Sub-Standard DAW Releases - Where Do You Cross The Line ?

[ramseysounds]

Different DAWS for live performance I totally understand. What I don't get is why people use multiple DAWS just for composing and mixing

[jancivil]

As of late Steinberg has been releasing buggier updates with inadequate testing. They do a great job of eliminating major bugs and you can do professional work with it. Regardless it is a stunning achievement. They are slipping lately. 11 is still not solid for many people and it cant all be dismissed as user error.

this is so true, really. 11 is not real stable, 11.1 less so, .2 and .3 less so still here.
I have eliminated one user error (leaving the OS to do automatic graphics switching) but still insane crashes.
(One li'l dude at their forum accuses everyone of having problems with their system, hardware faults ad naus. If I had that quality of problem I wouldn't have Resolve and FCPX rendering at superspeed and being 100% reliable, would I.)
Most of which are hit play and boom, there it goes. Which isn't about pushing the number crunching being impatient, it can be I haven't touched anything for a whole minute, spacebar-play and bam.
It's not from plugins in all probability, as I don't use it to host them mostly, and it's a couple of things inserted in audio channels, half of this is theirs (Frequency). I can't just take VE Pro out of the equation, and it's highly doubtful this is causal at all afaic. Instead of testing they do other things with their time.

But crossing over into another DAW, I can't afford it time-wise or justify the money. And there are features I absolutely rely upon which the others don't do or don't do it with the same ease.

[jancivil]

Here 10.5 worked just about perfectly and there was literally no system change here coinciding with the move to 11.

[xbitz]

One thing I don’t get is why people use multiple daws? Stick to one and learn it inside out

Because one DAW doesn't do everything. Even Cubase.

enlighten me

Ok, what Cubase misses for me personally are modulation sources (LFOs, MSEGs, Env. Followers, etc.) that you can attach to any other device; and splitters that let you process signal in parallel, by dividing it into left/right, mid/side, low/mid/high on a single track. Sure, there are workarounds, but once you've worked with a DAW that does this properly it's difficult to go back.

That's why some will use Bitwig for sound design, Cubase for mix & master and Live for live performance.

this why I like Voltage2+PSP nitro modular

+ black Friday sales luckily Voltage can host VST/3 so Cubase has been saved

ps. gotcha it was 49$ during the last black Friday, PSP Ultimate Modular Collection

Summary
Product Purchased From Price
PSP Ultimate Modular Collection PSPaudioware.com $49.00

https://store.cherryaudio.com/bundles/p ... collection

[antic604]

Different DAWS for live performance I totally understand. What I don't get is why people use multiple DAWS just for composing and mixing

For some it's easier to do sound design in something like Bitwig or Live, due to reasons I mentioned. And they also might find their clip launchers better to "arrange" their ideas, because they facilitate non-linear workflow that's much more flexible than Cubase's arranger track mode.

Obviously it depends on how one writes music. For many the linear tape machine paradigm of Cubase will be ideal and if they don't need complex FX chains and/or modulation, they might find Cubase meeting their needs from start to the end. But everyone is different, hence different preferences.

[ramseysounds]

Im not making it a cubase topic. I use it yes, but I’m saying daws in general. I’ve seen people on here say they use about 4 or 5 different daws

[xbitz]

to not here

[jancivil]

I get why someone that wants to write LFO in the DAW isn't using Cubase for that, but the conclusion that the "linear composers" "don't need modulation" is silly.
Sound design is a great big term, "modulation" is also a big general term. I do extensive setting up of LFO in eg., Absynth (including creating original waveforms for the basis, as well as for how the filters or waveshapers behave. Then there's the extensive breakpoints and envelopes and manipulations in so many ways one isn't going to just intuit) and set up extensive control of it, just that there is no point in drawing it in a CC lane for me, it isn't how I think.
It would be severely restrictive to think like that for me. It's exceeded "BPM" and beats within barlines thinking completely. Then a delay may have its own action which spreads out over time (not tempo synced) taking that movement to another level. Time can be completely elastic.

The reduction to 'the linear tape machine paradigm' is another one. We might have a lot of strategies during composition and need to use the DAW as a DAW. "Linear tape machine paradigm" sounds like one thinks we start at the left locator and go contiguously to the end as a simple matter and we're done. That will be limited to what one human can perform, and I make things far beyond my ability - & anyone's ability - to do at one time.

Cubase has a whole pattern-based methodology, and there are jazz people who write that way; it's not actually "linear". I'll use "linear" to try and encompass through-composing, which is just one way of thinking. When a new idea occurs midstream, or we find that this motif can be foreshadowed to great effect, we open up the time there in the middle; the through-line is altered. Song form, note well, is not through-composing (usually).

I like extensive control of time, and some of teh DAWs are new to even having time signatures, let alone the other things like cross-rhythm and multiple grid views at once... (I've had my mind expanded learning about my own impulses and ideas using the visual of the Cubase timeline that otherwise didn't happen)

if the thing ain't got the features like that, I ain't bothering. So I don't "cross the line", even as Steinberg's culture has gone to the dogs and they're botching some code.

[xbitz]

^^^ "The reduction to 'the linear tape machine paradigm"

luckily both lanes and track versions can be used and even can be converted into each other
https://steinberg.help/cubase_pro_artis ... ons_t.html
without modifying the already existing arrangement + https://www.soundonsound.com/techniques ... ign-cubase


pretty good together with the independent track looping + shared events

[antic604]

I get why someone that wants to write LFO in the DAW isn't using Cubase for that, but the conclusion that the "linear composers" "don't need modulation" is silly...

I didn't mean it like that at all!

There's many people who'd use linear DAW to just record their performance - acoustic, electronic or mixed - and they'd do all the modulation they need at the source. For example, I might require an LFO to bring some life into a sequence I programmed; they'll just tweak the knobs when recording. I might have to use Bitwig's velocity randomisation to breath some life into hihat pattern, they'll just finger drum it with actual feel. I might need to spend hours applying complex grooves and randomisation to my bassline so that it's not repetitve, they'll just play it for 3 minutes straight...

I'm not saying others not needing those features = they're stupid or something. Actually it's me who's stupid and requires all those crutches to achieve something half decent. And some DAW devs recognise there's growing market of such inept "producers" like me, whereas other still concentrate on the actual pro- market of real musicians.

But that doesn't change the fact that - for me - Cubase is "missing" native modulation system, rack/layer devices or a clip launcher. And for other people Bitwig's missing notation editor, expression maps and surround sound, etc.

[jancivil]

I come from a background of improvisation with the actual goal of a real-time composition, including a group improv. Record an event, that's it.
Did it in a studio with the intent of a release; every time I was called to the studio everything was live and we didn't do take after take. More than two takes and something is wrong. But, editing. Mixing.

But composers in the general sense use erasers and re-do, re-think. Plans evolve. Things change once we hear someone try to pull off what's written. An idea occurs later and we insert it, not unlike inserting bars in Cubase.

So, sometimes one is inspired enough to where the composition just happens, left to right and it just works. I have a couple of things that are that.
Even here, we edit. Maybe quite a bit, because things can always be better (vs just nailing it in one go as per the above where one can ruin things by overthinking or doing too much, and where the cure is worse than the malady). Perhaps more prevalently, compositions evolve in process.
I'd prefer to eschew imputing what someone who wants extensive Bitwig modulation is about, since I don't really grok the why of it. I'm sure I'm guilty of having done, but I try not to because it's kinda stupid to.

[pixel85]

^^^ multitap delay was a good one in 10.5 at least, sample track

finally usable from 11 and it's not a joke: the MIDI note deletion with double-clicking also ... finally and I'm using SuperVision too

Multitap Delay is useless for me because it's using a ridiculous amount of CPU. Too much for what it does. Apparently, they programmed it in a way that it will always be CPU hungry so I don't even bother anymore. I could understand if there would be some fancy analogue hardware transistor resistor emulations but it's just a compilation of basic Cubase's effects in one plugin + routing. This makes me worry that if one day they will make a 'modular hub' for plugins with advanced routing capabilities, it will also be useless and will put 12 core CPU's on its knee with just one instance.

I'm using SuperVision now to. It's a powerful tool but I'm already finding stuff that is missing in SV, like for example, the spectrum analyzer in a channel can read frequency and notes but the one in SV doesn't. I hope they will update it in C11.5

[pixel85]

Cubase is "missing" native modulation system,

Yes, definitely

rack/layer devices

Yes (nice to have)

or a clip launcher

To hell with your clip launcher!

I'm worried that if they would do a modulation system, it would be done in a similar manner to what is there already like this ancient thing called 'Auto LFO' (midi inserts). Which means: usable for your Casio keyboard to play General Midi files on weddings in 90's

Seriously, they have to redo the entire midi system, automation, integration with controllers... Dammit, they created VST and other devs are better at using it than Steinberg
The modulation system will be useless if Cubase will still have the same issues with horrible integration with controllers etc.

[Scotty]

Both are great features and I use them. I may have to revise my complaint. I was researching this today and I read that the errors I encountered regarding audio out of sync with group editing enabled can be better managed if you
"Don’t use snap-to-zero and do all your editing in the Project window". I almost always have snap to zero engaged so this may be the culprit. It does make sense although I don't remember reading any precautions in the documentation but I've been wrong more than once today so there is that.

^^^ "The reduction to 'the linear tape machine paradigm"

luckily both lanes and track versions can be used and even can be converted into each other
https://steinberg.help/cubase_pro_artis ... ons_t.html
without modifying the already existing arrangement + https://www.soundonsound.com/techniques ... ign-cubase


pretty good together with the independent track looping + shared events

[jancivil]

I remember learning to turn that off, snap to zero. That's sound advice IME.