Recording Programs?

[AmazingGracePlayer]

Can anyone recommend a very good recording program? (Preferably one that's better than Audacity)

Money is not an issue as long as it's not too expensive (oxymoron).

[WayneS]

I recommend Cubase. Great software!

[bluestarbass]

Reaper is supposed to be very good and its free. They ask for a donation if you start using it alot but even the reccomended donation is less than most of the stuff out there. If you go to gearslutz.com theres a forum dedicated to asking the designer questions. Ive never used it but would consider it if I moved from pro tools for some odd reason.

I kinda find that all recording programs do basically the same thing, it just depends what your comfortable with and which one allows you work easiest.

It also depends on what OS your using. If I was on a Mac itd be either pro tools or logic

If I were on a PC itd be either pro tools, reaper, or sonar

I used cubase for a while and really hated it, but thats one mans opinion, plenty of people use it and love it and make wonderful music with it.

[Jeff Martinez]

I've been using Adobe Audition for years (and Cool Edit Pro before that). I have no desire to switch to anything else.

[James Hart]

I've always used the Cakewalk products.... Sonar 4 is my current.

The "Home Studio" versions are pretty cheap

[satchmo]

I second Cubase -- has a bit of a learning curve, but is very functional.

Reaper is making giant strides, so it is worth checking out.

[Jeff Martinez]

Originally Posted by James Hart

I've always used the Cakewalk products.... Sonar 4 is my current.

The "Home Studio" versions are pretty cheap

I use Sonar 4 for midi-tracking keyboards. It's awesome for that.

[EricF]

There are a lot of "good" recording/sequencing programs on the market ranging from free to fat-stacks-o-cash. As long as it has the features you need in a format that is easy for you to use, it's hard to make a bad decision.

That said, I started with Cubase LE that came free with the Lexicon USB interface I have. I like the program enough that I bought the upgrade to Cubase Studio 4.

[Vandelay]

+1 for Reaper, it's definitely worth at least trying.

It's tiny (just a 2MB download and takes up less than 9MB on your hard drive) and it's cheap (it's uncrippled shareware so you can use as long as you want for free, but they ask that you pay $40 after 30 days). But it has lots of advanced multitrack and MIDI sequencing features.
http://reaper.fm/

To the OP: what don't you like about Audacity?

[Jim Roseberry]

Originally Posted by AmazingGracePlayer

Can anyone recommend a very good recording program? (Preferably one that's better than Audacity)

Money is not an issue as long as it's not too expensive (oxymoron).

If your MIDI needs are fairly modest, Reaper is an excellent choice. At $40 for a non-comercial license, it's an amazing tool and hard to beat. Commercial license is $200.

Otherwise, I'd recommend Sonar 6 (7 isn't too far off).
Great company/folks...
Sonar is rapidly becoming the most advanced audio sequencer with features like Audio Snap.

If your needs were very intricate audio editing, Samplitude 9 (10 isn't too far off) would be an excellent choice. The Pro version isn't cheap... but it's realtime object based editing makes complex tasks quick/easy. It also has batch processing.
As a side note, I wrote the English user manual for Samp v5.x.


Jim Roseberry
www.studiocat.com
jim@studiocat.com

[irjason]

I really like Tracktion. Unlike most recording software it is not set up to look and act like a mixer. So I find it much easier to use. I have version 2, but the new version looks like it has the same interface.

[mrufino1]

Reaper is excellent. Still some areas in it that need development but it works great and Justin is responsive to requests. I have recorded 2 albums and a handful of singles for people using reaper since I switched to it full time 3 months ago.

[fokof]

Digital Performer 5.12 is the best all around software I've tried so far.

[lemur821]

Originally Posted by fokof

Digital Performer 5.12 is the best all around software I've tried so far.

Unfortunately, I suspect whoever designed the interface is brain-damaged.

[Munjibunga]

Originally Posted by satchmo

I second Cubase -- has a bit of a learning curve, but is very functional.

Reaper is making giant strides, so it is worth checking out.

Yeah, Cubase, or even Cubase SE. They're fairly intuitive. I think they're easier than ProTools.

[vicenzajay]

Originally Posted by mrufino1

Reaper is excellent. Still some areas in it that need development but it works great and Justin is responsive to requests. I have recorded 2 albums and a handful of singles for people using reaper since I switched to it full time 3 months ago.

Completely agree - after using Cubase and Sonar, I'm strictly working with Reaper these days.

Jay

[jrduer]

Originally Posted by Jeff Martinez

I've been using Adobe Audition for years (and Cool Edit Pro before that). I have no desire to switch to anything else.

+1. I've been using Audition, as well, and it's had everything I need.

~John

[lm183902]

You can't go wrong with Pro Tools. I know a lot of people seem to have a beef with it for some reason, but it really is the industry standard. Depending on your needs, price is obviously going to fluctuate. If you're just going to be recording yourself, and maybe overdubbing guitar/ vocals, you can get an mbox mini with Pro Tools LE software for 300 bucks. If you're going to record a whole band (each instrument on it's owm track), you would have to spend around 1500 bucks. Like I said, Pro Tools is the industry standard and all files are compatible with other PT Systems, so you could record your tracks at home and take them to virtually any professional studio and they could open your session files to tweak or add other instruments. A lot of musicians nowadays are recordings basic guitar and bass tracks on Pro Tools at home and taking the files to studio to have drums done.

With that said, there are tons of other options out there. Cubase is definitely another great program, as is Apple's Logic. It all comes down to how serious you are and what you are willing to spend.

[pogipoints]

I've just started using Reaper a few weeks ago, and it's running like a champ on XP Home on my old AMD Turion laptop... and works decently in Vista with my Konnekt 24D interface...

[T-zone]

Kristal. http://www.kreatives.org/kristal/
Nobody has heard of this, but I think it's some of the best free software out there.

Also, Google for AudioMulch; it costs something like $50, but it's DEFINITELY worth it.