Studio One 3, Ableton 9 or Cubase 9

[Stan Navi]

Good day!
I know there was a gazillion threads. But i need to ask.
I like Ableton 9 in terms of electronic music production. It is what i know well. But sometimes i am requested to record and arrange acoustic guitars, electric guitars and vocals + some electronic stuff.
Ableton is not good for such tasks like recording, comping and editing guitars, vocals.

I heard many good thing about Studio One 3 (except clicks and pops issue) and Cubase 9.

Maybe there is someone who experienced in all this daws and can advice something?

Logic Pro X is not an option (i don't want to be mac "slave").
I tried Studio One 3, but still have no full experience, what it can do, but noticed clicks and pops issue on heavy synth project.
I didn't tried Cubase, but as i heard it is mature DAW.

Ableton 9 - great for creating ideas and arrange them on the fly; not good for recording, editing, mixing (IMHO, maybe someone can tell me i'm mistaken)
Studio One 3 - great workflow, great arranging capabilities, good for recording, mixing; many synths=clicks and pops (don't have experience)
Cubase 9 - i don't know anything

[Andrei Marchenko]

Ableton Live is good and bad as other DAWs. Learn your tools! But if you don't want to use Live buy cheap Reaper for recording and other stuff.

[rod_zero]

I am in the same situation, except I am sticking to Live for my solo work (electronic music), I am just asking: Do I need another host?.

I am recording/producing a rock band and I am wondering if I am missing any features in Live that come handy for audio editing and mixing tasks that I could find in Studio One.

I already downloaded and using the Studio One 3 demo, for a start I loved (my guitarist too) the Amp simulation included with Studio One, much better than Live one. I also like that studio one comes with more metering plugins, the VCA functionality and overall better arrangement but I have not gone to deep still.

What can Studio One make easier and better vs Live for recording and producing a rock band? Should I stick to Live and save money and time learning?

[billcarroll]

Studio One v3 and Cubase 9 are both excellent for comping and working with audio, i. e., recording instruments and bands. In addition Studio One v3 has Melodyne, and Cubase 9 has VariAudio for manipulating vocals and other recordings. Live can't really compete here at all.

Live is a great tool for many things that Cubase and Studio One can't compete with, but it's not really suited for studio recording work. You can make Live work, but it's not the ideal solution in my opinion.

[RichieWitch]

I'm a long-time Live user too and I picked up Studio One after attending a Presonus demo at Sam Ash. I was especially interested in the comping feature and Melodyne. However, when it came to actual recording sessions with live musicians, learning Studio One just to use these two features was more trouble than it was worth.

I ended up installing Melodyne in Live and learned some of the comping work-arounds for Live I found in Jake Perrine's book. I just felt Studio One was getting in the way of getting things done quickly without a major time investment.

So I could learn another DAW or I could make music.

[Winstontaneous]

Live 9 can do all those things natively except for comping, hopefully that's slated for v. 10.
There are workarounds but they're clumsy hacks compared to Logic's comping.
IME Live is one of the best audio recording tools available (aside from its metering), it's so easy to route/record audio in real time.
Despite its limitations I try to use it for as much as possible even though I have Logic & Reaper.

I'd go with Samplitude if looking for a great Windows DAW for editing/mixing/mastering.

[incubus]

If you have not bought them all, sold at least half, and then re bought them than this thread is invalid.

[dzilizzi]

I have all three but only am really using Cubase right now. Trying to learn one at a time takes time.

I think the main plus for both Cubase and Studio One over Live is the ability to comp tracks. Pro Tools actually does it better in my opinion. But I can do it in Cubase as well. Once it is set up, you can actually loop record vocals, for instance, and then select the parts you like and turn them into one take.

In Ableton, this is not an option. However, there are workarounds - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eKEOopUuTnU

Really just a bunch of takes grouped together then copied to a comped track. But it works if everything else works for you. You could do this with all audio recording. I would try this first before trying to learn a new DAW. They all have their pluses and minuses. And I've come to the conclusion that no one will never be happy with any of them.

[spinmeister]

Does Ableton Live support VST3 plugins (yet)?

[aumordia]

Does Ableton Live support VST3 plugins (yet)?

Nope.

[spinmeister]

Does Ableton Live support VST3 plugins (yet)?

Nope.

thanks for confirming @aumordia -- I was afraid of that ...

[thechronix]

I am finally able to run padshop pro(vst3i think) on ableton 9.7 after trying it a year or so back with no luck after I made the switch from cubase.

I got pro tools from my school program but I don't like using it much. If you switch HD protools you have to upgrade all of your plugins ontop of the HD converter which costs $

Cubase is more of a professional recording approach in my mind when comparing to live 9.cubase on my old PC was very unstable at times for 6.5 artist, would crash and not load plugins properly

Use what works best for you, a good soundcard if your recording will make a huge difference. I have a MOTU 828x can stack these together for more ins and outs, get a lunchbox for good quality preamps