level of accessibility and friendliness.

If you have narrowed down your choices to Studio One Professional and Live, it's just a matter of preference. Both are expensive, relatively, and both are powerful. They do the same thing, in different ways. Live is a bit more aimed at EDM, I guess, but any DAW can be used for any style. If you want one of these, make it dependent on which "feels" better to you and that you feel more productive with. The demo versions are sufficient to figure that out.

[EnGee]

I like both (S1 and Live). I have also Oxygen 49 (and love it). There is a template for Oxygen 49 for S1 in their forum, so it can integrate nicely with it.
Still, I prefer Live because for me I can come with really nice drums (ambient, electronic ..etc) in no time. It lacks midi library so you might want to put some money for some midi beats. It also lacks preview for midi (the best DAW for previewing midi is cubase IMO).

What Live version/edition you can afford?

Yes, Oxygen 49 is playing nice with Live. I really like how you can mute the tracks by pressing the buttons and how the sliders control the volume. The knobs are also mapped to the main knobs in the instruments. All these small things will make Live very enjoyable, so my vote is for Live

[holzlag0r]

Well,
I'm using S1 - and it's great!

I would recommend you to download the trials of both programs and then try to get used to the first one and produce maybe a little song. Then you install the other trial and do the same thing there.

Finally, you ask yourself where you had more fun creating stuff and less to worry about technical stuff/navigation/and so on.
Because that's what it's all about, right?

[keyman_sam]

Since the course teaches you Ableton, go with it. You don't want to feel like you're lagging just because of a difference in DAW.

And since there are tons of built-in sounds, you can quickly get a song done in Ableton vs. fiddling around in other DAWs. Ableton also has high quality built-in effects, so it gives you pretty much everything you'd want.

[MadAnthony81]

It does matter what DAW you use. It matters how you operate it... How you feel comfortable, andofcrouse what the DAW can do easily or even do at all.

I like Ableton and is the only one I've used but... It is great for EDM. That is because all the effects are really clear and transparent. The MUltband compressor is gritty and that is cool for that. All in all for pro production all that is needed extra to Ableton is a good Limiter from Waves like the LL's. Also GTR3 for guitar because Ableton guitar Amp sucks quite frankly.

Ableton is well suited for live shows with a fast enough computer. Operator is the cool thing it has in a way cuz it like having a good drum machine that can do soo soso so much.

Ableton Sampler will turn any sound into a synth like keyboarding thing. And also "Saturator" is indispensable. I can turn all my VSTs into super duper stuff that way. Lives reverb is transparent and has lots of cool features. All in all Live has a lot of wonderfull effects but their Limiter sucks.

Ive made some nu house on it before witht he phaser, delay and reverb. It came out so cool. Really lucid and dreamy. Ableton really is awesome for edm.

[arkmabat]

I find myself using FL Studio the most for midi and Sonar for mixing/live recording.

[SoundDigest]

Go with what feels right to you. If you decide to switch down the road, ya there will be some growing pains, but you'll be familiar with what you're striving to do in a DAW, so it'll be just a matter of learning a new layout of the same sort of thing.

[christie89]

Studio 1 is good DAW and easy to learn. Whichever DAW you use you need to put time into learning its features. Give time to that, it's a good idea in long term of your music career.

[e@rs]

Get Studio One. Learn it inside out and forget about the other DAWs. After a year or two get Live and repeat the procedure. Worked for me.

[billcarroll]

Hard to beat Ableton Live, especially given all of the free tutorials available for it. Studio One is fantastic, but overall Ableton has it beat for ease of use and being a creative tool. Ableton Live will take you anywhere you want to go (except maybe large orchestral stuff) if you learn it inside and out.

Pick one, and learn it inside and out. Choosing to fully commit is probably the most important part of your choice.

[Robmobius]

If you are looking for quality and ease of use you should check out S1. It's inbuilt FX are really good.