Firstly, I think your summary of history of platforms is excellent. We're a small project
studio, so there is an aspect of platform support that my be important to some.

We transitioned from ADATs to hard disc recording by picking the "best" app we could
at the time. Given the features, audio pipeline and cost, Sonar on a PC gave us the
best bang-for-the-buck. Or so we thought.

While we got business using this configuration and still do today, we were locked out
of a much larger stream of business that only exists if you have Protools on a Mac.
We invested in a PT HD3 Mac system and that system has paid for itself. The initial startup
costs are high .. and the overall cost-of-ownership is higher; but, the amount of business
we can both as a tracking house and a post assembly facility more than offsets that
cost.

I don't mean to suggest that all one has to do is get an HD system and a Mac and business
will magically appear .. the number of panic eBay sales of HD systems shows that this
doesn't happen. But, if the business is there, then you can get a part of it using the standard
platform.

I don't want to impune any artist or band for choosing whatever platform they wish to record their
own material or release their own CDs/DVDs, etc. There are several DAWs (Sonar, Nuendo,
Reaper, Logic, etc. ) that are (in some areas) technically superior to Protools. But, when
you want to swim with the bigger fishes, you will be limited in what you can do by straying
from what the industry rides upon.

I don't want to slam Protools either .. it's a fantastic audio editor and I think the TDM system
sounds fantastic. It's just really freaking expensive.

Who knows? Maybe the collapse of the label structure will give rise to a whole new set of
standards. But today, I am glad I don't have to walk another Protools mixing engineer through
the steps of reading my OMF or AAF or reading in Broadcast wave files, etc. .. it's now

"I put the session on my iDisk ... call me if you have any problems."

J. markham
Sunnyvale, CA

I've got Pro Tools, Nuendo, Reaper, and SONAR in my studio.  I prefer SONAR.  Just works for me.

I supply drum tracks over the Internet to other studios (large and small) in the form of timestamped Broadcast Wav Files, and there is never an issue when dealing with large studios using a Pro Tools TDM system on a MAC.

In fact, I've done MANY projects with the above post (jmarkham) that way with stellar results and no way to tell which tracks were done in PT and which were done in SONAR.

Maybe when I run out of more important things to spend my money on, I'll end up on a PT TDM system on a MAC.  I can see why one would make that choice in order to be perceived as a respected player in the audio industry.

BTW... jmarkham is in fact one of those respected players in the industry. ;)

A lot of people have mentioned Reaper to me, so I checked it out.  It still feels a little "unfinished" but I have to admit it's a really decent tool, ridiculously so, considering it's shareware.  What are your Top 10 likes and dislikes about Reaper, given that you've been using it a while.

Logic 5.5.1 on an XP machine for me.  Until I run into a compelling reason to go on something else, this has served me more than well.

Has anybody tried Cubase 4?  I'm curious what people think of Steinberg since they changed owners a couple of times, and if it's still the workhorse that it used to be. Has anyone had good or bad experiences with Cubase or Nuendo in the last couple of years?

I've been a Cakewalk/Sonar user for a number of years. I like its production capabilities. I started editing on SAW (mid-nineties), and I own SAW Studio. Now that it includes some form of input monitoring, I'm going to try to track with it. I have a documentary film project, and I'm going to mix it in surround w/ SAW. I also have an older version of Nuendo, and I'm trying to decide if I should upgrade to v3.

I'm running Protools LE 7.4 on a Dual Dual-Core 2.66Ghz Mac Pro with 3GB of RAM. My studio isn't large enough right now to support me so I work a day job as a Windows admin for 750+ users and dozens of servers but all of my personal machines are Macs. I've tried to use XP as the base of my Protools rig but had a lot of performance and stability issues. It was a digi-approved computer but the money I saved on it did not out weigh the simplicity and stability I get from my Mac Pro. It's my personal preferance and I've never been happier in the studio since I did it. I look back at the year I spent fighting with the PC and can't believe I didn't do it sooner.

As far as my choice of protools? I'm very happy with the software in all respects excpet for MIDI, it's getting better but it's not great. Fortunatly I don't get much call for a lot of MIDI but when I do it certainly adds to the work load. For me Protools works the way I think. The protools mixer, in my mind, is laid out very closely to a hardware mixer. I like the way it gives me channel strips and I like being able to add 'small' faders to my aux sends. It makes it much faster for me to visualize what is happening.

I also use a fair bit of outboard gear and an 8 track 1/2 tape machine. Other DAWs probably do this now too, I've not been DAW shopping in a while, but being able to use hardware inserts and quickly sync my rig to tape keeps my options open. Once you find a DAW that works you stick with it, I agree with Bill.

I've been enjoying reading about everyone elses setups. It's interesting to see how people look at things. I appreciate the mentality here that you don't have to have the top of the line everything to make good music. You gear is what you make of it and getting the core of your setup just right is much more important that having X piece of gear... at least in my book!

Robert

My first computer recording experiences involved using a really old version of Cakewalk (3 or 5 maybe) running on a 386 (with Windows 3.1!) to drive a drum machine while recording on a 4-track casette deck (and, briefly, a Tascam 388). My earliest experiences DAWing it were with an earlier version of Cakewalk Pro Audio, and I've used Cakewalk 8 and 9, and now I use SONAR 4 (on a 2.8 GHz P4 running XP). I find SONAR very natural and easy to work with (in no small part, I'm sure, because I've been using Cakewalk-style stuff for so long), it's never caused me any problems, and I really have no desire to use anything else.

As far as using your DAW for audio only, that's good advice, but I've succumbed to web surfing, photoshopping, and I've even installed a few games on my machine and I've never had any problems. I'm smart about what I click on and download, and I have a separate drive of which I take good care that I use for ONLY digital audio. I think the key is to be careful and not balk at the prospect of reformating your system drive and reinstalling everything.