Please compare cubase/studio one/live to reaper

Reaper = Editing dream, Multi-channel routing, custom actions blah blah. Seriously, once you use reaper, you wont be able to use anything else. Studio one is really far behind still, forget any audio editing. Cubase lol, wow that thing is like a 500lb boat anchor, total workflow killer. Reaper has custom menus, screensets, custom toolbars, can customize just about anything you need. Really a no-brainer. Download it and get to work.. No sense really in explaining it all.. theres too much to list.. And the "other guys" are trying to play catchup.... ~Rob.

Hey there, and welcome to the DAW word! Reaper will make an excellent DAW for just about all musicians. I'm not too experienced with Cubase, Live or Studio One, but once thing I can say about REAPER is that its workflow is straight forward and doesn't get in the way of recording. I record 80% MIDI and 20% audio and both functions serve me very well. The program is ROCK SOLID, loads fast and is really snappy. Don't be fooled by its small download size of only 5 megs...This DAW really packs a punch. I used DP 5 on a mac before this and now that program (although very functional) seems like a dinosaur. My advice would be to download a copy along with the PDF manual and try it out for 30 days. That should give you enough experimenting time to see if it might work for you. I'm already very happy with the current version and there is V 4 in works..probably to be released fairly soon. I honestly don't have any negatives about this program. I'm not a fan boy, just someone who wants to make music and have a good flexible program that acts as extension of my thought process.

BTW, check out the change log. These guys work hard!

Live is probably one of the easiest "out of the box" has a ton of cool shit midi editing kinda sucks cool timestretcgh algos can be really good for producing loop based electronica personally I think it would be horrid to record bands with live Reaper is probably the most stable and versatile has a ton of cool shit midi editing is more on par with other daws though straightforwards, still probably the toughest to learn (IMO) out of the box, though with the greater rewards cubase, good shit, havent used in years though, wasn;t very stable

I wouldn't even consider using Ableton Live to record anything other than loops and samples :P And i agree that Reaper is pretty tough to learn, mostly because of all the customization. But when you actually read the manual, it's not that hard.

If you are willing to spend a couple of hours a day applying what's presented in the manual, you should be up and running within a week. In a month you should have a basic understanding of using Reaper to record and mix. Get Reamix: it's a great book. If you don't like it after a month, then you'll still have learned something about DAWs which you can apply. If you dreaming about a DAW that you'll be able to turn out mixes in a day, look somewhere else. Reaper is rock-solid and can do just about anything you want to do concerning recording and mixing music, but it will take some effort to master it.

Probably the most efficient use of your time would be check out the various YouTube (or vendor) videos for all the DAWs to get a overall sense of how each handles workflow, then go from there. Sure you could pick one and dive right in, but they're all pretty deep -- especially if you're new to home recording... You could spend a week of intensive use, only to decide the workflow isn't for you. So, my advice -- start with the short videos. Good luck, and try to have fun.

The trouble with "ease of workflow" is that, I think, it's kind of an organically learned thing. The DAW you chose will, to a certain extent, dictate your workflow, and how you work best will develope out of that. Before Reaper I came from Sonar, Live, and Reason, which all have very different work flows. I would say reaper is definitely closer to Sonar (which I would consider "normal" DAW linear audio workflow). Live is loop based and still has it's place when I'm working on electronic music, though contrary to what was previously stated, I have learned to use Live in a traditional linear way after having worked with it for so long. And also, I did not find Live intuitive out of the box because I came from sonar - live confused the hell out of me at first! The same goes for Reaper. I wasted a lot of time early on out of fear from my initial confusion, but once I dug in, read the manual, watched some videos, and learned one very useful command, it's become my full time DAW. That one command is Alt-shift-? (I believe, I do it by habit now, and I think those are the keys I hit) anyway, it brings up the "action list" which is a list of EVERYTHING REAPER CAN DO. Enter a key word or two for what you're looking for, find it and click "run" - use something a lot and you can set up your own midi trigger or hotkey command - you can even chain these actions together and link them all to a single key stroke. It's a lifesaver and has never failed me - so as far as workflow is concerned, I say Reaper has them all beat because now I set things up for how I want to work instead of having to work according to what the DAW dictates. But out of the box it can be a little confusing, just do your homework.

...it's the soup that eats like a meal. Choose the fork or the spoon, in the end, if you dedicate the time needed to learn to use it, you'll eat well.

I've made 622 songs in reaper since this was first posted :D Time to get busy! :D hehe (little devil)