Vegas Audio 2.0

Rating:
Summary: powerful and easy to use multi-track recording
Review: I use this to do multi-track hard disk recording of guitar, bass, drums, and vocals. My needs are fairly basic. E.g., record simultaniously on multiple inputs, overdub multiple takes of complex sections, add effects, occasionally splice and rearrange things, etc. I have no need for sequencing (the ability to record, playback, and manipulate keyboard MIDI events), which Vegas doesn't provide.

Before buying it, I spent a reasonable amount of energy researching what the best software was for this purpose and wound up focusing on Cakewalk, Cubase, and Vegas. I was initially drawn to Cakewalk by claims that it had more market share, but encountered several people who felt it was something that serious users would outgrow. I used it a bit, did not bond with it, and moved on to Cubase. Cubase was very powerful and visually striking, but I found its user interface to be a cryptic and confusing obstacle. I used it for a while, but was discontent enough to switch to Vegas.

I am quite happy with Vegas and find that it provides the features I want packaged in an elegant and well thought out user interface. It allows me to focus on the music without unnecessary distractions and I would not hesitate to recommend it.

FYI, one thing I did not look at is ProTools. This is what is most commonly used in professional studios, but it seemed to be only available for the Mac. I heard it was being ported to the PC though, so I would consider investigating it.

Rating:
Summary: if only it had midi
Review: this product is dead easy to use and solid as a rock. everything works the way you think it will and the sound is great. my only wish is that it had some kind of midi implementation - somewhere between nuendo and cakewalk/cubase/logic. there are some things i just want to keep in midi for as long as possible prior to mixdown. if it had this....it would be 6 stars. as it is - i can't imagine life without.

Rating:
Summary: sketchy manual, but still an excellent multitracker for XP
Review: When I bought this software, I was under the impression that it concentrated on multitrack audio recording. I was right, but, by reading the manual, you'd never know it. There are so many references to the video aspect of this program, it's frequently difficult distinguishing the audio part. Thank goodness the program doesn't support MIDI.

I am managing to find most of the the information I need, however, it took me a long time to figure out how to set up an audio project for maximum efficiency and portability. You see, by default, Vegas will dump all the recordings from all your projects into one big community file/folder. If, when saving, you use the "Copy all media with project" checkbox, Vegas will copy EVERY recording in the community recordings file, regardless of what project they come from (GigaBytes of files!). I finally figured out you need to manually make a separate folder for each project's recordings and specify their paths in the properties menu. Maybe it's just common knowledge in the digital recording world, because I've yet to read any documentation regarding this.

I've also discovered that the "Media Pool" allows you to automatically delete any unused recordings/events/takes at the click of a button - what a great organizational feature!

Other than the transitional manual, this program is relatively simple and has every feature you need to make high quality/professional multitrack recordings.

Out of print, it can be found on Ebay. Don't worry if it doesn't include a paper manual because it's in PDF form on the disk. It works perfectly on the Windows XP operating system!

Rating:
Summary: manual is confusing
Review: When I bought this software, I was under the impression that it concentrated on multitrack audio recording. I was right, but, by reading the manual, you'd never know it. There are so many references to the video aspect of this program, it's frequently difficult distinguishing the audio part. Thank goodness the program doesn't support MIDI.

I am managing to find most of the the information I need, however, being a beginner, it took me a long time to figure out how to set up an audio project for maximum efficiency and portability. By default, Vegas will dump all the recordings from all your projects into one big community file/folder. If, when saving, you use the "Copy all media with project" checkbox, Vegas will copy every single recording in the community recordings file, regardless of what project they come from. I finally figured out you need to manually make a separate folder for each project's recordings. Maybe it's just common knowledge in the digital recording world, because I've yet to read any documentation regarding this.

Other than that, this program has every feature you need to make high quality multitrack recordings and is relatively inexpensive.