Of course we all dig a nice proprietary digidesign TDM rig running protools, but realistically none of us can afford it. And the affordable versions usually limit you. There is pretty limited hardware support if you want 4+ simultaneous recording channels with preamps all running at 24bit/192khz. Protools is sort of useless if you need to record seriously on a budget. Their digi002 costs two grand for a few channels that don't even come close to 24/192, and a basic control
console. Anyways, you're talking about editing.
Cool Edit Pro is an old favorite of mine. The cool edit rights were bought by adobe and cool edit became adobe audition. It's
bundled together and intergrates nicely with all the adobe a/v products (premier,
etc). So that means that cool edit was discontinued, so it's not avalable or supported like it once was. However, that didn't discourage anyone from still using it. Cool Edit is still avalable for download all over the internet. And tons of people use it and will discuss it in various audio forums/groups. So in a way, cool edit is still supported and alive. Best of all, it's FREE! It's an excellent waveform editor and comes with a decent library of effects and
plug ins. Cool edit has been enough for must of my editing needs for theater stuff (but I did not say recording). It'll allow you to beef up and manipulate those awful sound effects we find on the internet. Cool edit is very user friendly and does a lot of things better than it's pricey counterparts. But keep in mind this program is pretty useless as far as recording. Sure it'll work but it doesn't support a lot of hardware. So it'll do basic things and you can use your computer's line-in, but if you need serious recording, forget about it.
ProTools LE is also a good DAW app. This is the very same software shipped with digidesign's mbox, digi001, digi002 control, and their digi002 rack. It will do everything that cool edit does and more. And best of it all it's recording functions are actually useful. But it's not going to record at the resolutions like some of it's bigger siblings do. It has a wide range of plug-ins and effects avalable for it, so you'll never have to complain about that. As far as an editor, it does all the basics but I wouldn't say it's as surgical as cool edit. I say this because it's not as user friendly as other DAWs. Sometimes you have to dig a little harder to acheive the same
level of performance of others. This will support quite a
bit of the mainstream hardware but only a select few are pro tools friendly.
Cubase LE is pretty similar to Protools in terms of what you can acheive. Cubase supports a lots and lots of hardware. It shipped with more hardware than any other DAW applacation. It's shipped with much of steinberg's own hardware. Presonus is also pretty fond of cubase. Cubase is very userfriendly and offers a fair range of plug-ins/effects. It's
tracking system is very efficient. It will manipulate the rhythm of your tracks for consistency very well. It is amazing how well it does it consider how little the effort the user has to put forth. Even though steinberg does what it does very well, it's viewed as obselete by many. It'll do everything just as good, if not better than everything else I've named so far. But it's a little behind for it's range and price. Steinberg has been pretty conservative with it's uprades for the Cubase
line. So it's not as innovative as others. But, it all depends on what you need to do. To most, the advantages they receive from nicer DAWs will be slim. But to some that slim advantage makes all the difference in the world.
Digital Performer is probably my favorite DAW aside from the high end version protools coupled with it's HD hardware. But still you can't really do much with protools without it's hardware, a fast desktop, and a huge
screen. So digital performer will be more convient if you want to edit on the fly with a laptop. Digital performer is such a good for the
level of control and features it gives you. Digital performer even records at the high resolutions like the big dogs, it does 24/192 without any limitations. DP also supports TDM systems so while you cannot integrate with a protools rig you'll certainly be able to import and export TDM projects or vice versa. You can export in DP and import on a TDM
system. So you'll still be able to fit in with protools gang. Not only does DP record well, it also edits better. I've found it allows you to edit more than you could with a protools
system. And this gives you a huge advantage when you're doing film stuff, it allows you to integrate your musical notations and audio with the video all natively inside digital performer. You can open a video a file and you can start syncing complex audio
tracking with it. This makes a huge difference if you're project is in surround sound. Believe it or not, all the post production audio editing and
tracking was all done on digital performer. DP works with quite a
bit of hardware, and it's parent company (MOTU:
Mark of the Unicorn) makes some of the best firewire audio interfaces avalable. So you have much trouble finding good hardware to sync up with this awesome hardware. If only digidesign could learn how to be not so proprietary like MOTU. On the downside, digital performer doesn't come with many extra
bundled in. Sure it has effects and plug-ins avalable for it, but who likes buying software? DP also doesn't have many built in insturments, at least not as much as cubase or logic. It's really disappointing for how well this program works. What I really like about DP, is how well made it is. Everything is laid out for optimum performance and productivity. It also makes the best of your
screen real estate unlike protools which pretty much makes it impossible to operate with dual 19"+ monitors without having a mental break down. Best of all, it's relatively inexpensive for how effcient it is. It's half the price of logic pro and twice the performance of logic pro.
Logic Pro is overpriced in my opinion. It integrates beautifully with Final Cut Pro and all the apple products and istuff. But it basically is garage band with an extreme steroid addiction. It definitely whips cubase, but i still prefer digital performer. It isn't as efficient as DP, it's a
bit cluttered. Logic has tons and tons and tons of extra plug-ins, insturments, and effects it's insane. Logic also records extremely well, but it seems to have the most issues with hardware support. However, it's
midi support is the best I've used. Logic is great for creation and such, but it's not a work horse and you find yourself constantly wasting time in post production. And plus it's EXPENSIVE. It's a grand for a DAW that isn't as good as DP (which costs half the price of logic) and a load of extra insturments, plug-ins, and effects. Obviously, because it's made by apple it will run beautifully. In fact if you have a few extra G4 or G5 computers nearby you can actually connect them up to your machine running logic via gigabit
ethernet and you'll be able to advantage of extra processing
power. It's a really cool feature and works surprisingly well. It's nice to get that extra boost of
power when running intense applacations like this. It's nice because you won't have to freeze up tracks and/or live effects to free up resources. This is a commonly a huge problem when your doing a lot of processing on the computer with plug-ins/effects, it really drains
system resources. And it's very unproductive when you have to constantly freeze or lock things just to get work done. But overall logic pro is a great app, it's probably the most versitile DAW with all of it's extra bundles. Unfortunately I have not used the logic
express, it's the cheaper version. I think it goes for $100-$200 or so.