SOUND ON SOUND

[The Elf]

With CW (and Reaper) on Windows, nowadays it makes no sense to get something else if you aren’t bound by your existing experience and knowledge in a specific DAW.

Hmmm... I can't agree with this. It may not seem to make sense based on cost alone, but there are reasons to choose other DAWs beyond familiarity. Nothing comes close to Cubase's Control Room, for instance - just one example.

[blinddrew]

Out of curiosity, what does Control Room give you that makes it so useful?

[Fishnish]

Out of curiosity, what does Control Room give you that makes it so useful?

To name a few things in no particular order - Artist cue mixes, instant level matched swapping between different monitors and monitor configs with stereo/mono/ surround downmix presets, click track management, talkback, listen function, reference levels and audition level setting independent of master fader, dimming, dedicated headphone busses and direct external audio busses for reference tracks etc, instant source swapping on cue mixes between cues, master bus, externals etc.

I guess you could set up many of these things without the CR, but it's so very slick and easy to use, I'd be lost without it.

People often seem to think that it would only be of use in setups with actual physically seperate live and control rooms, but I have a single space setup and even when there's just me in it, I'm still using the CR functions all the time.

The Control Room is a Cubase highlight for me. It's never turned off and if it was hardware it would be the most distressed looking part of the desk, the bit where all the numbers are worn off.

[CS70]

To name a few things in no particular order - Artist cue mixes, instant level matched swapping between different monitors and monitor configs with stereo/mono/ surround downmix presets, click track management, talkback, listen function, reference levels and audition level setting independent of master fader, dimming, dedicated headphone busses and direct external audio busses for reference tracks etc, instant source swapping on cue mixes between cues, master bus, externals etc.

I guess you could set up many of these things without the CR, but it's so very slick and easy to use, I'd be lost without it.

Well, this is the point.

Short of the surround stuff (which I have not worked with), there's nothing there that I can't in 30 secs in CW. If I were to use the Control Room it would take me half an hour.

Tools are tools and either they are good or they aren't. The rest is religion, and I am not a believer :lol:

[CS70]

With CW (and Reaper) on Windows, nowadays it makes no sense to get something else if you aren’t bound by your existing experience and knowledge in a specific DAW.

Hmmm... I can't agree with this. It may not seem to make sense based on cost alone, but there are reasons to choose other DAWs beyond familiarity. Nothing comes close to Cubase's Control Room, for instance - just one example.

See above. Without details, that's just marketing talk :D

I'd be happy to bet my car vs a dollar that for 90% of the stuff one can do in Cubase, there's an as efficient method in either CW or Reaper... and the remaining 10% goes both ways.

[Rich Hanson]

You're overlooking personal workflow preference - one size does _not_ fit all.

I have Studio One and Reaper. I much prefer working in Studio One. I have a lot of love for Reaper but Studio One just fits me better.

[The Elf]

I see no need to defend a DAW that's free or low-cost - that is part of its appeal. Nothing wrong with that. But to push that into making no sense to pay more? I can't go with that.

Just because you can use nails and hammer to make it do something another DAW can do doesn't make it more appealing per se. I'm sure we could go through every minute detail of every DAW and find a way to do the same in every other.

Every DAW has its specialities, strengths and weaknesses. Personally I'm quite prepared to pay a premium for some of those 'ready to go' features (and it goes way beyond just Control Room, which was just one example), in exactly the same way that I will happily pay a premium for RME's TotalMix, for example. Could I find other ways to do the same job? Sure. Do I want to? Not at all. :lol:

[CS70]

I see no need to defend a DAW that's free or low-cost - that is part of its appeal. Nothing wrong with that. But to push that into making no sense to pay more? I can't go with that.

Just because you can use nails and hammer to make it do something another DAW can do doesn't make it more appealing per se. I'm sure we could go through every minute detail of every DAW and find a way to do the same in every other.

Every DAW has its specialities, strengths and weaknesses. Personally I'm quite prepared to pay a premium for some of those 'ready to go' features (and it goes way beyond just Control Room, which was just one example), in exactly the same way that I will happily pay a premium for RME's TotalMix, for example. Could I find other ways to do the same job? Sure. Do I want to? Not at all. :lol:

Well, sure, what makes sense to people is obviously different, which is why we don't have only one brand of anything. My "not make sense" was in the context of the OP, when you start from scratch.

Speed and efficiency is the result of potential capabilities and familiarity.

I use TotalMix myself a lot, but the first period when I didn't know how to use it, it was anything but efficient - indeed, it was cause of much swearing. However, half of the US studios use RME with ProTools rigs without even starting TotalMix again after the first setup, and it's not that they are slow amateurs for that. They can do their thing day in day out as efficiently as you and I do.

Therefore it's not just TotalMix: it is its potential capabilities and the familiarity that you and have acquired.

It doesn't seem very controversial to me?

So to the OP question: everything else being equal in terms of potential capabilities and efficiency, and familiarity being zero, non-functional factors are the only ones which remain: cost, for example, or how the names sounds to you, if you get on with the GUI immediately or not, on what your friends have or the color palette of the website that sells it.

The OP mentioned cost, so it seemed appropriate to indicate that there no-cost (or much lower cost) options with which he can achieve what he want. Hence "it makes no sense" to do anything else.. unless there's pressing reasons for choosing Logic or Cubase who he did not mention.

Unless you mean that the potential capabilities are different, and then I beg to differ - and so far I haven't seen one concrete example of that.. :D

[blinddrew]

Out of curiosity, what does Control Room give you that makes it so useful?

To name a few things in no particular order - Artist cue mixes, instant level matched swapping between different monitors and monitor configs with stereo/mono/ surround downmix presets, click track management, talkback, listen function, reference levels and audition level setting independent of master fader, dimming, dedicated headphone busses and direct external audio busses for reference tracks etc, instant source swapping on cue mixes between cues, master bus, externals etc.

I guess you could set up many of these things without the CR, but it's so very slick and easy to use, I'd be lost without it.

People often seem to think that it would only be of use in setups with actual physically seperate live and control rooms, but I have a single space setup and even when there's just me in it, I'm still using the CR functions all the time.

The Control Room is a Cubase highlight for me. It's never turned off and if it was hardware it would be the most distressed looking part of the desk, the bit where all the numbers are worn off.

Thanks FishNish. Yep, I think I could probably set all that stuff up in Reaper if I wanted to but having it automatically to hand and integrated into your workflow would be a tough thing to lose! :)

As always with these things, we come back to horses for courses. :thumbup:

[The Elf]

:thumbup: