what you use depends on how seriously you are taking it, how complex a program you are prepared to learn to use and what you can buy/beg/borrow/steal

Cubase and reason are the serious end of the market; the manual for reason is a doorstop in paper format ( and i have used it as such)

at the simpler end of the market but lacking all the features in the two above you will find ableton live, cakewalk, magics music maker, ejay, fruity loops

I have a fondness for ejay cos its simple and cheap; others will swear by their favourites.

if you want to get your toes wet and not drown in unfamiliar technical info try ejay or maybe ableton.
when the limitations of the program start to annoy you it is time to move on to something more complex. what i say is push the program you do choose to its limit and then upgrade

hope this helps:bigsmile:

i have used cubase SX, which are massive, but just to arrange sounds / beats it’s quite user friendly and has scope for you to develop with (into multi-media production)

reason does my head in… it’s really for people studying music technology / sound engineering or those who are adept and committed already… too complex for me

jsut got a copy of ableton live and it seems quite fun to use and irons out some of those ‘match up’ niggles I had with cubase / nuendo

i like Absynth for making your own crazy sounds and melodies

i’d recommend making friends with some people who are already using some of the above and seeing which ones you like

Reason and Cubase are both great programs that I use. Didn t take me long to understand the basics of Reason, so you should have no problems. Google Reason Tutorials if you do have any probs, theres lots of info and help avalible online.

I always thought Fruity Loops was a little tacky too, but alot of good Drum And Bass producers use it and make some great tunes.

I’d agree with Asdf. Although I tend to use Reason, fruity is no longer tacky. Maybe FL 1 – 3 were. But since 4 it’s quite a professional program which is user friendly.

I hear what you are saying about Reason mate. It just has that ‘sound’. It’s a great program but it does have that certain quality to it that lets it down. I’ve noticed it more after borrowing my mates Virus C. Making phat sounding samples on that then whacking them in to reason seems to take away from the quality and warmth despite no after effects being applied at all.

There is another extremely underrated option too just to let you know. It’s my preffered choice of music production software but each person has their own methods of working.

http://www.synapse-audio.com/orionplatinum.php

Mac or Windows? A lot of people like Logic Pro on the mac because of it’s ease of use. On Windows, Cubase takes the cake. There are heaps of tutorials online if you get stuck 🙂

@Raj 40773 wrote:

I have a fondness for ejay cos its simple and cheap; others will swear by their favourites.

There are worse ways to learn. It’s not great but it’s a starting point, in different incarnations.

Damn sight easier than trying to do EVERYTHING in a sound wave editor like Audacity.

i use ableton live. i used to use reason, nuendo and digital performer at uni. for me, live is just so much better than the others. im sure logic and cubase can do pretty much everything live can and im not experienced with these although nuendo is similar to cubase (steinberg). and either way, pro’s use all sequencers… i was reading a little while back how the prodigy guy loves using reason, although i doubt he uses any presets as they seem quite lame… but live just looks the business and everything is really smooth. to me, reason seems quite clunky in comparison. im working with the sampler atm and its incredible the level of manipulation… check these:
Ableton: Sampler – YouTube
Ableton: Robert Henke on Sampler Part 1 – YouTube