Which DAW Has the Best GUI?

[ckoe]

It's not listed in the poll, but my eyes find Renoise very aesthetic in a retro way. I also find Bitwig's GUI very appealing.

I agree with that. Why is Renoise not in the list?

[TheMaestro]

And? Reaper looks good. Especially with the modified theme I use. It both looks great and works great.

Won't change that it looks terrible for many people though. And... has been pointed out a gazillion times now, a theme will only change the things which it is supposed to change, nothing more.

Wow. Insightful.

Not that you're going to change your opinion, but your logic is off here. Reaper cannot change certain GUI elements with themes, people have pointed out that it's those GUI elements that make Reaper ugly to them.

Here's a simple break down.

"Reaper looks good"
The overwhelming consensus is it does not, even with themes.

You have every right to argue that it looks good to you, but that hasn't been what you're doing here. It's as silly as me arguing that everyone is wrong about Bitwig, I think it's fugly, but I realize that's my taste, not the majority. I think it looks like a kids toy, but it's also quite practical as most elements are touch compatible etc. So GUI issues lose out over UX.

Anyway enjoy Reaper, it's a great DAW, this thread was doomed to silly debate anyways.

You mean the foul "add VST Windows window" someone has mentioned? That Reaper doesn't have drag-n-drop thumbnails of every VST? That's a deal-breaker right there...

And no, it doesn't just look good.

"Reaper looks good"
The overwhelming consensus is it does not, even with themes.
If you don't find a Reaper theme you like, you haven't really looked. Just as you really haven't tried customizing Reapers workflow. Or really thought thru a post before you click "Submit", as with your reply.

[EnGee]

It is difficult for me to separate "nice looking" from "nice workflow"! After all, I find the most I like and use, is the most beautiful!
So, for me they are actually three not two! Cubase, S1 and Bitwig. Now, for colours, I like Cubase and Bitwig, but for ogranized style, S1 and Bitwig. Cubase is annoying with those two Windows (main and a child). But, I love the shortcuts because I got used to them all these years. It is good that S1 has almost the same shortcuts
Bitwig is a wonderful DAW with pleasant colours. It has a simple workflow and interface but complex modulations and presets that might be a challenge to analyse.
So, overall I think S1 wins the first place after all because it has only this "gloomy" grey with not great contrast when selecting. Everything else is dope

[machinesworking]

You mean the foul "add VST Windows window" someone has mentioned? That Reaper doesn't have drag-n-drop thumbnails of every VST? That's a deal-breaker right there...

Right there, you're not a flexible thinker on this, if it's unimportant to you, you see no way it could be important to someone else. Even going as far as to straw man.

Again, I'm not fan of the way Bitwig looks, but I'm not arrogant enough to think that my personal preferences override an obvious at least KVR forums preference for Bitwig's GUI.

[jamcat]

So, overall I think S1 wins the first place after all because it has only this "gloomy" grey with not great contrast when selecting. Everything else is dope

Studio One has a colour scheme mixer. You can find it in the menu here:

Mac:
Studio One > Preferences... > General > Appearance

Windows:
Studio One > Options... > General > Appearance

You can change the Hue Shift, Saturation, Luminance, and Contrast for the mixer and overall look.

[EnGee]

So, overall I think S1 wins the first place after all because it has only this "gloomy" grey with not great contrast when selecting. Everything else is dope

Studio One has a colour scheme mixer. You can find it in the menu here:

Mac:
Studio One > Preferences... > General > Appearance

Windows:
Studio One > Options... > General > Appearance

You can change the Hue Shift, Saturation, Luminance, and Contrast for the mixer and overall look.

Yes I know I have already experimented with it but still not that great. The colourful mixer makes the highlighted track difficult to see, so I prefer with no colours.
Anyway, it is not biggy, but it is easy for them to make the contrast better, for example in Bitwig (and Cubase) when you select a track, it inverts the the font colour.
It is a minor thing of course, but it makes the visibility better in Cubase and Bitwig compared.

[Stormin Norman]

And? Reaper looks good. Especially with the modified theme I use. It both looks great and works great.

Not to put too finer point on it, but I have seen dog turd on the sidewalk that is more appealing than Reapers GUI. As for the custom themes, it doesn't matter how much paint you slap on Reaper, it's ugliness still shines through. I personally never found one that both made Reaper look good and didn't have issues, loose functionality etc, and gave a good UX.

"Beauty is only skin deep . . . , but ugly . . . , it goes clean to the bone"

Reaper looks good.

[jamcat]

With Reaper it's not just the aesthetically unappealing ugliness of the interface.

The bigger problem is that it looks like a computer programmer's idea of what music production should look like, rather than a music producer's idea of what a computer program should look like.

[apoclypse]

With Reaper it's not just the aesthetically unappealing ugliness of the interface.

The bigger problem is that it looks like a computer programmer's idea of what music production should look like, rather than a music producer's idea of what a computer program should look like.

All the work the developer do to make the DAW featureful and they can't take one of those update cycles to do something about the UI/UX? If the developers can't bother to do anything about it I'm not going to spend hours downloading extensions and themes or whatever to fix it for them. Sorry I want to make music not sit around theming DAWs. The only theming control I need in a DAW is can I change the colors and resize the UI for hiDPI screens. That's it.

[antic604]

With Reaper it's not just the aesthetically unappealing ugliness of the interface.

The bigger problem is that it looks like a computer programmer's idea of what music production should look like, rather than a music producer's idea of what a computer program should look like.

All the work the developer do to make the DAW featureful and they can't take one of those update cycles to do something about the UI/UX? If the developers can't bother to do anything about it I'm not going to spend hours downloading extensions and themes or whatever to fix it for them. Sorry I want to make music not sit around theming DAWs. The only theming control I need in a DAW is can I change the colors and resize the UI for hiDPI screens. That's it.

That's not really fair. They've come a long way and with 6 I was actually ready to start using it, but MIDI workflow wasn't really to my taste. I'm sure that by 7/8 they'll iron out the links, like the Windows 3.1 windows and preferences but frankly, even the biggest DAW - Cubase - suffers from that and their human and capital resources compared to Cockos are huge, so...

[TheMaestro]

And? Reaper looks good. Especially with the modified theme I use. It both looks great and works great.

Not to put too finer point on it, but I have seen dog turd on the sidewalk that is more appealing than Reapers GUI. As for the custom themes, it doesn't matter how much paint you slap on Reaper, it's ugliness still shines through. I personally never found one that both made Reaper look good and didn't have issues, loose functionality etc, and gave a good UX.

"Beauty is only skin deep . . . , but ugly . . . , it goes clean to the bone"

Reaper looks good.

Well. That's says more about your ability than Reaper's look.

[TheMaestro]

You mean the foul "add VST Windows window" someone has mentioned? That Reaper doesn't have drag-n-drop thumbnails of every VST? That's a deal-breaker right there...

Right there, you're not a flexible thinker on this, if it's unimportant to you, you see no way it could be important to someone else. Even going as far as to straw man.

Again, I'm not fan of the way Bitwig looks, but I'm not arrogant enough to think that my personal preferences override an obvious at least KVR forums preference for Bitwig's GUI.

But there are no compelling reasons. And Bitwig, or any other DAW for that matter, isn't even remotely close when it comes to skinning and customization.
"Reaper is ugly" is about as intelligent as "cars are ugly".

[EnGee]

I don't think Reaper is ugly. Reaper 6 is fine with the default GUI and skin. I don't have a problem with the GUI or colours.
The main problem for me is with the scrolling/zooming and some shortcuts. Those IMO are a deal breaker for me to use Reaper. While the midi is really good, but editing using the mouse/keys is a pain for me. If there is a way to change such behaviour, I would buy it and use it.
For example, when I scroll with the mouse in the midi editing, I expect it to scroll horizontally not zooming! Such things make me frustrated then I just close it and began to use another DAW.

[jonljacobi]

Opinions vary, but a lot of people consistently complain about Reaper's look so obviously it's not striking the right chord with many people. Far more than with any other DAW I'm aware of. Personally, it's so uninspiring that I'm not willing to spend the 10 hours it would require to tweak it to taste. And when you theme it, you're still stuck with those XP-style dialogs. Why they don't just get a UI designer with some taste, I have no idea. There's got to be ego involved. It's a bloody shame as the features are fantastic.

Bitwig is the nicest looking DAW by my lights. But it's not even close to the most efficient interface for anything other than sound design. It's the DAW I wanted to love, but got tired of hearing no from.

That said, I still don't know if this thread is about looks or getting the job done as quickly as possible.

[Passing Bye]

Bitwig is the nicest looking DAW by my lights. But it's not even close to the most efficient interface for anything other than sound design.

Agree, it's really nicest looking, but I found Logic 8 to be most efficient interface for work, maybe it's the grey color, but as much as I liked Logic 7 look, 8 was just kinda invisible and straight to the point.