The Best DAW Software

So, what is your DAW of choice and why do you choose it over other software?

What is the feature you love most about it?

Digital Performer.

I chose it because it was not dependent on proprietary hardware, it had a workflow I could understand, the ergonomics suited me, and--this is half-embarrassing, half-legitimate--I figured if Stewart Copeland was working successfully and happily with it for his film scores and other myriad projects, then I could, too.

i too use DP. i use version 5 and dont plan to upgrade for a long time. i have several versions of poortools le that i have banned from any machine in my home.

but the best daw? why DJ DAW of course!

It's a toss up between Digital Performer and Sonar for me. I guess in a general sense I'll say Sonar for home recording and Digital Performer for live gigs.

I'm still using Acid 4.0 as my primary DAW, due to workflow. It's just me doing solo stuff for the last few minutes and it's does the job well. I like the ease of use and I'm real comfortable with the paradigm. When I get around to updating (which will be done when I update the machine), I'll upgrade to the latest version of Acid and Sound Forge.

SONAR 8 Producer 64 bit

Running on Vista Ultimate 64 bit.

It Rocks!

I`m a DP user. At this point, I`m not sure if one DAW is better than another because they all seem so powerful but at this point I know how to use DP and theres no need to change. If I did, I would go with Logic because I`m a MAC guy so...

well, they are all better than ptle due to plugin delay compensation. a daw without that is like a car without a shifter.

Nuendo - I grew up on cubase and atari 1040.

Logic Studio, for three reasons:

1.) Sculpture- This physical modeling synth is pretty much unique and I can't find an equivalent elsewhere

2.) Space Designer

3.) Delay Designer

If MainStage had a way to internally record output to a stereo AIFF file, I would probably use these three plugins in MainStage instead of using Logic Pro 8.

Atari 2600 for me.

i had an atari 400. it had 16K of ram, which was a lot.

and a tape drive, i could load an app in 12 minutes, so just a little faster than my win XP box

and a tape drive, i could load an app in 12 minutes, so just a little faster than my win XP box

Ain't that the truth.

I recently switched to REAPER from Cubase LE because of stability issues (my computer only has a 1 Ghz CPU and Cubase crashed frequently).

I also really like REAPER's routing flexibility and built in EQ and reverb plugs.

It also doesn't hurt that the non-commercial license is only $50.

I'm currently using Sonar 6 PE (soon to upgrade to v8). I started with Cakewalk Pro Audio cause it was bundled with the Studio Mix interface. My favorite feature... hmm... the Sonitus plugins that are bundled.

I was using Personnel Composer to create and run sequences on stage pushing 2 TX7's and a Yamaha drum machine by way of a Roland MIDI interface card. When DOS 3.1 came out I thought I was in Heaven because sequencing was getting easier. A band member owned the equipment and the program. I did the sequencing.

When I left the band and finally could afford my own computer, I went to my favorite music dealer and he recommended a new program called Cakewalk. I still have Cakewalk vs. 1 on 3 1/2" floppy. It was so much easier to use than Jim Miller's Personnel Composer. Over time my system evolved. With Cakewalk, MIDI Yoke, Techno Toys, Seer System Reality, and a new Roland JV80 I was bridging the gap between software and hardware.

Since that time there has been 18 versions of Cakewalk/Sonar. I've played with Reason, Live, Acid, Logic, Orion, and lots of other DAW's but always return to Cakewalk to supply my main DAW. To think that 20-25 years ago I was sequencing without a mouse, using macros and arrow keys to input input every note, velocity, length and tie.

Currently, Sonar 8 Producer on a XP Quad machine with loads of VSTi's, UAD-2 quad, stack of keyboards and a half dozen table top synths. MacBookPro with Live. Vista laptop with Acid Pro 7 and Reason. MOTU audio and MIDI interfaces.

Switched from Sonar to Reaper. Have also worked with DP, PT, Cool Edit Pro and Voyetra Digital Orchestrator Pro! Might have stayed with it, in fact, if they had added DX support.

Not sure I can articulate why, but Reaper is my favorite and the best performer on my particular DAW.

I used to use SAW+ on a PC a long time ago.

I now use Pro Tools LE 7.4. A while back, a recording engineer friend of mine said that if I liked SAW+, I would migrate to PT LE with no problem. I checked it out at NAMM, and it seemed logically laid out, and when I poked around on it, I could figure things out easily, so I purchased it and was happy with it. I like the editing and ease of recording. I was considering another DAW when I upgraded from PT LE 5.1 to my current system because of the lack of latency compensation. However, when I found out about MellowMuse ATA and how well it worked, I decided to stick with PT.

Cubase SX3 and 4. Delay compensation, works well with my UAD and my Powercore card. I still have PTle, but I use is less and less these days. All of the above mentioned DAW's work well on the right machine at this time. Find one that works for you and have at it.

Or as one of our dominant posters used to say:

"Choose your weapon and go to war."

Good luck...

Folks never apparently get tired of asking or answering this one... I guess. Damn, I've only seen it every three days here or GS or elsewhere for the last decade.

Sonar. It was the first practical host-based solution for me back in '97. Workflow.

Sorry, man. It's the best I could think of at 2 in the morning. I guess this means you're going back to Gearslutz?

I've used Logic 5 on PC (currently) and 6 on Mac. Took a bit to get the hang of it. I like it, but for PC it's a bit of a wreck, only recognising 1 GB of RAM and complaining sometimes about sample or midi something or other.

I've got Ableton Live Lite 7 with my Emu keyboard which is quite snappy and quick to get ideas going, but the other day it was freezing a lot - which doesn't usually happen. It's very limited, but the full version may be enticing down the road.

I just need to get Cubase and Sonar LE versions with some hardware soon.

Me too.

Me too. Well, I work with Pro Tools when working in commercial studios, and I've tried most of the rest of the popular DAW's too, and really all of them will do what I want to do (although I don't like the lack of ADC in PTLE, or the limited hardware options, or the fact that you have to buy a separate VST wrapper just to use standard plugins... so I wouldn't go with that). Otherwise, my audio needs are not really all that complicated so any of them will work fine.

However, Reaper does everything I need, with any hardware, is not a resource hog, great support, and you can't beat the price. So I'd be silly to use anything else.