Polarized opinions about Reaper

[Hink]

way back when I was in college taking psychology 101 the professor had each of us sign a a piece of paper and give it to him with the promise of a personality and traits description based on our signature the next class. When the next class came he gave us each our report and we read it with amazement because it was right. Then he had us exchange our report with another student, they said the same thing but not word for word. He had a few different ones saying the same thing but hitting different buzzwords that everyone could relate to.

About 90% of the time when I see people arguing about DAWs that is basically where my mind goes, the same buzzwords that can relate to most DAWs. Everything else imo is preference, I have never demoed Reaper but not because I dont think it's as good as what I have now. I have been using my DAW for almost 11 years, I'm still learning it and still humbled by it. I dont understand the need for polarization either as I am just completely indifferent. I do think sometimes people have something to prove, more often to themselves me thinks. However I do agree that Repear users can appear to be fanatical but I can think of plenty of others that the same could be said about. Perhaps Reaper users have maintained that fanaticism longer than others but that could simply be because Repear gives them good reason to.

Anyhow, in my eyes it all still and always will boil down to "to each his/her own" and arguing about it is like trying to teach a pig to sing. It only wastes your time and annoys the pig

[ATN69]

Anyhow, in my eyes it all still and always will boil down to "to each his/her own" and arguing about it is like trying to teach a pig to sing. It only wastes your time and annoys the pig

[Azura]

Anyhow, in my eyes it all still and always will boil down to "to each his/her own" and arguing about it is like trying to teach a pig to sing. It only wastes your time and annoys the pig

Beware! Some may start to argue which DAW is the best to record that pig!

[sjm]

Whyterabbit has addressed the pertinent points about Reaper on KVR on page 1.

I can only add my own personal opinion in that context. I think Reaper is/was somewhat polarising because it carved out a somewhat unique niche, and (seemingly) attracted a lot of tinkerers. And Reaper is EXTREMELY powerful in terms of what you can customise, so of course it appeals to these pepole.

Now to some people, the customisation options are a huge asset. It's just that I'm not those people. I'm me, and I really just want to open my DAW and make some music. Not spend 3 months configuring it the way I'd like to make music. I mean, I use FL Studio, which has absolutely no configuration options, just one skin and hard-coded shortcuts. Do I sometimes wish I could change that? Yes, but rarely. The only things that really bug me are not being able to map my own shortcuts for the transport, something which is no longer really an issue with FL Remote and my hardware with transport controls. Others on the IL forums are constantly complaining about the lack of options. I'd like it more as a feature for people with colour-blindness or otherwise poor vision, I personally really couldn't care about customising the UI.

Here's the thing: I don't (or better said, didn't) particularly like the way Reaper was set up out of the box. And I don't particularly feel like learning how to customise it when I already have a DAW I like.

And I think that's at the heart of what causes (or better said caused, as WR says, it's died down a lot) the arguments. "I don't like the UI" say many of us. "Download some custom skins, or make your own, you can customise the layout yadda yadda" is the reply. But some people don't really want to spend several hours browsing for a skin when they want to record a tune in their head. So you get two sets of users with different mindsets and priorities, finding it hard to put themselves in the position of the other. "I find it hard to do XYZ" leads to "you can customise it to behave just like in Cubase/FL Studio/whatever". And that's cool; but why don't I just use Cubase/FL Studio/whatever instead then?

But I get it that people like making things their own. People adorn their cars with personal memorabilia, bumper stickers etc. It's human nature I guess. And there are people who spend hours customising their desktop, for example. Me? I choose one of the default themes that is not too offensive, and forget about it. Unless I come across some amazing image, and decide to use that instead. Does that make the ability to customise the desktop bad? Does that mean you shouldn't customise your desktop? Of course not.

So yeah, I think the problem was that a lot of the evangelists found it really, really hard to put themselves in someone else's shoes and realise that just because they like something, doesn't mean everyone else should.

Now, if I were looking for a DAW without prior expectations and experience, I'd probably seriously consider Reaper. So yeah, you really should try Reaper, it'll solve all your polarising problems if you just invert the phase

[Azura]

Hi sgm,

I can understand that the large amount of customization possibilites can be daunting for some new users. But the key point here is that they are just that: possibilities. This is, I think, an unfounded reputation that one must spend months to customize Reaper before hoping to record a song. In my case, I started using it right out of the box, and during the first year of use, I added 5 or 6 new key assignments, added 2 or 3 new custom actions and added 3 buttons on the toolbar. That's all. Nothing complicated, but it helped me maximize my productivity.

But you are right, that reputation can contribute to polarization.

[sjm]

My point was more that you ain't me.

[bungle]

Reaper is polarising because of its community, manual done by some forum guy, add ons done by some forum guys, themes done by some forum guys, some vst plugins cheaper than for other hosts because they are done by some forum guy, the list goes on.
This gives rise to the two very vocal diametric.
1 Reaper A-holes who believe they owe a community, so their version of that is to act like complete idiots attacking any anti Reaper sentiment.
2 Non Reaper A-Holes who believe that Reapers community is nothing but these very vocal Reaper A-holes, so go on the defensive too and become the exact thing they were originally pissed at.

The rest of us get on with our lives and don’t worry why people hate or like whatever, go make some music because online A-holes will still be online A- holes long after you are dead.

[melomood]

way back when I was in college taking psychology 101 the professor had each of us sign a a piece of paper and give it to him with the promise of a personality and traits description based on our signature the next class. When the next class came he gave us each our report and we read it with amazement because it was right. Then he had us exchange our report with another student, they said the same thing but not word for word. He had a few different ones saying the same thing but hitting different buzzwords that everyone could relate to.

About 90% of the time when I see people arguing about DAWs that is basically where my mind goes, the same buzzwords that can relate to most DAWs. Everything else imo is preference, I have never demoed Reaper but not because I dont think it's as good as what I have now. I have been using my DAW for almost 11 years, I'm still learning it and still humbled by it. I dont understand the need for polarization either as I am just completely indifferent. I do think sometimes people have something to prove, more often to themselves me thinks. However I do agree that Repear users can appear to be fanatical but I can think of plenty of others that the same could be said about. Perhaps Reaper users have maintained that fanaticism longer than others but that could simply be because Repear gives them good reason to.

Anyhow, in my eyes it all still and always will boil down to "to each his/her own" and arguing about it is like trying to teach a pig to sing. It only wastes your time and annoys the pig

So that's why Arnold isn't speaking to me
seriously though,well put.

[slipstick]

You'll always get polarised opinions because some people are just plain wrong and not bright enough to realise it .

Reaper, peanuts, politics, musical styles, broccoli, it doesn't matter. Opinions will exist and will differ. Nothing new to see here folks .

Steve

[sharke]

I think part of it is that some people love to feel like they're part of a group which exists on a "higher plane" than everyone else. People like this have seen the light and have been made aware of some higher level of truth which sets them apart from the masses, who believe everything they read in the media and follow trends like sheep.

Discarding the practical pros and cons of Reaper as a DAW, you have to admit that as an "outsider" it is an ideal platform for the abovementioned type of person. It's cheap, and thus they feel wise compared to these saps who pay corporations $500 for a DAW. It looks raw and utilitarian out of the box, so they feel unlike these pliable cretins who are dazzled by fancy GUI's. It looks complicated, so they feel a sense of intellectual superiority.

You see the same sort of thing in Linux users.

Whenever you get something that makes people feel like they're part of some "in the know" club for using it, you're going to see tension between them and the people who apparently "don't get it." Side A thinks side B is gullible and stupid, whereas side B thinks side A is smug and pretentious. Hence the polarization.

[jonljacobi]

All I will say is that I find it a lot easier to deal with Reaper after having rejiggered and rewritten the menus and removed all the choices I don't use. I think it's a great DAW, but man, at first use there's a tidal wave of options and choices that tend to overwhelm. I think my eyes literally glossed over the first time I ran it and perused the menus. I mean "Close all projects but current"? Wow.

[braj]

I found Cubase and Sonar just as bewildering as Reaper when I tried them out, and scratched by head at doing things even in Studio One before resorting to the manual. Live is about the only DAW that I had very little issue getting started with, but figuring out the various reasons for random crashes was just as bad. Shocker, nothing is perfect. About elitism, I have to say some Studio One enthusiasts rubbed me the wrong way when I would ask for features or how to accomplish things, everyone has an anus, and everyone can act like one too.

Everything has a learning curve. Everyone should treat DAWs like shoes, not all shoes fit you, and not all shoes are made for the same activity. Not everyone needs to wear your favorite brand.

[el-bo (formerly ebow)]

Anyhow, in my eyes it all still and always will boil down to "to each his/her own" and arguing about it is like trying to teach a pig to sing. It only wastes your time and annoys the pig

Beware! Some may start to argue which DAW is the best to record that pig!

SOWstudio

[braj]

If you find a pig in your audio in Reaper, it is really easy to edit it out now

[el-bo (formerly ebow)]

If you find a pig in your audio in Reaper, it is really easy to edit it out now

That's impressive