Ableton vs Bitwig - pros/cons?

[antic604]

...where the rubber meets the road, I could get things done much more quickly in Live...

The question is, is it actually because of the number and complexity of steps you need to perform to get there, or simply because you know Live - menus, shortcuts, devices, etc. - much better and therefore are more comfortable with it?

BTW, for me personally one thing that'd tilt the scales either way is who first adds linked / alias clips. It still boggles my mind how both DAWs targeting mainly the electronic music producers are missing this very basic feature, that all the other linear DAWs have had for years...

[SLiC]

But if the licence method was acceptable,and I had the money to upgrade on an annual basis, I would go Bitwig.

Bitwig is not subscription, you don't have to pay an annual fee, you just upgrade when you want to and when you do you get a years free upgrades after that....

With 4 pretty big updates a year however, its more than tempting to keep paying for the new version to keep getting all the new features, but you don't have to, and the longer you wait, the more you get for your money when you jump back in!(like NI Komplete!)


I am not currently subscribed (haven't been for about 3 months) but I have had 3 'bug fix' updates to 2.3, one even had new features! I suspect when 2.4 comes out, I will have to choose to subscribe (buy the update) to use the new features, or, if I can live without them, just wait for 2.5 and see what that brings to the party...it certainly won't cost any more than all the 'paid' 0.5 updates in Cubase!

[SLiC]

The only thing that's turning me off Bitwig is clutter and it's insane and somewhat redundant modulation.

I have been demoing Bitwig for the last few days and have no idea what this modulating feature is ?

Have I missed something important ?

YES

Click the '+' box in the rack - select a modulator (lfo, adsr, random, step etc) there are a lot of them!

https://www.bitwig.com/en/bitwig-studio ... ators.html

Apply as many as you like to any VST synth, FX or send as a CV modulation to a hardware synth/Euro! Once you have a modulator open there is an arrow to set up more detil, a modulator can modulate anotgher modulator so you can build complex devices- peopl ehave built full synths and fx units just with the modulators!

https://www.bitwig.com/en/community/cre ... hines.html

[dellboy]

But if the licence method was acceptable,and I had the money to upgrade on an annual basis, I would go Bitwig.

Bitwig is not subscription, you don't have to pay an annual fee, you just upgrade when you want to and when you do you get a years free upgrades after that....

With 4 pretty big updates a year however, its more than tempting to keep paying for the new version to keep getting all the new features, but you don't have to, and the longer you wait, the more you get for your money when you jump back in!(like NI Komplete!)


I am not currently subscribed (haven't been for about 3 months) but I have had 3 'bug fix' updates to 2.3, one even had new features! I suspect when 2.4 comes out, I will have to choose to subscribe (buy the update) to use the new features, or, if I can live without them, just wait for 2.5 and see what that brings to the party...it certainly won't cost any more than all the 'paid' 0.5 updates in Cubase!

Ummmm.......

Just a few hours ago I searched the interwebs for pricing of Bitwig,including the ebay.

In the end I thought I would have a look on the Bitwig site, and this is what they have there.....

----------------------------------------------------------------

"Bitwig Studio Upgrade Plan
Renew your upgrade plan for another 12 months."

---------------------------------------------------------------

So, yes, if you wish to keep up to date, then subscribe you must.

Of course, it is not mandatory, and one can wait, but then one gets that awful feeling of being left out of the party

[SLiC]

If you wish to 'keep up to date' with NI Komplete then subscribe you must, same with Cubase, Arturia V collection....any VST that comes out with a 'paid' upgrade for new features...if you think that way you will be broke! You upgrade if you need (want!) the new features, if you don't, you don't upgrade....If it does what you need as it is, and you are happy with the price for those existing features, its all good!

Personally I will decide when I see what in 2.4, if it isn't stuff I need I won't feel I am, missing about by not buying the upgrade or as bigwig (unfortunately) call it, renewing my subscription! I will just consider it 'buying some new features I want' (an upgrade) and then getting all the other new features that I don't yet know about free for a year...

Personally I would rather be in vesting in a DAW that upgrades 3-4 times very year, than Live that upgrades one every 2-3 years....of course that will seem cheaper, but you have no option to buy new features! (I have Live 9 suite, no desire to upgrade and I don't feel like I am missing out or not up to date, there was nothing in 10 I needed (or even wanted) I didn't re-subscribe for the next XX year cycle

[Trancit]

i learned so far that NONE has a great piano roll like fl studio, which is a total bummer for me, i work with love with patterns, piano roll and EASY vst inserts.

If you really mean what you´re saying here and really like the workflow of FL Studio in this regards than you´re in the same boat like me...

"You can run but you cannot escape!!!"

I have all this "testing" (or shall I say 100 times testing) done and done and done... liked many features... what can I say... deleted everything after wasting months/years of time and use FL Studio again...

For me, there is no real competitor in terms of workflow/feel/creativity... there are many shortcomings... but you know what: every other one got shortcomings as well... no matter where you look, you´ll find things you like better but you´ll find many things you´ll miss from FL Studio

What A does well lacks B and what B does well lacks A and here we go again...

[dellboy]

Personally I would rather be in vesting in a DAW that upgrades 3-4 times very year, than Live that upgrades one every 2-3 years....of course that will seem cheaper, but you have no option to buy new features!

And there you have it.

What I said in the first place.

Its a matter of personal preference about licensing options.

Bitwig have the better program, but Live has better licensing ------- for me. There are other aspects to the license. For instance, someone is selling Bitwig on KVR market place at this moment. And so I looked up the faq on license transfers but I could not find it. It seems that if you want to sell Bitwig you have to write a letter to support for them to consider.

In Live its just a matter of clicking on the transfer option in your account and supply an email address, job done.

[chk071]

So what exactly is so nice about FLS's piano roll? That would be the first step in being able to comprehend which DAW could do the same. Although it would also be nice to hear what's wrong with FLS, so that the OP wants to switch. In general i don't quite get threads like these. Laziness? Boredom? Why not go out, and demo other DAW's, to see what fits and what not. That's much more to the point than posting threads, without even describing what the real issue is with the DAW you use.

[Tj Shredder]

My personal,story with both:
I am a heavy Max/MSP user, I can do miracles in Max. When Cycling and Ableton joined forces to pull out Max4Live, I thought its time to get into sequencers again. I tried Live, had a license for some jobs and it never really clicked. Then two years ago, I got Bitwig in a bundle with a keyboard and really started to like it. Though with M4L and my experience I would have endless possibilities Live didn't cut it, I tried to port my multi channel patches to Live, which worked but was a pain for all kinds of restrictions. Back then their mind set was just stereo.
I attended several user group sessions and all the music which came out sounded the same, no musical innovation at all, much focussed on Abletons marketing etc... Since end of last year I attended the first Bitwig user group in Berlin, and we jam together and actually make more music than talking...
See you - every last monday at c-base...; - )

[rod_zero]

If you wish to 'keep up to date' with NI Komplete then subscribe you must, same with Cubase, Arturia V collection....any VST that comes out with a 'paid' upgrade for new features...if you think that way you will be broke! You upgrade if you need (want!) the new features, if you don't, you don't upgrade....If it does what you need as it is, and you are happy with the price for those existing features, its all good!

Personally I will decide when I see what in 2.4, if it isn't stuff I need I won't feel I am, missing about by not buying the upgrade or as bigwig (unfortunately) call it, renewing my subscription! I will just consider it 'buying some new features I want' (an upgrade) and then getting all the other new features that I don't yet know about free for a year...

Personally I would rather be in vesting in a DAW that upgrades 3-4 times very year, than Live that upgrades one every 2-3 years....of course that will seem cheaper, but you have no option to buy new features! (I have Live 9 suite, no desire to upgrade and I don't feel like I am missing out or not up to date, there was nothing in 10 I needed (or even wanted) I didn't re-subscribe for the next XX year cycle

If you have komplete 10 and kontakt gets updates within version 5 you will also get the updates, so really not the same situation, you get maintenance updates unlike Bitwig.

As for Live, the developing cycle is around 4 years, and do you get some new features in the cycle (9.5 and 9.7 had new stuff). It isn't completely stale.

[pottering]

Live updates regularly, had multiple 9.x updates between 9 and 10, and multiple minor 9.x.x updates between those 9.x updates.

For Live 10, there are 10.x.x.x betas every 2 weeks or so (it is not scheduled, but seen more or less 2 updates per month).

[SLiC]

If you wish to 'keep up to date' with NI Komplete then subscribe you must, same with Cubase, Arturia V collection....any VST that comes out with a 'paid' upgrade for new features...if you think that way you will be broke! You upgrade if you need (want!) the new features, if you don't, you don't upgrade....If it does what you need as it is, and you are happy with the price for those existing features, its all good!

Personally I will decide when I see what in 2.4, if it isn't stuff I need I won't feel I am, missing about by not buying the upgrade or as bigwig (unfortunately) call it, renewing my subscription! I will just consider it 'buying some new features I want' (an upgrade) and then getting all the other new features that I don't yet know about free for a year...

Personally I would rather be in vesting in a DAW that upgrades 3-4 times very year, than Live that upgrades one every 2-3 years....of course that will seem cheaper, but you have no option to buy new features! (I have Live 9 suite, no desire to upgrade and I don't feel like I am missing out or not up to date, there was nothing in 10 I needed (or even wanted) I didn't re-subscribe for the next XX year cycle

If you have komplete 10 and kontakt gets updates within version 5 you will also get the updates, so really not the same situation, you get maintenance updates unlike Bitwig.

As for Live, the developing cycle is around 4 years, and do you get some new features in the cycle (9.5 and 9.7 had new stuff). It isn't completely stale.

that stayement about not get maintenance updates is inaccurate (why do you think that?) I have had 4 maintenance updates (and some new features) already and I am not subscribed!

I have live 9 suite and the free updates since V9 (almost five years of waited ng for edit in clip) amount to far less than the free updates I had in 1 year from Bitwig, so for me Bitwig is better value, but more importantly to me, more fun!

[pottering]

You can load VSTs in Max For Live, hence you can load MIDI VSTs like Cthulhu or Scaler in the same track, like FL's patcher or hybrid tracks.

The only tricky part is that Max needs a "midiparse" object to format the MIDI input before a MIDI VST.



That "vst~" in the middle can load any VST (also AU I think).

You can drag a .dll straight into Max, it will create a nicer box with the exposed parameters.



If you add your VST folder to Max File Preferences they will show up in the Max Browser's "Plug-ins" section.

[chk071]

I think the OP is already brooding about his next this vs. that thread.

Of course, without demoing either Bitwig or Ableton, or giving a flying damn about the technical explanations.

[antic604]

I think the OP is already brooding about his next this vs. that thread.

Of course, without demoing either Bitwig or Ableton, or giving a flying damn about the technical explanations.

Damn, so you're saying my 'essay' on previous page was in vain?