PG Music Home Forums PG Music Product Forums RealBand TIPS....WHEN RB MIGHT BE A BETTER ALTERNATIVE VIZ BIAB. MAJOR FEATURE DIFFERENCES.

DC RON.

thanks for your kind comments....appreciated.

ALL.

as promised here is further detailing re when rb might be a better fit for a musicians needs...
before getting into things let me say that both bb and rb are very VERY deep music apps as obviously over the years pg have added lots of different features in order to meet lots of user feature requests..and keep users happy.

let me also say its a very complex task that i undertook.
in some ways a no win situation for me due to the complexity involved.
soooo...please allow for the fact that there might be omissions ive made and errors due to the fact that as i said both bb and rb are very deep......
if someone feels ive screwed up and can produce a better document detailing when rb might be a better fit for a users song project.......feel free....
you will have my utmost respect as its a darn complex task....and i'm happy to get egg on my face (lol.) for the betterment of all us rb users...
if ANYONE feels ive missed anything...i'll be happy to amend or add to this document and of course attribute to them.
ONE BIG THING i would like to mention and its top of my list is that i feel....
AT THIS POINT OF TIME...rb tracks view is far ahead of bb tracks view.
i just find the rb tracks view far far easier than the new bb tracks view.
BUT haveing said that its only to be expected as rb tracks view has been around for years while bb tracks view is new....and i think it only fair to say that its pretty obvious that bb tracks view (a great concept for bb users imho..) will over time be fleshed out with further features. i'm just trying to be fair here...but at this point imho the combo of the rb long menu for a track in conjunction with rb tracks view is very VERY powerfull for doing songs.
plus of course all the ways one can do auto-accompany and track genning in rb as well as the various user views rb offers....makes it unique in some ways compared to other daws/music apps.
i invite the reader, if one doubts me to go through in detail and understand the rb tracks view/looong track menu pop up combo viz in comparison the bb tracks view.
(ps...fyi...ive suggested to pg that bb new tracks view is a grrreat concept...
but that it needs imho various built in features a la rb tracks view....
to quote spock...lol...'its only logical.')

finally let me say (as an ex programmer...) obviously both bb and rb have been developed by very talented people...to sum up... this stuff isnt trivial.
as ive said before on these forums....a developer faces many many challenges which the normal person might not be aware of unless a few programming courses are taken.
now i hope the following added details will be of help particularly to new pg users.
lets get to it re rb features...in no particular order.
(to my fellow rb users please feel free to add to the list if ive missed something.)

....audio sub grouping.
....record mixer moves.
....pitch to midi conversion.
(eg try on single notes maybe sung ? results can vary.)
....midi guitar cleanup.
....3D drum kit window plus ability to use pc kbd to record for such.
....instrument tuner view.
....tone generator.
....detailed very usefull midi monitor view.
....easy swap tracks feature.
....volume nodes...new feature.
....easy dragging of a selected section of a track one might like into another daw.
(obviously can also drag over whole tracks also.)
....split stereo track to two tracks.
....midi vocoder.
....fix tuning.
....reverse/backwards feature.
(eg if you want to put hidden messages in a song for listeners...lol.)
....generation of your own (or standard) midi drum track patterns.
(rapid fill track with drum pattern in various styles ...with ability to use say plug in a synth and get that 'throbbing' synth rhythm one hears in some films etc if one is crafty and gets to know rb's tons of nice midi features)
....vst/vsti handling features.
(make your own conclusions...i feel rb does a better job.)
....fill button in tempo map to gradually increase or decrease tempo.
....ability to handle not fixed but various ppq resolutions.
(pulses per quarter note.)
....de-ess/exciter/hum filter/noise suppression and various other tools/fx.
(ive used these to clean up old recordings...)
....multiple real charts for same soloist ?.
(this is a fuzzy area whether rb might be better...do your own tests.)
....custom metronome and write to midi track.
(one could build up a library of ones own metronomes.)
(note...its my opinion that midi features/midi track editing and track recording is way better in rb as rb has a plethora of midi features and tricks up its sleeve.)
....jukebox feature.
(i dont use it...all the typical formats are supported.)
....percentage quantisation feature.
(might be easier in rb ?)
....guitar tab printing ?
....eliminate midi note overlap.
....more vst/vsti instances.
(up to 16 fx per track.)
....proper horizontal mixer similar to other familiar music apps.
(displays up to 48 tracks at a time...256 total.)
....aux busses.
....a very nice feature is while recording audio one sees neat track graphics
showing overs....very usefull....i find this very cool.
....cpu useage stats.
....track waveform colours.
....big lyrics/clock windows...can resize to taste.
....align music to click track.
....streach/pitch shift obviously.


i'm sure ive missed something....i'm human...lol.
particularly its KEY you right click over a track to reveal all the features for a track....its extensive.
bottom line is if you want lots of tracks to record and more advanced audio/midi
features related to these tracks...rb might be for you.
note...in some cases bb and rb just do some things differently or overlap and also there are what i might 'fuzzy' not cut and dried areas.)
i would highly recommend that if you want to decide which app to use viz a feature you might need to do a song....
try in bb AND rb and run tests...and gradually build a series of notes to yourself which app you prefer when you need a certain feature.
this will make things easier...
(and also READ BOTH MANUALS to form your own opinions....i KNOW its a pain...but to realise the brilliance of these apps its important to understand them so you dont miss a feature that might take a song of yours to the next level.)

i hope this helps someone new agonising over whether to use rb....
have FUN as PG says.

happiness.

om