Is Bitwig dying?

[aroundtown]

you bought bitwig 2 only a month before they release bitwig 3 ???

I looked at used copies but people are asking $200-$250 with no upgrade plan.

I bought it new and get 1 year of updates for $399.

[kpv]

you bought bitwig 2 only a month before they release bitwig 3 ???

A month from now? Yeah right.

[pdxindy]

you bought bitwig 2 only a month before they release bitwig 3 ???

A month from now? Yeah right.

Whether it is one month or three... the person still gets 3 for no extra cost. Plus they get to use the betas right now...

[telecode]

Was there a fellow that did a cost of ownership comparison on KVR between Bitwig and other DAWs? I thought I recall it.

[antic604]

Was there a fellow that did a cost of ownership comparison on KVR between Bitwig and other DAWs? I thought I recall it.

And why exactly is that important? If being the cheapest is your main criteria for using a DAW you're doing it for the wrong reasons

[telecode]

Was there a fellow that did a cost of ownership comparison on KVR between Bitwig and other DAWs? I thought I recall it.

And why exactly is that important? If being the cheapest is your main criteria for using a DAW you're doing it for the wrong reasons

I was just curious.

But we need to be honest. Price does play an important factor in DAW and tool selection in general.

If you own a house and just need a drill you might use once or twice ... Save some money and get a cheap one. If you are in the construction industry and know you will be building houses and neighborhoods, get the best one on market .

But back to DAWs, it's good to look at what is roughy the cost of 5 years of ownership if you want to keep up to date..That gives a much better perspective on what the actual DAW costs you.

In my case, price is important, but not the most important. If I wanted to stay low, I would just use Reaper. But I have no qualms with paying extra for features and functionality that I will use and that will save time. It all plays a factor in cost of ownership.

[antic604]

Was there a fellow that did a cost of ownership comparison on KVR between Bitwig and other DAWs? I thought I recall it.

And why exactly is that important? If being the cheapest is your main criteria for using a DAW you're doing it for the wrong reasons

I was just curious.

But we need to be honest. Price does play an important factor in DAW and tool selection in general.

I know it matters, but shouldn't be a deciding factor.

Also, the calculation made a lot of assumptions that may or may not be true, e.g. how often will you be buying the 12-months plan (upgrades might come out timed in such a way you'll effectively update every 18 months for example, or you might decide to skip one or two because they add nothing for you), or how frequently Ableton will update Live (it's not a given they're in 4-5 years cycle now just because it's what it took them to get from 9 to 10), etc.

[pdxindy]

Was there a fellow that did a cost of ownership comparison on KVR between Bitwig and other DAWs? I thought I recall it.

And why exactly is that important? If being the cheapest is your main criteria for using a DAW you're doing it for the wrong reasons

I was just curious.

But we need to be honest. Price does play an important factor in DAW and tool selection in general.

If you own a house and just need a drill you might use once or twice ... Save some money and get a cheap one. If you are in the construction industry and know you will be building houses and neighborhoods, get the best one on market .

But back to DAWs, it's good to look at what is roughy the cost of 5 years of ownership if you want to keep up to date..That gives a much better perspective on what the actual DAW costs you.

In my case, price is important, but not the most important. If I wanted to stay low, I would just use Reaper. But I have no qualms with paying extra for features and functionality that I will use and that will save time. It all plays a factor in cost of ownership.

A couple people have done cost comparisons related to Bitwig, but they had an agenda to make Bitwig look expensive as a form of complaint about the pricing model. I have yet to see one with a sincere effort to make as unbiased an assessment as possible... especially including both price and some assessment of development pace and overall advancement of the software during the chosen timeframe.

As far as price... if you are on a Mac, Logic is an unbeatable deal.

Live between 8, 9 and 10 was almost a decade. 4 1/2 years between. So that is a fairly minimal cost, but also not a lot of core development during that time. However, over the life of Live, it has averaged under 2 years per paid upgrade. During the V8 -10 period, Ableton was selling Push's to Live users, but most of the userbase either has one now or doesn't want one. So my guess is it will now become something like every 2 years. But that is just a guess and I would say it is quite uncertain what to expect going forward.

Cubase is on the expensive side for upgrades and it is also the most overall capable DAW. Studio One I have no sense of. No MPE support so I've never paid it the slightest attention.

[dellboy]

Cubase is on the expensive side for upgrades and it is also the most overall capable DAW. Studio One I have no sense of. No MPE support so I've never paid it the slightest attention.

I have both those DAWs, and Cubase is going to cost more than Studio One if I want to update it once a year,pretty much on a par with Bitwig.

The easy way to cost Bitwig is on a daily cup of coffee basis.

First year will cost 133 cups of coffee ($3 a cup) 1\3rd cup of coffee daily.

Subsequent years 56 cups of coffee. roughly 1\6th cup of coffee daily.

So if you like a portion of Bitwig per day better than coffee that's how much coffee you have to give up to use it.

[telecode]

Cubase is on the expensive side for upgrades and it is also the most overall capable DAW. Studio One I have no sense of. No MPE support so I've never paid it the slightest attention.

I have both those DAWs, and Cubase is going to cost more than Studio One if I want to update it once a year,pretty much on a par with Bitwig.

The easy way to cost Bitwig is on a daily cup of coffee basis.

First year will cost 133 cups of coffee ($3 a cup) 1\3rd cup of coffee daily.

Subsequent years 56 cups of coffee. roughly 1\6th cup of coffee daily.

So if you like a portion of Bitwig per day better than coffee that's how much coffee you have to give up to use it.

It would make sense that S1 would be much less than Cubase. S1 and a new entrant in the linear DAW market.

Re S1: it seems to have lost some steam from when it first came out a few years ago. It was hyped as the next greatest alternative and cost effective, but seems like the hype has died down.

Re: Cubase. I think an interesting cost comparison for new entrants into the Steinberg Cubase ecosystem would to to look at features vs usage and cost of upgrade compared to other vendors DAW products.

For example, if you buy into the Pro version, what will it cost you to keep up to date vs just buying into the Artist or Elements version and keep upgrading and compare the features you are getting to what you will actually use and what those features are compared to other DAWs.

[telecode]

Was there a fellow that did a cost of ownership comparison on KVR between Bitwig and other DAWs? I thought I recall it.

And why exactly is that important? If being the cheapest is your main criteria for using a DAW you're doing it for the wrong reasons

I was just curious.

But we need to be honest. Price does play an important factor in DAW and tool selection in general.

I know it matters, but shouldn't be a deciding factor.

Also, the calculation made a lot of assumptions that may or may not be true, e.g. how often will you be buying the 12-months plan (upgrades might come out timed in such a way you'll effectively update every 18 months for example, or you might decide to skip one or two because they add nothing for you), or how frequently Ableton will update Live (it's not a given they're in 4-5 years cycle now just because it's what it took them to get from 9 to 10), etc.

I agree. A deciding factor should be comfort with workflow and features used/needed. As I said, I have no issue paying extra for good features I will use.

[Astralp]

Seeing as I use Bitwig and Cubase I thought i’d Add my view on them both.

I love Bitwig, but I’ve been patiently waiting for workflow enhancements. I find it great and flexible for messing around but very hard to work on arrangements without a decent marker system and with the insistence of clips recording over tracks every time you record. Why? I’m now stuck at 2.4 until I renew my license and whilst the grid looks great, I’ve decided to probably wait to see what they do for 3.1 which I think is supposedly workflow related. I hope that’s true.

I’ve gone back to Cubase and upgraded to 10 for the time being. I’ve used it since the Atari days and know the workflow extremely well, and whilst not as exciting as Bitwig, and certainly not as elegant or stable, I find it much easier working on the linear side of things. 10 actually feels much better to me, I have a lot of hardware and it’s always been really traumatic to get it all working well with Cubase prior to 10. Bitwig is almost perfect for hardware integration (and why I bought it initially), the major problem I have atm is not being able to filter what’s included in All Midi Inputs as I tend to use multiple external sequencers which leads to all sorts of chaos when adding a new track. I also have issues with Midi inputs suddenly not working and nothing helps except making a new track and duplicating the settings, but perhaps that got fixed in 2.5.

I hope that one day I can move over to Bitwig permanently, but it isn’t there for me yet. I still use it a fair bit though day to day, and after using it, Cubase is seriously clunky. Adding anything disrupts playback whilst it loads which has been painful forever, especially annoying when using hardware Sequencers or even software ones as they all lose sync... and when it crashes it’s extreme and it means a reboot... Bitwig on the other hand is extremely solid and I love the attention and depth given to every added feature. Bugs actually get fixed. I think it’s rare in the software world and companies like Steinberg should take note, the core of Cubase has been unreliable since the move to SX.

If Bitwig had Cubase style left right indicators and markers, and the ability to replicate the numpad shortcuts I would be in heaven with it. Currently apart from the numbers the numpad is not recognised as a unique entity for some reason. The numpad in Cubase is essential to me, it’s really well thought out and easy to use. I don’t really miss anything else about Cubase when I’m in Bitwig except these basics. I really don’t get how to work with the playhead marker, it’s a real letdown. Plus there’s no way of getting there via shortcut instantly whilst playing back. Sadly Cubase is far superior in this sense, I’d swap the Grid for that functionality without a thought

I think it would be a very good move if Bitwig added a way to map shortcuts of other DAWs, it would make the transition much easier for newcomers or oldies like me that have used the same system for the last 25+ years. I’m sure I’m not alone in that regard, regardless of which DAW you came from, and wouldn’t hurt tempting people over from them.

[Jolaff]

I’ve decided to probably wait to see what they do for 3.1 which I think is supposedly workflow related. I hope that’s true.

Where did you get that information ?

[T71]

[dcupmusic]

They should focus on features, UI/UX, workflow improvements, and integrations.

I'm very hopeful for Bitwig's future and I see myself using it for a long, long time. It's the first DAW I've ever used, and I'm glad I made that choice. The UI seems to be a lot more intuitive and simple than all of its competitors. They just need to keep playing catch-up with the other big DAWs.

I agree 100%

Back around version 1.0 they were marketing themselves at trade shows as "taking the best bits from all the current DAWs and combining them" which was true.
But now they're really trying to push the whole concept of a DAW forward - which i truely appreciate! - but theres still a handful of things i miss.
I would very much love to see them continue to steal the last remaining features
eq - Quick swipe comping could i could see working easy - the edit pane can view multiple tracks since a few versions ago, that seems like the perfect fit for a good comping solution (hey, some of us still record things live, as much as we love tweaking)