Picking a DAW

[shawshawraw]

Besides trying them out, you can also watch some video tutorials (for example, buy a month of Groove3 subscription) to get yourself familiarized, so that you won't be immediately turned down when you hop on a completely different spaceship-like environment, or even worse, make your judgments based on how unwieldy a DAW 'looks' like.

[halcyon68]

Performance-wise the M1 is pretty great, the real issue I have with it is that all the sh*t seems to be soldered on, even the SSD. Which is disgusting.

I still try new DAWs for fun, but for me - a bloody amateur who does nothing but noodle around with virtual instruments - Mixcraft seems to be the optimal solution (IMHO). Still quite fond of Live, still missing EnergyXT, still have an unhealthy obsession with THE INDUSTRY STANDARD™

[machinesworking]

I don't need to, I can see the issues with his testing and they are what they are. Think about it, if the M1 is so powerful why did they stick it in their smallest, consumer-focused laptop and not in their pro-sumer machines? Why do all their top-of-the-line machines still run on Intel processors? IF I was trying to convince people my CPU was more powerful, I'd put it in my top-level machines first, wouldn't you?

The M1 (4 efficiency low power 4 performance high power chips) in the 4-6 processor laptop category blows away everything. It even comes neck and neck with the top of the line 8 cores, which have huge power draws and noise levels compared. It trashes them all in single core performance. When they put out an 8 performance core version nothing is going to come close to it, and hopefully any issues are sorted when dealing with the consumer grade M1 that's already been released.

It's absolutely smart of them to release a consumer grade verison of the chip at first, it's a huge test bed for any issues that might come up, but in most cases those issues will not be crippling to the consumer and cause a shit storm of negative publicity.

deleted the baiting comment that BONES so eloquently ignored (thank you sir) and the ensuing comment from another member attempting to egg it on...ftr the thread is about picking a DAW, not taking the thread down that path again

[BONES]

Because they are going to use more powerful (M1X?) chip in those, even with Intel, entry level devices had weaker CPU's and integrated graphics, it's nothing uncommon.

Yeah but when Mercedes-Benz brings new technology to the car market, it's always in their flagship S Series. It only finds its way into cheaper models over time. Doing it the way Apple have done it telegraphs the fact that it's for consumer level machines, not professional work. Although, to be fair, that's probably more about graphics than CPU performance.

Thing is their entry level CPU is powerful enough to replace their Intel top of the line Macbook Pro

So why not debut it in those machines?

Everyone that used and tested is convinced it's great chip, video guys were shouting about it first

No, they weren't. I work for a TV network and I've been in broadcast and film post-production for more than 20 years, yet I don't know a single person who has shown any interest at all in M1 Macs. When you put it in the entry level computer, professionals won't take any notice.

I'm wondering if part of it isn't that the CPUs can't handle the kinds of spec that professional work demands. e.g. The most RAM you can get for an M1 powered Mac is 16GB and there are no machines with multiple drives. The specs just don't support the theory that they are good enough for professional level work yet.

if you want to have debate with actual facts with more than competent people, go ahead, I don't have any first world experience with M1 and we are just throwing uneducated opinions that doesn't really have much merit outside of speculation realm.

Who's uneducated? Would anyone who knows what they are doing rely on the CPU meter in the DAW they are using? No, they wouldn't. The reality is that the M1 chips have great single threaded performance and very average multi-threaded performance. It works OK for audio, where your DAW sends things to individual threads but for a lot of other things it's not going to cut it.

But my real point is that it is way too expensive for what it offers. My laptop was literally half the price of a similarly specced MB Air and has all the things I need, no compromises. e.g. It has 4 x USB ports, I x TB 4 port and an SD card slot so I don't have to use any adapters, dongles or hubs. It also has a 17" screen so I can see what I'm doing and the keyboard includes the numeral pad (quite common on PC laptops of 14" and over). The extra performance I might get from an M1 chip becomes irrelevant in the face of the compromises required to use it. Consequently, even if the M1 Air was the same price as my Dell G7, I'd still take the G7. But it's twice the price so it doesn't even get a look in.

Logic, as Cubase and Studio One, is their premium full blown offering, but it cost 200 bucks and it's free updates for life

a) That more than I paid for Studio One.
b) "Life" means as long as Apple are willing to keep paying for development but, as seen with Shake and Final Cut Pro, that could change at any moment, on a whim, and you'll be left with a legacy product with zero support. Too big a risk if you ask me.

Personally despise Apple as an company, but also Microsoft, Steinebrg and quite the few of audio vendors, but I'm not religious about my music gear, so will just use whatever makes more sense to me, advise everyone to do the same.

I'm the same, I hate Microsoft a lot more than I hate Apple but I am a pragmatist and Windows is just a better ecosystem than Mac and Windows 10 is a better OS for my needs. The first thing I think about are the applications I want to use, then I look for the OS that best supports them. Do that and it will always be Windows.

[revvy]

Yeah but when Mercedes-Benz brings new technology to the car market, it's always in their flagship S Series. It only finds its way into cheaper models over time. Doing it the way Apple have done it telegraphs the fact that it's for consumer level machines, not professional work.

Clearly M1 is being used in consumer level machines that do happen to have turned out rather well and would appear to handle, to a certain extent, "professional work". That's a statement of fact, not an opinion.

With the Apple switch to the already well established in computers Intel chips, the Mac Pro was the last to switch too, seems to be a pattern for Apple, if not for Mercs.

Time will tell whether MX scales to faster performance machines. The reports I have read suggest it will.

Also, I really wouldn't be encouraging anyone to switch to a Mac right now but that's just me.

[BONES]

The M1 (4 efficiency low power 4 performance high power chips) in the 4-6 processor laptop category blows away everything.

Not across the board. As I said, it's great in single threaded benchmarks but only about on par with a current gen Core i5 when it comes to multi-threaded benchmarks. Then there is the inevitability of being stuck with a max of 16GB of RAM, shared with the graphics cores. 5 years ago that wouldn't have bothered me but things have moved on, 16GB is a minimum for me today. So you can't just look at the CPU and not take into account the rest of the spec. The dual SSDs on my G7 would undoubtedly make it faster for some tasks than an M1 Air, like how quickly a song will load on stage, and it's proper nVidia GPU is non-negotiable for my motion graphics work. Right now I think you'd really have to want an M1, just to have it, to be buying into it. Even the new M1 iMac spec is underwhelming, as well as being twice the price of my Dell, but at least it has a few more ports and a big screen.

It's absolutely smart of them to release a consumer grade verison of the chip at first, it's a huge test bed for any issues that might come up, but in most cases those issues will not be crippling to the consumer and cause a shit storm of negative publicity.

What? You're happy to be Apple's lab rat? Why wouldn't they make sure it's trouble-free before they released it to their customers? Anyway, I've not read anything about any problems, it seems to have gone quite well for a new Apple product.

[BONES]

Does anyone else seem to have a problem picking a DAW and sticking to it?

No, none at all. I've tried a few different ones but I stuck with Orion for 17 years and, after giving both Bitwig and Cubase a red-hot go, I will be sticking with Studio One for the foreseeable future. If Orion had VST 3 support, I would still be using it but I really wanted Korg's ARP Odyssey and now there are just too many new plugins coming out that are VST 3 only.

I’ve used FL and bitwig 16 and am considering moving to Logic Pro X, if only for the lifetime updates and M1 Mac optimization.. is it worth it? Not really a fan of bitwig 16 track.

I didn't get on with Bitwig, either. I could use it OK but it never felt like I was in the target market for it. I always felt like I'd be a fringe dweller, never getting the full benefit of the application or updates.
OTOH, as I've got deeper into Studio One, it feels more and more like the best solution for me.

So the best advice I can give, I suppose, is try a few different demos and see what works. When you find your DAW, you will know it.

[machinesworking]

Clearly M1 is being used in consumer level machines that do happen to have turned out rather well and would appear to handle, to a certain extent, "professional work". That's a statement of fact, not an opinion.

They scale to the top end of notebooks, so yes professional work is easily possible.

Time will tell whether it scales to faster performance machines. The reports I have read suggest it will.

It's almost impossible to imagine that they can't add more cores to these chips, the single core performance is faster than anything but the most overclocked desktops, and it's competing with 8 core machines while only having 4 "performance" cores. IMO there's no way that theses chips don't scale well. Not one reasonably impartial tech

Also, I really wouldn't be encouraging anyone to switch to a Mac right now but that's just me.

Agreed. Not because these chips aren't going to be great, but because it's going to take a while for all of the soft and hardware you might use to be native, and on top of that you would be using a new OS, that's a bad combination of possible issues just to use Logic.

[machinesworking]

Not across the board. As I said, it's great in single threaded benchmarks but only about on par with a current gen Core i5 when it comes to multi-threaded benchmarks. Then there is the inevitability of being stuck with a max of 16GB of RAM, shared with the graphics cores. 5 years ago that wouldn't have bothered me but things have moved on, 16GB is a minimum for me today. So you can't just look at the CPU and not take into account the rest of the spec. The dual SSDs on my G7 would undoubtedly make it faster for some tasks than an M1 Air, like how quickly a song will load on stage, and it's proper nVidia GPU is non-negotiable for my motion graphics work. Right now I think you'd really have to want an M1, just to have it, to be buying into it. Even the new M1 iMac spec is underwhelming, as well as being twice the price of my Dell, but at least it has a few more ports and a big screen.

A couple things, this is the lowest performing Apple Silicon chip they will release. It's exactly the same chip in all 5 machines, and not surprisingly that's whey the performance is very similar for all of them, including the iMac. Maybe a current generation i5 desktop, but for sure not any laptop chip. I'm also certain that the limit of 16GB is just a beginning, same with GPU. I doubt your SSDs would be any faster, in fact there's a lot of tech articles about the way these same SSDs are responding in the SOC design VS regular motherboards.

What? You're happy to be Apple's lab rat? Why wouldn't they make sure it's trouble-free before they released it to their customers? Anyway, I've not read anything about any problems, it seems to have gone quite well for a new Apple product.

Think about it for a second here, Apple has been designing this chip for ten years now. iPads and iPhones have been using this chip forever, the test is not a "first generation" test, it's a new operating system, or rather the desktop version VS mobile touch version, and being cautious makes sense. I 100% think it's the smartest thing to do, release a single batch of chips that are only marginally faster than the A14 chip that preceded it in order to look for any issues that might arise. You can test for years in a lab, but at some point a couple hundred thousand users will point out any bugs or oddities that might be there. This isn't any different for any new release from any computer manufacturer, but when you introduce a new chip that has everyone talking about it, the last thing you want to do is push it to the limits out the door and have something go wrong on a massive scale.

[BONES]

They scale to the top end of notebooks, so yes professional work is easily possible.

Writing emails counts as "professional work", the term is meaningless.

[revvy]

They scale to the top end of notebooks, so yes professional work is easily possible.

Writing emails counts as "professional work", the term is meaningless.

The meaning seemed clear before when you first brought it up.

I'm wondering if part of it isn't that the CPUs can't handle the kinds of spec that professional work demands. e.g. The most RAM you can get for an M1 powered Mac is 16GB and there are no machines with multiple drives. The specs just don't support the theory that they are good enough for professional level work yet..

[machinesworking]

They scale to the top end of notebooks, so yes professional work is easily possible.

Writing emails counts as "professional work", the term is meaningless.

You're avoiding the truth here it looks like. Apple has released a killer mobile processor, and it's scalability is obvious if you look into it. There are dozens of videos of people stacking Logic with plug ins, plenty of online scores proving the viability of these chips. The raw scores speak for themselves, and again, it's the least powerful chip they will put out of this type, already beating comparable chips.

Again, it's absolutely correct to wait or not buy into it right now. At this point any modern CPU I bought would crush my old machines, and I rarely bump up against my CPUs, but to knock it is to just be being blind to the fact it's a great thing.

A long running thread on the M1 on Gearslutz had a couple Microsoft developers talking about how cool they thought it was, because like most people who are logic oriented to them any change for the better that moves computing into the future is good, even if their "team" didn't come up with it. I'm the same way in my best moments, I think touch screens are great, I think Windows is doing it right there, and Apple is being dumb about it. They flatly have the best touch tech, but they refuse to allow Mac OS to use it.

[BONES]

You are still just talking about the processor, which is only one aspect of what makes a workstation good at what it does. Yes, it is miles faster in every single-core benchmark I've seen but it is also comparatively slow in multi-core benchmarks so it's swings and roundabouts. There is anecdotal evidence that it is fast for audio production but I still don't see that it's better per dollar than a decent Intel based laptop.

The meaning seemed clear before when you first brought it up.

Because it had context. In the context of a MacBook Air, or even the forthcoming new iMac with a maximum of 16GB of RAM shared with graphics, most users are likely to be sending emails and making spreadsheets. It is going to be a while before you see them in any post-production house or recording studio, by which time who knows how they'll compare?

[AnX]

No, none at all. I've tried a few different ones but I stuck with Orion for 17 years and, after giving both Bitwig and Cubase a red-hot go, I will be sticking with Studio One for the foreseeable future. If Orion had VST 3 support, I would still be using it but I really wanted Korg's ARP Odyssey and now there are just too many new plugins coming out that are VST 3 only.

solutions: http://forum.synapse-audio.com/viewtopi ... =0#p120022

[machinesworking]

You are still just talking about the processor, which is only one aspect of what makes a workstation good at what it does.

That's not true at all. I've talked about the SOC and how that means the same SSD in this configuration will be faster than in your PC with a standard motherboard system. So far the weak link in this is graphics, which isn't really a concern to many of us. I run two external 1080p monitors off of a 9 year old MacBook pro here. I'm sure the M1's can do that.

Yes, it is miles faster in every single-core benchmark I've seen but it is also comparatively slow in multi-core benchmarks so it's swings and roundabouts. There is anecdotal evidence that it is fast for audio production but I still don't see that it's better per dollar than a decent Intel based laptop.

It depends on how you're looking at the cores. It's not truly an 8 core system, it's 4 power cores and 4 daily driver cores. So if you're comparing it to the 8 core i9 in the current 16" mbp and the Zenbook Duo it will beat it in single core and lose to it in multi. The thing is we're really talking about 4 performance cores here, the other 4 are maybe 1/4 the power. It competes directly and easily with the 6 core i7 laptops etc. So yes, the design is better, that's why MS people even had no issue admitting they thought it was cool, because in the bigger picture if you're into tech, you should love when it advances.

The one thing I can agree with you on is Apple could f*ck it up. Everything points to them being able to ramp this up to ridiculous levels, but they could cheap out or be too proprietary on graphics, they could not care about speed because they're too busy selling to regular consumers, and they could screw up the multitasking with coming 12,16,24 for models etc. Nothing points to any of that though, they've dealt with having to use duel chip configurations with multiple cores in the past, there's no reason to believe that they can't ramp up RAM and graphics etc.

Mostly though, if you're just starting out thinking about picking a new DAW from PCs and FL Studio, it's ridiculous to think about changing your OS, computer, and DAW, and on top of all that getting hardware that developers are not finished coding drivers for.