PG Music Home Forums PG Music Product Forums Band-in-a-Box for Windows Which Digital Audio Workstation is the best for BIAB ?

I'm a new user to DAW and looking for the best DAW for BIAB.
Can you share your opinion ?
Thanks
Vincente

Hi, the simple answer: there is no "BEST".
Its depends what you are used to (i'm a Cubase User since Atari Time, so for me it is Cubase). It also depends on the money you want to spend and the time. If you have not enough time then there is no sense in a high end tool. Maybe you start with real band and after a while you will see what your needs are. Then ask again and maybe there are some specific useful hints.

Many users here use Reaper. It has an excellent support base, and is a very powerful DAW, with what I understand is an attractive price tag. It's probably worth considering. Some Reaper users will chip in, I'm sure.

I think you can use any. The key is putting in the time to learn it.

Most people will recommend the one they know best because if you learn one there is rarely a good reason to use another. An exception would be for pros involved in studio work. I’m familiar with a few because of that. I have strong reactions, positive and negative, to each new DAW I see because some fit my idea of how they should work, and others really do not, making work more difficult. Luckily you can try demos of many to get a feel for how it ‘seems’ to you.

Simple question deserves a simple answer.

Reaper.

+1Reaper

What the best DAW is, is not a simple question at all.

The question here was, what is the best DAW for use with BIAB. I still like the first answer, “it depends”. And learning RealBand first would be very helpful.

However, even though I found Reaper to be among the more difficult to work with, I would support Reaper as the better answer for the first standalone DAW simply because we know there is an active user base here on this forum. One user even made a recent video describing the workflow between the two programs. So the guidance will be there.

I also like Reaper for their ongoing changes and communication with users. And the price is right.

If you're new to DAWs then you might want to begin by reading +++ the Wikipedia DAW article HERE +++ . The article explains what features are common and how hardware or software DAWs differ from each other. The article has many links for all of the most common free and for pay DAWs for Windows, Apple and Linux computers.

If you have the Windows version of Band-in-a-Box then you already have RealBand which is a PG Music DAW included with the purchase. RealBand is useful because RealBand can import Band-in-a-Box MGU and SGU files and it adds some much requested additional capabilities not available in Band-in-a-Box.

Some people don't use a DAW because Band-in-a-Box is all they need. When extra help is needed, they can use a free audio editor like +++ Audacity +++.

One problem with an audio editor is it can not work with midi. DAWs can manipulate both audio and midi data. One full featured DAW available for the cost of your email address is +++ Cakewalk by Bandlab (CbB) +++ This software is built on Sonar which is a DAW with a thirty year history. BandLab itself is an interesting music collaboration platform and social network.

All of the modern DAWs have similar feature sets and will work equally well with BIAB.

So it comes down to price (if that is important to you), and workflow; how intuitive is it to work with.

The good thing is that most DAWs available, if not all, have fully functional demos, so download a few of the demos and spend a few hours learning how they operate.

I did just that a few years ago and settled on Reaper, for me it just “made sense” as far as workflow went. You may like a different one better, so it makes sense to invest a week or two and take them out for a test drive.

I like Matt's answer best. The best one to use with BIAB is RealBand. That's the simple answer to the question asked.

Real Band amplifies and extends the power of BIAB as well as functions as a DAW for the major purposes of a DAW. It IS a DAW. And if you have it already, then it's free.

Besides that, there is a formal subforum in this forum for questions and comments about RB.

IF I can get my midi issues sorted out, Reaper will get my 60 dollars. But the learning curve is rather steep for me (and I have at least some acquaintance with DAWs). If you are new, and just getting into BIAB and DAWs, then RB is your obvious choice. I am guessing you've got quite enough on your plate just getting the hang of these great tools. I wouldn't jump to another DAW right off the bat when what you have may have more capabilities than you can currently use. I don't know.

Use the DAW you have. You won't need another one until you do. If you do now, then do what others have said and test-drive a few within your budget. I hope Reaper works out for me, because I've already spent more than I intended to. Another 60 dollars won't kill me, but my wife might hire someone to do it.

Hi Vincente,

As a number of people have indicated, my view is that there is no 'best DAW'. From what I understand, most DAWs are very capable and very powerful these days. When I listen to the songs on Users Showcase here in the PG Music forums, it's easy to hear that the many DAWs used all turn out great results.

Whatever DAW one decides to settle on, the key is to thoroughly learn those bits of the software that you need for what you want to create.


I'm a Reaper user. Below are the reasons I like Reaper...

1. Audio and MIDI tracks can be dragged from BIAB to Reaper.

2. It's easy to set up plugins and softsynths in Reaper.

3. Time-stretching is a valuable tool for me and Reaper has time-stretch markers that make stretching/shrinking audio very easy.

4. Full audio clips can also be time-stretched easily.

5. Automaton control in Reaper is vast and every control on whatever effect is used on a Reaper track can be easily automated. The main envelopes I use are (a) volume, (b) pre-FX volume, (c) reverb, (d) mute.

6. Reaper offers a number of envelope-related shapes that are great for (a) assisting with de-essing (or taming harsh sounds in general -- like J, G, K, etc.), (b) compiling snippets of audio into a single track, (c) fading in and out in general.

7. I've recently discovered spectral editing (from a user on these forums) and this is a very powerful, frequency-based editing tool.

8. 'Snap to grid' is something that I use a great deal and access to its settings and on/off switch is fast and easy in Reaper.

9. The tutorial library created by Reaper master Kenny Gioia is very, very extensive. Kenny's videos are also easy to follow and very instructive. In addition, there are many Youtube videos created by many different users on how to do things.

If you want to checkout Kenny's video collection, have a look at....

www.kennymania.com/reaper-videos/


Realband (available with the Windows version of BIAB) is also an important song-creating tool for me. While I assemble my final product in Reaper, the fact that Realband offers all the functionality of BIAB but in a DAW-like environment is useful. If I used the Mac version of BIAB and didn't have Realband, though, BIAB and Reaper would still do exactly what I need.

Regards,
Noel

Hi all

Yes almost any Daw that you are willing to learn.
Having said that I would not go for specialist programs like Ableton Live 8 and its successors as they are aimed more at live DJ clubbing work, and calling up sound loops. Triggered from a controller keyboard or special control suface.. Normal midi handling is not typical and you may well struggle using with BIAB
Just my thoughts
Mike

I agree with most posts here - it is down to how you like the workflow (which is very different from daw to daw).

I'll mention FL Studio here, because they have one big advantage, which is that you only pay once and then you have a lifelong licence for the program (with all updates, etc.). I payed about 149$ in 2001, I think.

Still I am also using other daws, like Cubase, Maschine and Ableton, but that is mainly because they have different interesting plug-ins that I wouldn't get otherwise - or sometimes because they simply fits better with my midi-keyboards or my Yamaha-synths.

Please, you should take the advice from many people here and try out the "lite"-versions or the demos before you settle on one daw - because the one that feels intuitive to you will probably be the right one.

Will

Hi Mike,

I'm sorry, but I (partly) disagree with you about Ableton Live. It can be a an amazing tool for composing if you are in doubt about how to build your song - like where should the different parts (verses, bridge, chorus, solos) be and in what order, because you can easily audition the different possibilities in Ableton by using the exact same tools as DJ's would use in a live situation.
I found a lot of inspiration by moving parts of a composition around to see what new sonic/inspiring things would happen. That's quicker to do in Ableton than in BiaB.

I hope I make sense (not sure about that).

Will

Wow! Thank you all for your inputs about my question: "Best DAW". What I meant was easy to use and cost.

Vincente, about cost you got the answer. RealBand is free because you have the Windows version of BiaB, but ease to use... more difficult to answer as I have not yet used it.

Stand alone digital multi track recorders such as the Zoom R8,R16,R24, L12, L24; Tascam DP-008,DP03 and DP-24,Dp-32 or the new D-24 all have proprietary DAW built in. The learning curve is better than any software DAW. The units are rock solid, some also double as an Audio Interface, will vary from two to 24 inputs and regardless of the actual channel count, can produce dozens of tracks. They are mobile, make great field recorders, have actual faders and knobs and normally the menu's do not go very deep. They all work flawlessly with BIAB tracks.

They can easily transfer audio files to and from a computer DAW and very seldom malfunction or crash.

Cost can be less than $100 used to just over $100 new to thousands depending on what you buy.

They operate as simply as turning it on, plugging in Mic's and line level inputs such as keys, electric guitars, etc, opening a song, select tracks, hit record and you're off. No drivers, sound cards, finicky plug-ins or wacky OS's.

You can learn a unit inside/out in a day...

They're not as fancy or popular as DAW's but at the end of the day, you can record, edit and publish a song from start to finish literally in the box --- The real box....

I use Studio One Pro 4. I can drag a BiaB song directly into it.

But, as previously stated, there is no best DAW. Asking a question like this is like asking what is the best vehicle to buy. It depends on your needs. Also you will get the Chevy, Ford, etc lovers and haters pitching their vehicle as the best and knocking all the others. YMMV

If Easy To Use and Cost are the key performance indicators, then RealBand should definitely be somewhere at the top of the list for you.

When you say a BIAB song, you mean a •.sgu /•.mgu file?