If you had to stick to one DAW, which one would it be?

[rod_zero]

Funny how different the results in these polls can be (2023, 6,601 respondents)…

https://www.production-expert.com/produ ... he-results



(2023): https://musicianshq.com/most-popular-da ... ucers-use/

(2017, over 30K respondents): https://www.macprovideo.com/article/new ... -voted-for

Normal bias when the poll is not representative and is opt in, nevertheless the data from Google trends at least is the whole universe of people looking about info, not users exactly but people looking for.

[Niowiad]

Funny how different the results in these polls can be (2023, 6,601 respondents)…

https://www.production-expert.com/produ ... he-results

About this first poll... "Production Expert" used to be "Pro Tools Expert" until quite recently.
Now on top of ProTools they also cover StudioOne and LogicPro, as the poll results accordingly show.

[cryophonik]

Exactly. Point being, these types of polls are not scientific and generally meaningless.

[apoclypse]

i.e. I don't think Ableton would ever be the success it is today if people weren't jumping on the warez scene as an inroad. Could it be that this model of creating interest and being in people's eyelines is more important than securing a product nowadays?

Ableton is a success for multiple reasons, their demo is super accessible, what with just not being able to save a song, but you can save audio. The time stretching was so far ahead of the rest, along with the "uninterrupted audio engine", that a massive amount of people used Live as a secondary DAW, until they stopped using their main one for everything but final mix and mastering.

Another thing Ableton did was work with every major hardware midi controller, and audio interface manufacturer to pack in a lite version of Ableton. They are still doing it today. Not only do they get support for hardware because of this, they get someone at least trying out their software since it's free. Very smart steps Ableton took to be the juggernaut it is today. Other's have tried that but just haven't been as successful.

If your goal is to actually get your software in people's hands, in this competitive environment you have to basically give it away and that still may not be enough (Traktion Waveform and Sonar should be huge if that were the case).

[funky lime]

Very smart steps Ableton took to be the juggernaut it is today. Other's have tried that but just haven't been as successful.

interestingly, reaper gets more representation here (if you go by polls) and on some other forums, with absolutely zero marketing whatsoever. of course, ableton is a "product" whereas reaper is more like a wealthy nerd's passion project.

i think that resonates with users; nobody is trying to "sell" reaper to you (well, except the occasional evangelist ) whereas you can't even so much as set foot inside a music store without accidentally catching at least one copy of the ableton demo. like a fuckin AOL disk ... remember those?

[apoclypse]

Very smart steps Ableton took to be the juggernaut it is today. Other's have tried that but just haven't been as successful.

interestingly, reaper gets more representation here (if you go by polls) and on some other forums, with absolutely zero marketing whatsoever. of course, ableton is a "product" whereas reaper is more like a wealthy nerd's passion project.

i think that resonates with users; nobody is trying to "sell" reaper to you (well, except the occasional evangelist ) whereas you can't even so much as set foot inside a music store without accidentally catching at least one copy of the ableton demo. like a fuckin AOL disk ... remember those?

Like I've said before Polls here don't really mean much. You have to remember the people here are the "initiated". Also while Reaper doesn't just hand you a disk like Ableton, Reaper users are like those evangelical people who just keep handing your a pamphlet, screaming out of a boombox, asking you to convert. So I'm not sure that's better than what Ableton is doing.

[BBFG#]

Kind of feel that when the argument against something is made by religious or political analogies it's a pretty good sign the ones making it are "clutching their pearls".

[sQeetz]

Kind of feel that when the argument against something is made by religious or political analogies it's a pretty good sign the ones making it are "clutching their pearls".

Like claiming liking/using something you're not using of being a cult?

[BBFG#]

Cults are not necessarily religious or political. But I get there does seem to be a personality type that needs them with an idea of a supreme being leading them. Usually revealed by them invoking the person's name rather than the product. The difference between a fan and a cultist can be a thin line at times. The difference here seems evident to me. But I get that might not be as evident to others.
Granted, either can gang quickly on dissenters. Ironically, this has me considering it might be time to download a current version of Reaper.

[sQeetz]

It's time to clutch the pearls...

[Trensharo]

Anyway, I always turn off my laptop. Turning it on again and booting Windows just takes a few seconds, and I prefer to start fresh every time. Besides, that saves battery too. As Linus states in the video, a laptop is not a mobile phone, it's a computer. Computers were not thought to be always on.

Well, now one has the freedom to think about the laptop how one wants.

I rarely turn my laptop off. Even on a roadtrip or on the airplane. And with my M1 MBP, I can close the screen, go on the road for a day or two and the battery is fine. Right now I have 4 projects open in Bitwig and I have not even done an initial save. One of those projects has been there for over a week. Have a number of other apps open and maybe 20 tabs on the browser. So yeah, I kinda treat the laptop like the phone... no reason not to.

You can't use an M1 MBP for a day or two for music production on battery. I have an M1 Pro MBP and had a 13" M1 MBP when those released. I can probably squeeze 5 hours of actual music production out of that laptop. A day ... maybe, if I'm barely using it. Two days. No. But, it's not like you can't carry a PD battery bank and just charge it in the bag when you're not using it, anyways. Beyond that, the scenario you are inferring is not possible. Creative software, including DAWs (and the plug-ins, virtual instruments, and samplers that run within them), drain the battery during use.

If you're just writing lyrics in TextEdit, it will last you a couple of days - easy

Like I said, I get about 5 hours producing music on mine with Logic Pro, and about 3.5 hours editing video (if I'm not heavily pre-rendering high raster footage). If you're only recording audio (not many plug-ins, etc.) then you can probably get a couple more hours out of it.

I don't even bother use it off the charger for those kinds of scenarios anymore. I have a TB3 Dock with Dual NVMe and 87W PD passthrough charging that's about the size of a PreSonus AudioBox 96... and I just plug it into that.

On my PC Laptop, I have a USB-C Dock with 60W PD Passthrough and an M.2 SATA SSD for a similar user experience.

Most airplanes I've been on have plugs and you can plug any Apple 67-96W adapter into the airplane and just connect the MagSafe 3 to the laptop. There is no point in using a MacBook (or any PC Laptop with USB-C PD Charging) off battery on an airplane... or on Amtrack... or even in a car riding shotgun since the car plugs for 60-90W charging cost very little.

I've ridden on a number of different types of public transport over the past year, and I never had to run any of my devices off the battery. There were plugs everywhere, Lol. I even kept my iPhone plugged in when I was using it.

The rated battery life for all of these laptops is for relatively light productivity workloads (Microsoft Office, iWorks, Edge or Safari with very little add-ins, etc.) and media consumption (Audio and Video playback). In those scenarios, a lot is offloaded to efficiency cores and the machine can run well at near-base clock speeds.

It's a lot different when you're running software that demands more. It has always been this way.

For professional/workstation use, those numbers are drastically exaggerated. Halve it, and that's about what you should expect it to be "rated" at (which is always an overstatement as consumers don't use "clean" install machines like the manufacturer does when testing this).

That's ignoring factors like degradation of battery (capacity loss), ambient temperature, display brightness, which radios are in use, Keyboard backlighting, connected peripherals, etc.

[pdxindy]

You can't use an M1 MBP for a day or two for music production on battery.

I was referring to the M laptops being frugal in sleep mode. And why I rarely ever turn off the computer.

[apoclypse]

Kind of feel that when the argument against something is made by religious or political analogies it's a pretty good sign the ones making it are "clutching their pearls".

Okay here is a non religious Reaper analogy.

Reaper users are like those parents who keep showing you pictures of their ugly as sin kid. You politely smile as you are sure the kid has some nice qualities, maybe they are good at sports or in the honor roll, but the kid is fugs (f’ing ugly). Pearl clutching avoided.

Just to make it clear I’m joking of course.

[Jac459]

Anyway, I always turn off my laptop. Turning it on again and booting Windows just takes a few seconds, and I prefer to start fresh every time. Besides, that saves battery too. As Linus states in the video, a laptop is not a mobile phone, it's a computer. Computers were not thought to be always on.

Well, now one has the freedom to think about the laptop how one wants.

I rarely turn my laptop off. Even on a roadtrip or on the airplane. And with my M1 MBP, I can close the screen, go on the road for a day or two and the battery is fine. Right now I have 4 projects open in Bitwig and I have not even done an initial save. One of those projects has been there for over a week. Have a number of other apps open and maybe 20 tabs on the browser. So yeah, I kinda treat the laptop like the phone... no reason not to.

You can't use an M1 MBP for a day or two for music production on battery. I have an M1 Pro MBP and had a 13" M1 MBP when those released. I can probably squeeze 5 hours of actual music production out of that laptop. A day ... maybe, if I'm barely using it. Two days. No. But, it's not like you can't carry a PD battery bank and just charge it in the bag when you're not using it, anyways. Beyond that, the scenario you are inferring is not possible. Creative software, including DAWs (and the plug-ins, virtual instruments, and samplers that run within them), drain the battery during use.

If you're just writing lyrics in TextEdit, it will last you a couple of days - easy

Like I said, I get about 5 hours producing music on mine with Logic Pro, and about 3.5 hours editing video (if I'm not heavily pre-rendering high raster footage). If you're only recording audio (not many plug-ins, etc.) then you can probably get a couple more hours out of it.

I don't even bother use it off the charger for those kinds of scenarios anymore. I have a TB3 Dock with Dual NVMe and 87W PD passthrough charging that's about the size of a PreSonus AudioBox 96... and I just plug it into that.

On my PC Laptop, I have a USB-C Dock with 60W PD Passthrough and an M.2 SATA SSD for a similar user experience.

Most airplanes I've been on have plugs and you can plug any Apple 67-96W adapter into the airplane and just connect the MagSafe 3 to the laptop. There is no point in using a MacBook (or any PC Laptop with USB-C PD Charging) off battery on an airplane... or on Amtrack... or even in a car riding shotgun since the car plugs for 60-90W charging cost very little.

I've ridden on a number of different types of public transport over the past year, and I never had to run any of my devices off the battery. There were plugs everywhere, Lol. I even kept my iPhone plugged in when I was using it.

The rated battery life for all of these laptops is for relatively light productivity workloads (Microsoft Office, iWorks, Edge or Safari with very little add-ins, etc.) and media consumption (Audio and Video playback). In those scenarios, a lot is offloaded to efficiency cores and the machine can run well at near-base clock speeds.

It's a lot different when you're running software that demands more. It has always been this way.

For professional/workstation use, those numbers are drastically exaggerated. Halve it, and that's about what you should expect it to be "rated" at (which is always an overstatement as consumers don't use "clean" install machines like the manufacturer does when testing this).

That's ignoring factors like degradation of battery (capacity loss), ambient temperature, display brightness, which radios are in use, Keyboard backlighting, connected peripherals, etc.

MBP 14 M2 pro here. I use Bitwig with a ton of heavy usage VST like Avenger or Falcon. I got more 6-8 hours of battery doing music.
My Battery is on saver mode. It reduces the CPU power by about 30% as per Bitwig CPU graph but I still have largely enough. Screen brightness is generally max. Sound through jack at about 30-40%.
If I plug my DAC by usb-C battery goes more to 5 hours.

[BBFG#]

Kind of feel that when the argument against something is made by religious or political analogies it's a pretty good sign the ones making it are "clutching their pearls".

Okay here is a non religious Reaper analogy.

Reaper users are like those parents who keep showing you pictures of their ugly as sin kid. You politely smile as you are sure the kid has some nice qualities, maybe they are good at sports or in the honor roll, but the kid is fugs (f’ing ugly). Pearl clutching avoided.

Just to make it clear I’m joking of course.

I've lived in four West Coast counties that all have Major League baseball teams and find an analogy with their supporters that I think seems closer to me. One of them doesn't have the best team, but it's support fans do seem the loyalist out of the bunch. Two of the others are loyal and known to get excitable and even physical with other team's fans, but during bad years they don't really support them at all. The fourth one, which is actually a different league, has a smaller base, which is loyal, but not fanatical and during good years, actually has one of those other counties claim them as their team along with their own. To me, Reaper reminds me of that first group. Loyal to a fault regardless of their standing and what supporters of others think of them. And if those others don't like it, then oh well. I feel like their community is one of their strongest selling points.
There are good software products I own that I refuse to claim in public simply because of the group thought seeking conformity if their level of praise isn't matched.

(Padres, Giants, Dodgers, Angels)