Poll: How many DAWs do you use?

[Sailor16]

I mostly use Renoise and Reason in combination (via ReWire). Renoise being the master DAW and Reason the slave. It's the ultimate DAW experience for my particular needs.

If I had to choose only one DAW, it's Renoise without hesitation. What a masterful piece of software, a real diamond.

But I also employ Bitwig, Studio One and Mixbus 32C quite a lot. Studio One being my default goto mixing console and audio file arranger.

For jamming and song writing I mostly use Band in a box, have been using it on and off since the Atari ST days in the early 1990's. I wish there were more softwares like BIAB on the market, that offered the user to just write down some chord sequences, choose a style and hit playback. Even better would be to have the Yamaha-style arranger keyboard features crammed into a solid piece of software, so you could just build a style, hit playback and then control the chord sequence in realtime by striking chords on your midi keyboard.

[jonljacobi]

I've only used one at a time generally, but have drifted between several. Cubase, S1, Bitwig, Live, and Logic. Tried most of the others. Logic at the moment.

[lajosuti]

I use only Reaper. I wrote some songs with Cubase as well, but after Reaper I just see Cubase inferior. I miss only one thing: a proper sheet music view. I know that Reaper people are working on it, and I keep an eye on this development, but it is a long road ahead.

However I use Presonus Notion for composing as well, and if there will be a really strong integration between Notion and S1 then I will consider S1.

[codec_spurt]

We've played this game before. What the hell..

1: EnergyXT - scratch pad. Super fast VST loader, chainer. Don't need anything else to make a full on production. Buggy, especially the later versions. I use 2.6.

2: FLStudio - stopped upgrading when they went vector. 11.whatever. I mess about sometimes with the latest vector version. But 11 is the Gold standard.

3: Ableton - happy with version 9 Standard. Amazing piece of kit. Love 8 too.

4: Reaper - only paid up to v4. I'll upgrade when it hits 6. Irreplaceable tool for so many tasks. The greatest Swiss Army Knife of ALL Daws. Genius.

5: Tracktion/Waveform. Used it years ago. Just bought a new copy. Amazing work flow. Incredible to see it still updated and faster and meaner then ever before. Very fun.

6: Samplitude - got it in the sale. Amazing power. But not totally stable on my system. My system is old though so don't listen to me. I love this software a lot.

7: Reason - got a very old copy. Mostly for legacy stuff. I mean it's very old. Like v4 or something. Still, if I wasn't going half-blind, I'd be able to use it.

8: Sonar/Cakewalk - got the deal. Great software. Just very unpredictable. You can use it for days and it doesn't crash, and then, for no reason at all...

9: Studio One - my main DAW. I love this software. My desert Island host. Insane workflow. Lots of things wrong with it. Many flaws. Still the best.

10: Maschine - does this count as a DAW? It's basic, but pretty powerful all the same. I could make a whole album with this and nothing else.

11: Podium - still fun sometimes. Just got an old copy. Many many faults. Much much fun! Still the best interface of any DAW ever!

12: MuLab/Bidule - looking seriously in to both of these for future endeavours.


Might have forgot a few.

Oh yeah, Cubase. Just got Elements. Been using it for a few decades now. All the way back to Pro-24. Bought it 3 times. 4 times in fact, now. Amazing software.

If I had to make a choice I would just want Studio One, Ableton, FLStudio and Reaper. In that order. I could do anything with that.

Looking forward to buying Plogue Bidule though...

[Bombadil]

1. Logic Pro.

[Topcheese]

Using a single DAW is like using one-ply TP to get the job done.

You'll have to double your efforts, or things could end up getting messy. The comfort of another ply helps ensure you'll be up to the duty at hand.

[jancivil]

[Aloysius]

In reality, about half of one. I don't use all of the functions available in my DAW.

[Bombadil]

Using a single DAW is like using one-ply TP to get the job done.

You'll have to double your efforts, or things could end up getting messy. The comfort of another ply helps ensure you'll be up to the duty at hand.

luxury! why I used to dream of one-ply TP back in the old days when all I had was a Philips cassette recorder!

[Psuper]

I wonder how many of you who use multiple DAWS actually make a lot of music, and/or for a long time.

I have, and there's a nightmare no one seems to be talking about, and if you use multiple DAWs and do lots of music, you'll know exactly what nightmare I speak of...

I had 3 'big' players in my life; Cakewalk/Sonar, Reaper, and Reason.

And instead of going through my history, let me sum it up... When I decided to go all-in Reason as my 'goto' DAW, and stop loading old versions of stuff I didn't use anymore, I had many hundreds of songs to convert from Sonar, many hundred from Reaper, and most of them used Reason rewired with accompanying rns files.

Night f'n Mare. Took me so many weeks of converting, moving raw audio around, exporting mids and audio, finding old VST/samples/packs I never use anymore, multiple clones to restore after some of the old ones busted my system. Nightmare.

Multiple DAWS is fun if you are just putzing around, but if you make a ton of music and have been for a long time and want to keep your original tracks, its a gigantic PITA.

[Yorrrrrr]

Ableton Live 10 Suite + Push 2 is rocking my world right now, but FL Studio has a special place in my heart (I don't use it anymore, just open it from time to time for the feels..BTW, FL Studio 20 is better than ever).

[ATN69]

FL Studio 12, Reason 10, Studio One 3 and Bitwig 1.3

My main DAW is FL Studio still but I also like to work with Studio One 3. I mostly use Reason 10 with Re-wire to get the rack from Reason in FL Studio. Bitwig doesn't get as much love as it deserve. It's a nice DAW in many ways but I never really took to the work flow.

[herodotus]

I have a confession. I use only Tracktion. And it hasn't been updated since I don't know when. 2010, maybe.

My laptop had other things on it, Reason, Audition, and a couple of more obscure apps, but it died recently, and we simply haven't had the cash to buy new things. What money I have spent has been used for a couple of microphones. Plus, I have been building skyline diffusors for my basement studio, to go along with the bass traps and midrange absorbers that I already have. It's a nice easy construction project, and it is kind of fun to see the room evolve.

In any case, I have had a creative resurgence recently, and to my surprise, I havent been frustrated by old system at all. In part it might be because the work I have been doing is mostly traditional audio recording, with little sampling or virtual instruments. But mostly I think it's because even an older system still allows you to get a lot of work done if you have the creative energy to make it happen.

So anyway, one.

[herodotus]

And single ply is all I use. Scott tissue is a superior product.

[ozmuso67]

I wonder how many of you who use multiple DAWS actually make a lot of music, and/or for a long time.

I have, and there's a nightmare no one seems to be talking about, and if you use multiple DAWs and do lots of music, you'll know exactly what nightmare I speak of...

Night f'n Mare. Took me so many weeks of converting, moving raw audio around, exporting mids and audio, finding old VST/samples/packs I never use anymore, multiple clones to restore after some of the old ones busted my system. Nightmare.

Multiple DAWS is fun if you are just putzing around, but if you make a ton of music and have been for a long time and want to keep your original tracks, its a gigantic PITA.

I agree with this. I have songs recorded using Reaper, done many years ago. These days I only use S1. If I want to go back and re-mix songs done in Reaper, sure, I could fire up Reaper and go to work, but it is a major PITA if I wanted to bring all the audio into S1, along with trying to re-create the mix.

I was tempted to try Cubase, but then I realised that if I did some serious recording and mixing in Cubase, then I'd always have to use Cubase for those particular songs. Sure, I could try and bring everything into S1, but it is a hassle and time consuming thing to do this.

That is one reason I am trying just to stay with the 1 DAW. Simplicity.