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OK, are you absolutely sure about that? Not trying to pick a fight but:
"Audacity is an easy-to-use, multi-track audio editor and recorder for Windows, macOS, GNU/Linux and other operating systems.
Developed by a group of volunteers as open source."
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Also, I have used it as a recorder more than a few times.
Not the original poster, but Audacity is not a Digital Audio Workstation (DAW).
An extremely capable audio editor? Absolutely!
Very much able to record stuff easily to multiple tracks? You bet!
It's what I have the members of my praise band use to record their tracks each week (which I then import and mix/edit in Reaper). I've edited many podcasts using it.
Would I ever mix and edit a 30-track song using Audacity? Only if it was the absolute last and only thing available to me. It's just not really built for that.
To be clear, I'm not disparaging Audacity at all. I love it and have used it for many years. It's a really good swiss army knife audio editor. It's just not a DAW.
That's… going to be a problem. If you found Live Lite confusing, your prospects aren't going to get much better.
Every DAW has a learning curve, so moving to another one just to escape a learning curve is not likely to work.
Even something like GarageBand, which is basically designed to be a "DAW for Dummies," has certain conventions that are in all DAWs that you just have to learn.
Ahh, syntax. I tend to consider everything that records to a computer a DAW but, my first DAW was an early version of samplitude studio back in 1999 and audacity has a lot of the same features and feel. I suppose you are right, by today's standards it's not a DAW but I have also recorded and mixed 12+ track projects in it a few times. It can be limiting but the lack options makes for better mixes with less clutter(for me). That's my experience but as always YMMV.
devnulljp
Supporting Member
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I'll never need 30 tracks, and am already comfortable with Audacity.
I (and others) could use a very basic lesson on "What Reaper Can Do For You That Audacity Can't".
Dom,
What's your computer? It's unusual for Ableton Live to crash. I used it for many years and I can't remember a single crash.
Only if you like your files in the cloud and only a couple of projects can be saved at a time, so if you do a lot of recording, you can't keep all your old projects around.
It's a teaser to get you to buy into Pro Tools.
Without low latency drivers, overdubbing is a nightmare. As a basic recorder, it's great. As an audio editor, it's great.
What's your computer? It's unusual for Ableton Live to crash. I used it for many years and I can't remember a single crash.
Only if you like your files in the cloud and only a couple of projects can be saved at a time, so if you do a lot of recording, you can't keep all your old projects around.
It's a teaser to get you to buy into Pro Tools.
Without low latency drivers, overdubbing is a nightmare. As a basic recorder, it's great. As an audio editor, it's great.
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i found the learning curve for reaper to be too much for me back in the day - ijust wanted to record with minor mixing, not spend two days immersed in a manual learning, so i ended up using audacity and a multi track recorder instead at the time. i'm now looking into DAWs myself, low priced ones, and have been reading up on recroding boards about the pluses and minuses of each.
one thing, though - even the easiest to use i'm considering are not easy to use. reaper has a HUGE manual in PDF form, as do most of the rest. there are youtube how-to videos for pretty much all the ways.
also some are much less system intensive so will work better on a 7 year old computer, and some at the cheaper and free levels can only work on a limited number of tracks at a time.
i think studioone is up to version 9 now; it's one of the ones on my list to consider.
i've used audacity to record a lot back in the say. i still needed some help., but the help was easy to understand, so i'd say it's fairly easy to use.
one thing, though - even the easiest to use i'm considering are not easy to use. reaper has a HUGE manual in PDF form, as do most of the rest. there are youtube how-to videos for pretty much all the ways.
also some are much less system intensive so will work better on a 7 year old computer, and some at the cheaper and free levels can only work on a limited number of tracks at a time.
i think studioone is up to version 9 now; it's one of the ones on my list to consider.
i've used audacity to record a lot back in the say. i still needed some help., but the help was easy to understand, so i'd say it's fairly easy to use.
I've used Audacity and Tracktion and recently got Ableton live lite with my new Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 interface. All of them will take time to learn. I used Audacity before I got the other two and seem to go back to it a fair amount. Might be because it's just more familiar to me.Hi everyone! any suggestions on the above!?
Please, it has to be FREE or very cheapand for dummies!
I tried Ableton live lite but I didn't quite get it, I am afraid! Also it keeps crushing almost everytime I am there using it..! Anyway.. I want to try something else and possibly easier to use
Thanks a lot
Not really. DAW stands for Digital Audio Workstation, and it has certain expectations that go along with that definition. Before DAWs we had midi sequencers in software form.
Original midi only sequencers included Cakewalk, Opcode Vision, Cubase, Performer, Digidesign (formed by former EMU engineering staff) invented Drumulator, and others - all excellent products used in major studios.
Then some added audio recording/playback/editing... it was problematic for them all at first, but they all eventually got it figured out. Performer became Digital Performer, Cubase renamed to Cubase Audio, Opcode disappeared. Digidesign then added Sound Designer, then Sound Tools (stereo audio recorder/editor), then Pro Tools (4 tracks of audio at first, then full 16 track audio and midi editing, then with custom top-tier hardware products making it an industry leader/standard pretty fast).
And so on.
Those products all evolved into having certain basic requirements: powerful splice-style editing tools for both audio and midi, with midi and audio tracks synchronized together seamlessly, and with similar features for both audio and midi. REAL TIME AUDIO MIXING that feels like working with multitrack tape. MIDI tracks. SMTPE timecode sync (once an important standard, and still important for matching time between two hardware devices).
While Audacity is great - it is not a DAW.
It is a multitrack digital audio editor. A great one, at that.
It's mostly used for post processing since, for the most part, it performs destructive edits and non-realtime processing of audio. There is some stuff that is real-time with it now, but that is only because plugin technology has allowed it to take advantage of daw plugin technology in a very rudimentary way.
One thing to tuck into the back of your mind: If you do get into recording you’ll also find you may wind up using multiple DAWs depending on what you’re doing. Each has its own features, and most have a preferred workflow. But all are quite capable of getting the job done.
Over the years I’ve used a 2 and 4-track reel to reel tape recorders with sound-on-sound capabilities, various cassette tape “mini-studios,” Cubase, Logic, GarageBand, FruityLoops, ProTools, and a bunch of others for various recording projects.
These days I use Reaper when I want to get tracks down quickly and start working with them. But my current main DAW (not free) is Mixbus 32c from Harrison Consoles. Does that mean I think Mixbus is a better DAW? That’s like asking if a PB is a “better” bass than a JB. Because the answer is: it all depends on what you’re doing. Likewise in my case. I just prefer Mixbus for some things and Reaper for others.
So the key thing is to pick something and get started. You can always switch to something else later on as your needs and skills change. The skills you pick up with one are almost always transferable.
Over the years I’ve used a 2 and 4-track reel to reel tape recorders with sound-on-sound capabilities, various cassette tape “mini-studios,” Cubase, Logic, GarageBand, FruityLoops, ProTools, and a bunch of others for various recording projects.
These days I use Reaper when I want to get tracks down quickly and start working with them. But my current main DAW (not free) is Mixbus 32c from Harrison Consoles. Does that mean I think Mixbus is a better DAW? That’s like asking if a PB is a “better” bass than a JB. Because the answer is: it all depends on what you’re doing. Likewise in my case. I just prefer Mixbus for some things and Reaper for others.
So the key thing is to pick something and get started. You can always switch to something else later on as your needs and skills change. The skills you pick up with one are almost always transferable.
I've been using Sonar since 3, used 8 as long as I could before I needed to upgrade. At that time the cost of upgrading had me using Reaper, which is a fine product. Gibson killing Sonar was a great development in retrospect, BandLab picked it up and made it free. I'm using Cakewalk by Bandlab now and very happy with it. Respect for Reaper though, works well and it will run on a potato. Whichever you choose, it's probably better to take your time and learn a fully featured "grown-up" DAW than a simple product that will soon frustrate you with its limitations.
I've used Cubase (on Windows) the most, followed by ProTools (on a Mac), which I currently have in my new studio. In parallel, at home, I've been demoing with a Zoom R24 recorder because I got sick of struggling with Ardour in my i7/8GB RAM home PC (on Ubuntu, used for anything, not only audio). Some months ago I started using Reaper and it blows anything I've used out of the water. PERFORMANCE IS JUST SUPERIOR, MOST STABLE AND FAST DAW I'VE WORKED WITH. Also highly customizable. Still I prefer doing takes home on the R24 then importing it all to Reaper. Anyway. I'm really envisioning the future of my studio being Reaper ontop of Linux, will happen sooner or later (also moving away from the digi stuff and into the many other interface options that are both cheaper and pretty much plug&play with the ALSA audio architecture). I can't afford using crap that's both expensive and gets in the way of WORK with crashes, lags, etc.
The only time I've had Ableton crash, it had to do with certain vst plug-ins. Ableton is a really nice program if you can get that sorted.
