Cakewalk Home Studio 2004

Rating:
Summary: The Jury is Still Out
Review: After an apparently successful installation, the "Wave Profiler," module repeatedly crashed my machine. Installation of the patch offered by Cakewalk did not seem to be of any help.

At present, I am able to record MIDI. Due to the aforementioned problem with wave profiler, however, I am unable to record instruments through mic/line input.

I believe this software does have potential. Hopefully I will be able to realize it in the near future. This reveiew will be updated accordingly.

Rating:
Summary: Cakewalk Home Studio just keep getting better and better!
Review: Cakewalk products just keep getting better and better. Possibly the best all-around home studio recording software packages in it's (low!) price range. Cakewalk Home Studio 2004 includes a whole whack of goodies, including some very serious new tools for musicians. The best part is that Home Studio is nice and easy to use.

If you're a musician stepping into the world of digital recording, Cakewalk Home Studio gently eases you into a creative recording environment, providing you with everything you need to turn your computer into a powerful multitrack recording studio.

With lots of pro level features not found in most other recording software packages, Home Studio 2004 records up to 24-bit / 96 kHz audio and is designed to let you focus on the creative process of making music.

Home Studio also includes the great sounding EDIROL Virtual Sound Canvas DXi. With over 990 sounds and drum sets, this little 'extra' is actually a HUGE bonus with the software.

One of Home Studio's many pro-level features is support for multi-channel audio cards. This is great if you want to record more than one instrument or audio track at once - perfect for recording live bands with each musician recorded to a separate track.

Want to create some killer drum tracks? It's easy to 'paint' drum tracks with the simple 'click and drag' feature. You can record unlimited audio and MIDI tracks, mix with real-time audio and MIDI effects, and then burn your masterpiece to CD with Pyro Express CD maker and WAV ripper. Home Studio 2004 supports ACID-format, MP3, WAV, WMA and MIDI files.

For anyone wanting to enter the magical world of digital recording, this product is truly an excellent choice...

Rating:
Summary: Powerful but hard
Review: I bought the program, so that I could be able to record MIDI. I have an Casio WK-1800 keyboard, which I thought to connect to my computer. I connected the keyboard with a Yamaha UX-16 Midi in/Midi out to USB connector. I have gone through zillions of e-mails with support, and they don't seem to be able to make it work.

Otherwise, the program is a powerful workhorse, only if you spend hours and hours of figuring everything out. As an first-timer, I don't recommend this product. But as an professional, go for it.

Rating:
Summary: Good value - if you have the patience
Review: I bought this as a home recording novice. Whereas my prior home recording experience was limited to a microphone and an office tape recorder, my knowledge of desktop computers and how they operate is extensive. Novices be aware that Cakewalk has a steep learning curve with regard to troubleshooting. Don't expect to install and be recording right away. This is a very complex program and it seems the possibilities for conflicts with other software on the computer is endless. I can't imagine having to wrestle with this beast not having the computer knowledge that I have. For example, to avoid dropouts I have to set my soundcard and Cakewalk audio mode to ASIO. It will not record in the standard MME mode and to this day I have no idea why and have explored every possible soundcard conflict to no avail.

That being said - if you are up to a couple weeks of trying to defeat the beast, Cakewalk does provide a tool for you to make pro-quality digital recordings at a bargain price. You have unlimited tracks for audio and MIDI instruments. I only use the audio tracks to record guitar and bass compositions. The drum machine included in the software is kind of weak so I recommend getting a CD of professional drum loops. With a good drum loop I can record a bass line, rythm guitar track, and lead guitar track with sound quality that match any store-bought CD I own.

The options to tweak your sound are practically infinite. So you are limited only by time and your imagination.

If you think it will be too much of a hassle, I understand. Otherwise, if you have the courage and determination, you will eventually reap the rewards.

Rating:
Summary: Good except for one obnoxious thing...
Review: I bought this from EBay in January 2004, and from what I see today Amazon is offering an excellent price.

On first appearance, this software looks to be complciated to learn. The thing is, they packed it with more features than I personally would ever need. If you have the patience, you can really get some neat things out of the software. I played around with it, but eventually discarded the manual and started using it just like my old tape-drive 4-track recorder. Build-in metronome? Cool. Don't need it. Built-in effects? Might use it someday. Not today. So - you can get off the ground with the basic pretty quickly. One really neat thing is graphicly selecting regions that you want to punch in before hitting record. All in all, really good.

There are a couple of clunky thing about it that you can work around easily - if you try to record a track before selecting an input device, for example, that track isn't going to work again (so just deleted it and make a new one). Double-clicking a Cakewalk file from file explorer results in an error, so bring up the application first, then load the file. I haven't run into any really drastic bugs, but makes me wonder when I will.

Okay - my big beef - you have to pay extra to enable mixing down to MP3. I personally find it very obnoxious to buy a fully-featured, production piece of software - and then they want MORE MONEY - $30 - to enable what should be a standard feature. You can mix down to plenty of formats, sure, but let's face it, you'd expect MP3 to be a pretty standard format to use. I feel cheated and not respected as a customer of the product when the developers resort to this kind of money-grubbing.

Well, I was going to give 2 starts because of the MP3 thing, but to be fair, overall this is a really nice piece of software, so it deserves a balanced review. Happy recording!

Rating:
Summary: Good except for one obnoxious thing...
Review: I bought this from EBay in January 2004, and from what I see today Amazon is offering an excellent price.

On first appearance, this software looks to be complciated to learn. The thing is, they packed it with more features than I personally would ever need. If you have the patience, you can really get some neat things out of the software. I played around with it, but eventually discarded the manual and started using it just like my old tape-drive 4-track recorder. Build-in metronome? Cool. Don't need it. Built-in effects? Might use it someday. Not today. So - you can get off the ground with the basic pretty quickly. One really neat thing is graphicly selecting regions that you want to punch in before hitting record. All in all, really good.

There are a couple of clunky thing about it that you can work around easily - if you try to record a track before selecting an input device, for example, that track isn't going to work again (so just deleted it and make a new one). Double-clicking a Cakewalk file from file explorer results in an error, so bring up the application first, then load the file. I haven't run into any really drastic bugs, but makes me wonder when I will.

Okay - my big beef - you have to pay extra to enable mixing down to MP3. I personally find it very obnoxious to buy a fully-featured, production piece of software - and then they want MORE MONEY - $30 - to enable what should be a standard feature. You can mix down to plenty of formats, sure, but let's face it, you'd expect MP3 to be a pretty standard format to use. I feel cheated and not respected as a customer of the product when the developers resort to this kind of money-grubbing.

Well, I was going to give 2 starts because of the MP3 thing, but to be fair, overall this is a really nice piece of software, so it deserves a balanced review. Happy recording!