PC: Garageband = Rocknroll John Hodgeman?

December 4, 2010 1:48 PM

Anyone tryout Acoustic? (billed as garageband for the pc)

I'm becoming more casual with my home-recording, so I'd really love a single program that got the job done simply. But i'm'a PC. Anyone try this?
posted by es_de_bah (9 comments total)

shit! link
posted by es_de_bah at 1:49 PM on December 4, 2010


On first glance, looks very similar to REAPER, which I'd probably use if I used a PC.
posted by tmcw at 6:02 PM on December 4, 2010


Reaper on Mac is very good. Much better than Garageband IMO. So I second that recommendation.
posted by unSane at 8:26 PM on December 4, 2010


thanks, I'll check out Reaper.
posted by es_de_bah at 4:55 AM on December 5, 2010


I have a friend who uses REAPER on windows and he loves it. Can't speak for Acoustica, never heard of it until now.



(sort of) Related:

Longtime Logic user here, but I'd like to get out of that upgrade path if I can. REAPER for Mac looks intriguing. Do you think it compares favorably to Logic? (bearing in mind that the only things I still use in Logic are their graphic EQ and Space Designer. I've been buying 3rd party instruments and samples for years and I don't really use the Logic ones anymore).

posted by jnrussell at 9:47 AM on December 9, 2010


I don't have quite enough experience with Reaper to recommend that yet, jnrussell. I get frustrated with Logic too but the thing I worry about most with Reaper is 64-bit compatibility. Right now I need to run Logic in 64-bit to take advantage of the memory addressing (I am using a couple of really huge sample libraries which bring the 32-bit version to its knees). However to run 32-bit AudioUnits it has to launch a 32-bit Audio Unit Bridge. Apple is very good about working in compatibility layers like this but I don't know if/how you'd manage the same thing in Reaper. If you can deal with the 2Gb memory restriction, or only ever use 64-bit plugins, you'd probably be OK.

The best thing is to work your way through a project on it I guess.

I like the compactness of the main arrange window but I find the mixer a bit less visually obvious, in terms of getting immediate access to plugins etc.

DAWs are one of those things where you have a lot of sunk cost in terms of your time... I've been using Logic for about eight years and I still feel like a beginner sometimes.
posted by unSane at 10:44 AM on December 9, 2010 [1 favorite]


I definitely use the 32-bit bridge in Logic. Forgot about that. Interestingly, I did a search on REAPER's forums and people are talking about a bit-bridge that works pretty well, but it isn't mentioned in the technical spec page...
posted by jnrussell at 11:03 AM on December 9, 2010


I just don't have time to climb the learning curve on Reaper at this point... one of the nice things about Logic is that it (mostly) Just Works these days and although Reaper is a very pro-feeling app it isn't really mac-like enough for me to feel entirely confident it isn't going to break in some annoying way. The long thread in the forums about plug-in incompatibility in OS X really makes me think twice about investing time learning it when I could be making music.

The Logic upgrades have not been too painful to me thus far although it still has a lot of cruft left over from the eMagic days which has not been touched -- the environment, for example, and the total lack of a decent step sequencer without having to fuck around with hyperdraw or some such bollocks.
posted by unSane at 3:24 PM on December 9, 2010


I use Reaper on Windows, and I've loved it so far (mainly for the price point and because it runs smoothly on my beat-up 6-year-old laptop, but it's also really easy to use for simple stuff). I haven't tried to do anything particularly complex in it yet, but given that the previous bit of software I'd used for multitracking was Audacity, that's not saying much...
posted by ZsigE at 4:50 PM on December 13, 2010


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