[LAU] FOSS DAW recommendations

[Len Ovens]

On Fri, 17 Nov 2017, David Kastrup wrote:

> It is very prone to crashes and hangs when anything with the transport
> goes wrong, and it's not exactly trivial to restart transport.  Its

I have not had this problem, but that means nothing. I generally do 
straight almost tape machine style recording of analog signals (I am not a 
keyboard player and so use very little MIDI if any on my projects) I enjoy 
the energy (subjective for surre) of live performance and try to get as 
much of that in the studio as I can. So I might completely miss using 
parts of Ardour you use all the time. I would think audio device and 
graphics cards make a difference to stability too. (ICE1712 pci card audio 
and Intel graphics)

> autosave does not just leave a recoverable state but actually saves the
> whole thing periodically as the current project, so if you don't know
> whether you actually want to commit (or are pretty sure you don't) you
> have to turn it off, or quitting without saving will leave you in some
> unpredictable state.

That is not quite true. the periodic saves are not saved to the project. 
However, there are some things (like adding a new track) that do force a 
save so I can see that getting confusing.

> I recently had a demonstration where the mics were wired wrong and so
> the two "stereo" channels I recorded on were mixed up.  You think I
> managed to split the tracks into mono in order to salvage two usable
> tracks?  No beef.  I'd have had to do a stem export and reimport.  Or
> something.  Didn't really fit in the demo time frame.

The balance control can be set to -100% for stereo image reversal though. 
Assuming I understand the problem correctly.

> Handling marks (setting, moving them) is always hit and miss.
> Manipulating automation with the mouse is hit and miss.  And so on.

I have to admit I have less experience here.

>> and yes, Ardour can be run quite well with a physical UI. Be it a

> For recording a session, I use a nanoKontrol.  Don't want computer fans
> or rotating disks anywhere near my mics.  Ardour is fine for making
> takes.
>
> It's when you start editing that things get awful.

While I haven't found what editing I have done (not much) easy, it hasn't 
seemed that bad but I probably don't do enough with enough time pressure 
to really coment.

--
Len Ovens
www.ovenwerks.net