My thought was as follows:

I don't know how good of a MIDI editor BIAB is. My gut feeling is that it generates MIDI files but editing the individual tracks is better in a dedicated MIDI editor. I'd import the MIDI files and the associated RealTracks files into something like Reaper or Reason 6 - which has audio and MIDI editing and synths, to be able to get the sum of much of my song and add in vocal tracks, tweak the MIDI and add addition MIDI/audio tracks.

At this point I have a choice between Cubase 6 and Reason and I'm moving towards Reason 6 upgrade since it seems to have a lot more value and you don't have to deal with Steinberg, poor support and horrible copy protection manacles that have plagued me all too often with Cubase. Reaper is a great low cost app that I may end up using too, at the very least.

I don't think that buying any hardware is necessary (I've got an i7-2600K and 1.5 TB 6 Gb/s hard drive) along with an old MIDI interface that I may not need since my Roland piano has a USB input. I may only miss the pitch bend, if needed.

Richard - too funny. I just posted the above after you posted. I have an offer to upgrade Reason to 6 for $170 ($195 with shipping) and figured that with BIAB with RealTracks, I've got an amazing studio. At the very worst, I also own Reaper, which is amazingly well priced if you're just doing this for fun as I am. I think we're onto something.

PS - I also have Sony Vegas for video editing and it came with SoundForge, which adds a few nice things of its own. My guess is that I'll only need Reason 6 as the be all end all. I'll end up selling the Cubase version I have to someone who loves it and I'll have a solution.

Last edited by hink; 09/18/11 06:10 PM.