What's the catch with Reaper?

[PoorGlory]

I just tried out Reaper yesterday and determined that I liked it far better than Cubase (I'm currently a PT user looking to jump ship)... but the whole thing seems to good to be true. $40?? on the honor system?? Unlimited shareware?

Please someone inform me what I'm missing here... It has to be sonically inferior to other DAWs or something, right?

Side note: I actually got Reaper to play nice with my Digi 002R. Amazing.

[Todd24]

No catch.

Your just not being robbed.

Buy it, its the right thing to do.

[sam c]

Originally Posted by PoorGlory

I just tried out Reaper yesterday and determined that I liked it far better than Cubase (I'm currently a PT user looking to jump ship)... but the whole thing seems to good to be true. $40?? on the honor system?? Unlimited shareware?

Please someone inform me what I'm missing here... It has to be sonically inferior to other DAWs or something, right?

Side note: I actually got Reaper to play nice with my Digi 002R. Amazing.

You are only missing the opportunity to buy it!

It is not sonically inferior to any DAW. With a 2.1MB footprint it is superior to most DAWS. It's a revolution baby!!

Seriuosly though, I have used a few DAWS, Sonar 5, Cbase3, Samplitude, and SAW. At this point, I use Reaper exclusively.

[Phil Aiken]

Originally Posted by PoorGlory

I just tried out Reaper yesterday and determined that I liked it far better than Cubase (I'm currently a PT user looking to jump ship)... but the whole thing seems to good to be true. $40?? on the honor system?? Unlimited shareware?

Please someone inform me what I'm missing here... It has to be sonically inferior to other DAWs or something, right?

Side note: I actually got Reaper to play nice with my Digi 002R. Amazing.

No catch.
It rocks - and is getting better and better. Justin, the developer, is amazing.
I haven't made it my primary DAW - yet - but I purchased it and it is still worth having in conjunction with other software.

[retractablezing]

it's understandable i suppose..

whenever a good thing surfaces and breaks out of the norm (everyone getting robbed), people grow suspicious...

i'll also second it sounds better than samp...too bad i paied a fortune for samp 8 before reaper appeared..

[PoorGlory]

This is all great to hear. I'm still stuck in that Digi mindset, so it was kind of hard to believe at first. Thanks.

[Methlab]

Keep this in mind..get on the train now because this program will probably get bought out one day.

This happened with Tracktion. Tracktion is now 300 bucks after Mackie took over. Before Mackie, I spent like 80 dollars on that program.

As for Reaper...how does it play with BFD? I hated how you had to lay everything out in Tracktion when you opened BFD. You had to map out each channel, then make a template..it was a pain..Cubase is great because it reads everything and opens it up for you with one click. It's all about super fast workflow for me.

[statikcat]

Does the GUI still look like it is from 1995? Let's take some of that 100 million and pay a graphic designer plz.

[Phil Aiken]

Originally Posted by retractablezing

it's understandable i suppose..

whenever a good thing surfaces and breaks out of the norm (everyone getting robbed), people grow suspicious...

i'll also second it sounds better than samp...too bad i paied a fortune for samp 8 before reaper appeared..

Interesting you should say that.
As I migrate away from PARIS I am on the fence between Samplitude and Reaper as my main DAW. I already have Samp LE on my system and am planning on doing some shootouts.

[mahasandi]

Originally Posted by statikcat

Does the GUI still look like it is from 1995? Let's take some of that 100 million and pay a graphic designer plz.

you can customize the graphics there are lotsa of pre-made skins too

[JeffSanders]

Reaper is just plain amazing.

One of the best things about it is it's like a damn gazelle! I had major crashing issues with Sonar and Tracktion. You can't crash Reaper. Projects that were dropping out all over the place with other apps are at like 3-5% in Reaper.

I pray to God Justin doesn't sell this, because I think he is on his way to forging a new industry standard, and the way he treats customer requests and hunts down bug fixes is impeccable.

[Solar]

Originally Posted by Phil Aiken

Interesting you should say that.
As I migrate away from PARIS I am on the fence between Samplitude and Reaper as my main DAW. I already have Samp LE on my system and am planning on doing some shootouts.

Hey Phil!! Man coming from PARIS DAW.. that is by now the BEST DAW every.. the SOUND in it was simply and still amazed me but unfortunately its been a long time that it nobody had intrest on it and its getting away and fading away its been while now. All that to say, if i would have MONEY like "Justin" from REAPER i would re-invest in PARIS.

Anyways one thing for sure that i can say with REAPER, it is a GREAT PIECE of Music Software. When you look since when this DAw exist, it has included and is geared with one of the best Feartures that a DAW should have in many years. It also and simply FAST- very small indeed in size 2.1MB and price wise , more then affordable. And not only it is afordable but many YOUNG Engineers, music producer and more can ast least BUY a Real DAW that everybody can Afford and not having any LIMITATIONS!! How cool is this?

Sonically, the sound of REAPER is Stellar and the best thing for those who do not like the Basic GUI theme, its all good, you guyz do not even have to worry about the LOOK, you can Customize everything about the "GUI" and there is TONES of nice THEMES to your needs.

I simply hope as someone mentioned here that "Justin" won't sale this great piece of Software to a Huge compan y that only think about their OWN profit and instead of Responding to the USERS best intrest wich we all have experienced thru other (without naming any) BIG time Developpers!!

But indeed at the END, i'm not saying here that Logic, or Cubase or PT or Saw is less better or Better the REAPER, ALL DAW are great, simply experience, TRY and put your hands on the one that really respond your NEEDS!! Especially WORKFLOW!!!!

Only my 2.5 cents!!

Later fellas!!



Edit: I forgot to mention a very veyr important thing is that i believe that Major Daw developper should take the true example of JUSTIN on how he respond to all his Customers Needs and how he always TRY his best (wich 'till today he always overcome every request) To find a SOLUTION to make REAPER a GREAT growing DAW wich he already accomplished by far so many in a shor time then Big Developpers have. Thats all!!!

[Nu-tra]

I'm waiting for the mac version so I can leave logic.

[theblue1]

Originally Posted by Todd24

No catch.

Your just not being robbed.

Buy it, its the right thing to do.

First, let me say this is not really directed at Todd, more at his probably offhand and not-too-serious comment about "being robbed"...


It's not necessarily that you're being "robbed" when you pay relatively big bucks for a big name recording software...

For one thing -- and I shouldn't think this need be pointed out but, well, here we are -- no one is holding a gun to your head forcing you to spend five hundred bucks on this DAW or a thousand on that one.

If you don't want to be "ripped off" -- just don't buy it. That's easy, innit?


Now, with regard to why Reaper, like other small or open source software vendors can sell their products very cheaply or even give them away has MUCH to do with the fact that developing the core product is typically only a very small part of the aggregate costs that have to be figured into the price of a large company's product.

Developing a core product that works on basic, standardized test machines is a whole lot different than putting out a suite that works across a wide variety of hardware configurations in a wide variety of software environments.

And then offering customer support for -- let's be nice -- a wide range of users (think about many of the posts you see here), many of whom have manifestly little technical knowledge and even less ability to sort out complex hardware and software interdependencies or troubleshoot -- and you end up with a huge support bill.


Sometimes I get frustrated with people whose lack of broader comprehension of the real world causes them to come to naive, simplistic, conspiratorial views of how things work, business-wise.


One thing I totally agree with: If you buy Reaper or any shareware / honorware and end up using it -- it really IS part of the "bargain" that you pay the (in this case) very reasonable fee.


[I may need more coffee this a.m... my grouch-level is pretty crankin' today... ]

[sam c]

Originally Posted by theblue1

First, let me say this is not really directed at Todd, more at his probably offhand and not-too-serious comment about "being robbed"...


Developing a core product that works on basic, standardized test machines is a whole lot different than putting out a suite that works across a wide variety of hardware configurations in a wide variety of software environments.

And then offering customer support for -- let's be nice -- a wide range of users (think about many of the posts you see here), many of whom have manifestly little technical knowledge and even less ability to sort out complex hardware and software interdependencies or troubleshoot -- and you end up with a huge support bill.


Sometimes I get frustrated with people whose lack of broader comprehension of the real world causes them to come to naive, simplistic, conspiratorial views of how things work, business-wise.


[I may need more coffee this a.m... my grouch-level is pretty crankin' today... ]

I think if you know Justins background you realize he clearly understands developing a product that works across a variety of machines!

Support, in my opinion, is one of the biggest problems with many large DAW developers. I can't come up with a reasonable explanation for why they f&*k this up the way they do?

I hope Reaper/Justin/Cockos changes the paradigm of "how things work" business wise!

[mahasandi]

Originally Posted by theblue1

It's not necessarily that you're being "robbed" when you pay relatively big bucks for a big name recording software...

For one thing -- and I shouldn't think this need be pointed out but, well, here we are -- no one is holding a gun to your head forcing you to spend five hundred bucks on this DAW or a thousand on that one.

If you don't want to be "ripped off" -- just don't buy it. That's easy, innit?


Now, with regard to why Reaper, like other small or open source software vendors can sell their products very cheaply or even give them away has MUCH to do with the fact that developing the core product is typically only a very small part of the aggregate costs that have to be figured into the price of a large company's product.

Developing a core product that works on basic, standardized test machines is a whole lot different than putting out a suite that works across a wide variety of hardware configurations in a wide variety of software environments.

And then offering customer support for -- let's be nice -- a wide range of users (think about many of the posts you see here), many of whom have manifestly little technical knowledge and even less ability to sort out complex hardware and software interdependencies or troubleshoot -- and you end up with a huge support bill.


Sometimes I get frustrated with people whose lack of broader comprehension of the real world causes them to come to naive, simplistic, conspiratorial views of how things work, business-wise.

The bottom line is this, if your bills are high you do have to charge more.
Simple.
Beyond that how you treat the customer is a seperate issue .

This is the key point, and is not a conspiracy, as it is we have a choice to support companies whose practices we respect and feel are in our mutual positive interests.

the gun to the head analogy is a bit steep eh? though i do appreciate your bringing up the bigger picture.

Its more like coercion with some companies ensuring you can't do x with there product to maintian their conception of "loyalty".

But there is another so called "real" world viable approach.

Treat your customers to the best product and service that really meets their needs

and you will have a friendship too.

Besides if a company doesn't care about its customers total needs eventually the river
breaks the dam , because someone will come along and better meet the needs of

customers. Treat the girl right you know..........

[theblue1]

Yeah, Sam... I wanted to give some wiggle room there.

I figured it was just an offhand comment -- but I HAVE run into a fair number of people who sincerely seem to believe that just because a niche product has a high ticket price that the developers are kicking back drinking champaigne on the Riviera...


I'm a big fan of the Open Source movement and of light-on-their-feet developers.

But as a business software developer I know how much time you can spend holding hands and explaining things in what seems (to you anyhow) like babytalk...


And I'm keeping an eye on Reaper for Linux... I guess there are some real hurdles but I'd LOVE to see Linux become a platform for a full-featured DAW.

[theblue1]

Originally Posted by mahasandi

The bottom line is this, if your bills are high you do have to charge more.
Simple.
Beyond that how you treat the customer is a seperate issue .

This is the key point, and is not a conspiracy, as it is we have a choice to support companies whose practices we respect and feel are in our mutual positive interests.

the gun to the head analogy is a bit steep eh? though i do appreciate your bringing up the bigger picture.

Its more like coercion with some companies ensuring you can't do x with there product to maintian their conception of "loyalty".

But there is another so called "real" world viable approach.

Treat your customers to the best product and service that really meets their needs

and you will have a friendship too.

Besides if a company doesn't care about its customers total needs eventually the river
breaks the dam , because someone will come along and better meet the needs of

customers. Treat the girl right you know..........

With regards to the "gun to the head" analogy... well, I haven't had much coffee yet and... well, I argue politics a lot in a very lively and somewhat no-holds-barred forum and I must have forgot I was here with my colleagues instead of fighting the Good Fight against the philistines and bully boys...

[clonewar]

Originally Posted by JeffSanders

I pray to God Justin doesn't sell this, because I think he is on his way to forging a new industry standard, and the way he treats customer requests and hunts down bug fixes is impeccable.

Justin is smart, engineering-wise and business-wise. Don't forget that he sold Winamp..

[Stiff]

Originally Posted by Methlab

Keep this in mind..get on the train now because this program will probably get bought out one day.

This happened with Tracktion. Tracktion is now 300 bucks after Mackie took over. Before Mackie, I spent like 80 dollars on that program.

Yeah, same with Cool Edit...

[SRR]

In regards to the price, its not really a $40 program, its a $200 program, well $200 if you make money in your studio . Got to keep your karma up even if the wallet takes a hit.

[manning1]

just my 2cents.
my biggest concern with reaper frankly is not technical, .

i'm somewhat concerned it might be bought out by a conglomerate of some sort.
but then it already does everything i want.
thus if that happened i would just stick with the version i have.

[Todd24]

Originally Posted by theblue1

First, let me say this is not really directed at Todd, more at his probably offhand and not-too-serious comment about "being robbed"...

Yes, offhand for sure. I do get there is massive amounts of R&D that goes into these programs. Companies do need to make money.

It is however clear that thier buisness model sucks. The cant charge as little, or fix as fast as Cockos. Why? I would guess middle managment. Lots of it.

In the end you do get ripped off.......... by comparison.

If Reaper will do everything YOU need it to, (Request it if it doesnt) then it would seem foolish not to use it, given the price and responsivness of the developers.

[mr. moon]

Originally Posted by mahasandi

you can customize the graphics there are lotsa of pre-made skins too

Yeah, but it still looks outdated to me.


...However, with the fukkin minimal CPU hit compared to my primary DAW package and sonic quality I get from Reaper, the GUI doesn't matter to me anymore. I'm even getting used to the workflow and graphics...

-mr moon

[statikcat]

Originally Posted by Todd24

No catch.

Your just not being robbed.

Buy it, its the right thing to do.

Let's face it. If you spend 1000 dollars on Logic Pro.. that product is aimed at PROS. AKA people who money and a living doing audio. If you make your salary using Logic then 1k$ is not very much money.. especially since after that the life of Logic you are just paying optional upgrade pricing.

Now if you don't make any money off of Cubase or Logic (etc).. then you should be buying the light versions. Dont complain because products designed for pros are not cheap.

[Todd24]

Originally Posted by statikcat

Let's face it. If you spend 1000 dollars on Logic Pro.. that product is aimed at PROS. AKA people who money and a living doing audio. If you make your salary using Logic then 1k$ is not very much money.. especially since after that the life of Logic you are just paying optional upgrade pricing.

Now if you don't make any money off of Cubase or Logic (etc).. then you should be buying the light versions. Dont complain because products designed for pros are not cheap.

The problem is that the price tag does not equate to better.

Certainly Reaper has room to grow, and may noy have every feature you need (though not likely). In fact, you might even have to learn differant ways of doing things. Many people come to the Reaper forum asking, or complaining, about thier certain feature needs. Almost without fail there is a way to do it.....quickly. When there is'nt, and there is a great enough need for everyone, it generally gets added in a matter of days, sometimes hours.

The $960 price differance (that $800 for pros) is not justifiable. If you spent a grand on something you could have got for $200, well that sucks and I am sorry for you. (I feel you got ripped off)

Again the $1000 price tag doesnt make Logic or any other App more capable.

Unfortunatly there is a underlying belief that more expensive equates to better. The facts are the two are not always, or even usually related.

Some things in the hardware world cost more to produce and justify a higher price tag, but generally not anywhere near what we will pay for them. IE if a great mic cost $50 more in components than the Chinese version, why does it cos $4000 dollars more? Because it make Pros feel better about there gear? Ok, but Im out.

[MT Groove]

I got a chance to check out Reaper for a few minutes. First of all, the look sucks big time! No matter what "theme" I choose, it looks plain shitty! :D Now with that out the way, it seems like a very nice program. I was even surprised that it can open and save Samplitude EDL files, even though the panning seems to be reversed. . A very nice feature since I'm using Samp Pro. This can make it a very good companion for location recording. A couple things i noticed immediately. The program starts up almost instantly. The navigator and Routing Matrix is very useful. However, there are quite a few features that are lacking that makes Reaper not quite measuring up to Samplitude Pro. Maybe they're there and I don't know it.

Does Reaper have object editing (or clip editing)? Can you take an object or clip and simply drag the level of that object up or down like in Samp or Nuendo? Can it go further and have a complete object editor like in Samp, where you can have individual panning, effects, timestretch/pitch shift, aux send, etc. etc. per object? Can Reaper, burn a Redbook CD-R Master? or DVD-Audio? Can you set markers on the timeline and export each section out as wav files? Can Reaper open up an individual wav file and act as a destructive 2-track editor? Can it mix in surround? Well I'm pretty sure it can with the Routing Matrix. Can it edit a file, even before it's finished recording? These are just a fraction of the features in Samp that's not available in Reaper, or at least not that I know of. I may be wrong. Reaper may be up to par compared to some DAWs but I still think it's got a long way to catch up to Samplitude, even though it does borrow a lot of Samp's capabilities such as being able to have multiple file types, sample rates and bit depths in the same session....very nice.

Reaper is definitely on the right track. Get a good GUI design team and implement some more features and it's en route to being a pro application.

[mersisblue]

Originally Posted by Todd24

No catch.

Your just not being robbed.

Buy it, its the right thing to do.

the catch is

its easier to sell a million copies for 40 then 40 copies for a million

im gonna check it out now .........

[statikcat]

Originally Posted by Todd24

The problem is that the price tag does not equate to better.

Certainly Reaper has room to grow, and may noy have every feature you need (though not likely). In fact, you might even have to learn differant ways of doing things. Many people come to the Reaper forum asking, or complaining, about thier certain feature needs. Almost without fail there is a way to do it.....quickly. When there is'nt, and there is a great enough need for everyone, it generally gets added in a matter of days, sometimes hours.

The $960 price differance (that $800 for pros) is not justifiable. If you spent a grand on something you could have got for $200, well that sucks and I am sorry for you. (I feel you got ripped off)

Again the $1000 price tag doesnt make Logic or any other App more capable.

I never said more expensive is better. Just because Reaper is underpriced doesn't mean other things are over priced. Infact Reaper's price reflects very little at this point. The app is still in infact stages and being so cheap is a good strategic move (look at all the buzz).. possibly nothing more.

A 1000$ investment is kind of cheap for any professional anyway..if you are not a professional then dont buy the 1000$ version. If you are cheap then fine.. but again dont complain about Cubase/Logic pricing because a NEW product with no history is under priced. You can't charge much with no history..

Don't get me wrong. I think Reaper is cool so far.. but you shouldn't be using it to justify slamming other products pricing at this stage..

[manning1]

groove.....
right clik on an individual audio clip........go to item properties.
yes...u can do lots of things to an individual clip.
lets say a trak has lots of spaced apart audio clips for example...
hold the mouse at the top of the clip n youll see an up/down arrow to change volume. lots of other things to discover.
read the reaper wiki n get the manual.
cos my answer to your question .second para...would be extensive n i dont have the time right now..sorry.
ps..yes markers/regions etc etc. CHECK OUT ALL THE KEYBOARD SHORTCUTS AND ALSO RIGHT CLIK ON EVERYTHING .