Ableton or Bitwig? Help!!

[igoramos]

I use both and find myself drawn more to Bitwig. I like the clip launcher in Bitwig better overall and don't like the arrangement view lack of comfort level with editing. When I think of a project i want to start, I click on Bitwig without hesitating. Personally, if its limited by comparison, I almost prefer the constraint. There have been times when I hit a wall and have to go search out a solution but often find that there is one. Of course this is true of every DAW. I feel surprised at times that there is so much potential and it all seems to be happening so slowly though I really don't keep up with what future projects they have in store, though I assume there are many!

[pottering]

Live may be closer to v10 than Bitwig to v2
I would wait unless you are not capable of making music which seems unlikely since it sound like you know exactly your set up etc.

Nice to hear that mate , how closer can that be? weeks or months? I am not a Live-follower so I don't know about release dates.
And yes, I can totally work with my Cubase stuff yet

I do follow Live, don't expect Live 10 before 2018, there are zero rumors about any alpha or any kinda of development [edit: they are still developing 9.x versions].

[Maxim b]

used Bitwig for one year and what I can say is, bigwigs performance is really not that great on a 2014 late MacBook Pro 15. I created a Heavy serum Patch that I to test the CPU of logic Bitwig and ableton and Bitwig can handle 7 instances, ableton 11 and logic x 20. Also the ableton built in instruments and effects are way better, I never really found any use for anything but blur and tool in Bitwig. On big projects bitwigs sound engine sometimes stopped playing and I had to press it up to 15 times for it to run again and it caused lots of frustration.. basically what I am saying is if you tend to use CPU efficient/stock plugins and your projects don't get too big, i would choose Bitwig because the workflow is a breeze but if you tend to use 60+ tracks with heavy synths and effects, I would choose ableton, it feels really solid.

[inkwarp]

i would imagine bitwig is sweet for people who deal mainly in electronic music. it is fairly straightforward even though there's a lot of content and info there. but i agree ableton has a lot more power when you get your head around the worklfow. it would be awesome so live could have clip editing like it is in Bitwig though...

[shonoob]

Cheers for you review mate. From the distance of still not having Bitwig I think the developers are doing a good job, at least I see them answering stuff in posts. As regards Ableton I see no communication with users, for instance, the scroll wheel mouse option has been demanded in forums of 2007 and still no answer/feature. But that is just my view from the distance, maybe if I go for Bitwig I end up frustrated for the same reasons and I really don't want to get there.

As for features I find Bitwig much better, but I find Live rock solid (and Bitwig really unstable). So that's the issue: features/workflow vs stability, what do I choose?

My pleasure mate, really (The Bitwig subforum is full of fanboys, making it impossible to criticize there). I have had qualms from Bitwig as of late and enjoy pointing out their deep and sincere flaws.

Bitwig is the definition of unstable as well from my experience. I have used it on a Windows 8 Laptop (most stable here), but it crashed constantly on a brand new iMac and my new windows 10 computer makes it tough to use to say the least.

I get audio crashes every 15 minutes it seems-resulting in all plugins crashing and having to reload each, which has taken 2-3 minutes depending on the project. I once worked on a project for 8 hours non-stop saving constantly, when BW crashed. When I reloaded said project every single plugin state was forgotten/init, and my samples were all broken. This was only a month ago on the Windows 10 anniversary update.

I still own Bitwig, because I have faith that they will shape up, but am 110% happy with Ableton as it stands right now.

[sovietpop]

My experience on OSX with Bitwig.
Never had any crash, its really stable on my system imac 27 2012.
I could no go back to Ableton live to be honest.
No zoom with mouse wheel is retarded and you cant edit audio in clip. I use third party plugins like Soundtoys bundle, Diva, PPG wave etc so i really dont care about the included stuff.
Live is just too expensive for what it is imo. Bitwig is not perfect bit for the price its a no brainer.

[.jon]

I faced the same choice a while ago, ended up choosing Live (for now) because it's simply more mature. I had a Live Lite license, and the limitation has been inspiring but it's obviously a temporary solution. I'd like to see both Live 10 and Bitwig 2 before committing finally to either, but they might both be too far away... I'm also slightly concerned that there might not be a Bitwig 2 ever, it does look like the development has all but stopped.

Bitwig could be a better version of Live, but I've learned to never buy could bes again after falling for the Reaper trap. Possibly upcoming features are the worst kind of features.

[pc999]

I have very few, if any, problems with bugs on Bitwig (but I mostly just use BWS devices, almost no VSTs).

Plus I love the integration with the SL mk2 and the Launchpad (the first one), little need to look at the screen once you have a few templates (but I assume that if you have newer/better controllers you will barely need to look at the screen at all).

[Tearing Riots]

it does look like the development has all but stopped.

They've been fixing bugs for the last 15 months so not a lot of new features have been added. And it´s shaping up nicely imo. A year ago it felt like being an early adopter, by now it´s working pretty flawless on my win7 and 10 machines.

You´re right about the could bes though, just look at the features, try both and use what suits your workflow best.



@OP: I´ve been using AL for nearly 10 years but quit it 2 years ago, so here´s for BWS:
- Has it ever let you down at a critical point in your work?
Not since about ten point releases ago. There´s a pretty rare disappearing-undo-bug which can be scary if you ie deleted the wrong track or sth, i just save new versions and ctrl+s before i do anything critical. Never failed with recording.
- Has it ever made you lost all the work you did before?
Same
- Has it made you get pissed off at some point and say "Why am I still using it?"? What was the reason?
No. Yes it has bugs, but most of them can be worked around.

AL has tons of content/features and is well-refined but BWS is AL, re-thought and with a working modulation system.
Plugin delay compensation within containers is a huge plus in my book as well.

So count me as a fan

[xbitz]

forgot to mention, Groove Pool (https://www.ableton.com/en/manual/using-grooves/ ) also missing from Bitwig (and it's huuge miss especially because you'd like to use it to trancy things)

to the questions AL; three yes

[.jon]

it does look like the development has all but stopped.

They've been fixing bugs for the last 15 months so not a lot of new features have been added. And it´s shaping up nicely imo. A year ago it felt like being an early adopter, by now it´s working pretty flawless on my win7 and 10 machines.

You´re right about the could bes though, just look at the features, try both and use what suits your workflow best.

Well, it didn't feel buggy at all when I tested it, everything worked very well, so guess that confirms your feelings. I had mostly no problems with what was already in there, only with what is still missing.

[J-909]

used Bitwig for one year and what I can say is, bigwigs performance is really not that great on a 2014 late MacBook Pro 15. I created a Heavy serum Patch that I to test the CPU of logic Bitwig and ableton and Bitwig can handle 7 instances, ableton 11 and logic x 20. Also the ableton built in instruments and effects are way better, I never really found any use for anything but blur and tool in Bitwig. On big projects bitwigs sound engine sometimes stopped playing and I had to press it up to 15 times for it to run again and it caused lots of frustration.. basically what I am saying is if you tend to use CPU efficient/stock plugins and your projects don't get too big, i would choose Bitwig because the workflow is a breeze but if you tend to use 60+ tracks with heavy synths and effects, I would choose ableton, it feels really solid.

Nice and objective, thnx!

[J-909]

it does look like the development has all but stopped.

They've been fixing bugs for the last 15 months so not a lot of new features have been added. And it´s shaping up nicely imo. A year ago it felt like being an early adopter, by now it´s working pretty flawless on my win7 and 10 machines.

You´re right about the could bes though, just look at the features, try both and use what suits your workflow best.



@OP: I´ve been using AL for nearly 10 years but quit it 2 years ago, so here´s for BWS:
- Has it ever let you down at a critical point in your work?
Not since about ten point releases ago. There´s a pretty rare disappearing-undo-bug which can be scary if you ie deleted the wrong track or sth, i just save new versions and ctrl+s before i do anything critical. Never failed with recording.
- Has it ever made you lost all the work you did before?
Same
- Has it made you get pissed off at some point and say "Why am I still using it?"? What was the reason?
No. Yes it has bugs, but most of them can be worked around.

AL has tons of content/features and is well-refined but BWS is AL, re-thought and with a working modulation system.
Plugin delay compensation within containers is a huge plus in my book as well.

So count me as a fan

Really appreciate your post mate
I can consider myself an almost fan of BWS, but it has happened before that I end up hating pieces of software that promise a lot and are eventually useless

[J-909]

Thank you all guys for your interest, I really appreciate your opinions (even the one-side ones )
Much as I read I can't decide yet, I might just take a blind decision and then suffer the consequences. I'm a Bitwig ignorant-lover and a Live practical-follower, maybe the logical steps are trying Bitwig first, and if it goes wrong end up working with Live. If both go wrong I will want to destroy the world

[pottering]

Plugin delay compensation within containers is a huge plus in my book as well.

Ableton fixed most PDC issues, only issues that remain are Return tracks that route into audio tracks with the respective Send still active (feedback loop danger), and devices that sync to the Main Transport (example: LFOTool). They start together with the Main Transport, which can cause problem when they are placed after plugins that add delay.

But no Racks (container) specific issues anymore.

Worth noting those PDC issues are predictable and explained in Live's manual and FAQs (and solvable by user action), not mysterious random bugs in unexpected places.

[edit: to be clear, they did most of the fixing in version 9.2, previous versions did not get the fixes]