Logic 10.5 vs DP 10.1

[Gravity Jim]

I'm weighing the differences between current versions of DP and Logic myself. I love DP, but it has some kind of problem with my system... two days ago I had to reinstall the OS thanks to a problem loading the most recent security update for Mojave. As soon as I did, DP starting crashing randomly again. So I reinstalled DP. No joy.

As of this morning, DP is back to its old tricks, locking up, displaying the spinning beach ball, demanding to be force quit and restarted multiple times in a day. I had this same problem months ago, but I have no idea what made that problem go away, so I can't fix it.

As a result, I fired up Logic, and I have to say, I still like the streamlined interface (I know there's supposed to be some advantage to DP's method of handling software instruments, but in my workflow there isn't one) and enjoy the much improved audio handling. I'm not saying "I quit DP for Logic Pro." But right this minute, unless I can figure out why DP crashes all the time, Logic is a better tool.

For many months, working in DP was like using a hammer with a head that fell off every 20 minutes. It eventually stopped and DP became stable again... but if that's starting up again, I'll just use Logic until a new version of DP comes along.

[bayswater]

I know the annoyance. I use a CAD app that is stable for about 30. minutes, then needs a restart. Out of the blue, key commands stop working, images disappear, random crashes, etc. If there was an affordable alternative, I'd be all over it.

I work with people who use Logic so tried to set up a set of templates and workflows with Logic but hit brick walls. Still working my way through Multi timbral and multi out VIs, tracks versus channels, preferences versus settings, umpteen types of drummer tracks, mysteries of the Environment ... Looks like you have all that worked out.

On the topic, DP versus Logic, in my attempts to learn Logic, it occurred to me that these are really two different apps. DP, like some other DAWs e.g., Mixbus, is a traditional studio in a computer with a close one to one relationship between what you did in the studio and what you do in DP. Logic is a way to make music without musicians (possibly, other than yourself, but not even that is necessary if you have good idea). One of the markers of this is when you create an Audio track and the question is whether you're going to record a vocal or a guitar. You don't need to record anything else; it's in the library already. Someone has already recorded it for you. Another is that Logic will not let you do anything until you download some basic "content". Logic has concepts, objects, processes etc that never existed in a traditional studio, and this is what a lot of people want.

Not unrelated, I listened to a discussion about current top 40 lists -- apparently, there are very few bands any more in that list. On of the discussants pointed out that a creative person with a great idea used to have to start by assembling a band and finding a studio. But they don't need to do that any more, they can just fire up Logic, find the right drummer tracks, a few loops, record their voice, and they're done.

[Michael Canavan]

I know the annoyance. I use a CAD app that is stable for about 30. minutes, then needs a restart. Out of the blue, key commands stop working, images disappear, random crashes, etc. If there was an affordable alternative, I'd be all over it.

I work with people who use Logic so tried to set up a set of templates and workflows with Logic but hit brick walls. Still working my way through Multi timbral and multi out VIs, tracks versus channels, preferences versus settings, umpteen types of drummer tracks, mysteries of the Environment ... Looks like you have all that worked out.

On the topic, DP versus Logic, in my attempts to learn Logic, it occurred to me that these are really two different apps. DP, like some other DAWs e.g., Mixbus, is a traditional studio in a computer with a close one to one relationship between what you did in the studio and what you do in DP. Logic is a way to make music without musicians (possibly, other than yourself, but not even that is necessary if you have good idea). One of the markers of this is when you create an Audio track and the question is whether you're going to record a vocal or a guitar. You don't need to record anything else; it's in the library already. Someone has already recorded it for you. Another is that Logic will not let you do anything until you download some basic "content". Logic has concepts, objects, processes etc that never existed in a traditional studio, and this is what a lot of people want.

Not unrelated, I listened to a discussion about current top 40 lists -- apparently, there are very few bands any more in that list. On of the discussants pointed out that a creative person with a great idea used to have to start by assembling a band and finding a studio. But they don't need to do that any more, they can just fire up Logic, find the right drummer tracks, a few loops, record their voice, and they're done.

IMO you're mostly correct. DP started as a MIDI sequencer as well, but Logic has a lot of legacy oddities because of this beginning. MOTU developed MAS, I think that's the defining difference, Emagic Logic used third party MIDI and audio drivers, VST for plug ins, and Opcodes MIDI environment, ASIO for audio. Meanwhile MOTU developed FreeMIDI and MAS for plug ins and their audio drivers for OS 9. Basically Emagic Logic had to tack on third party work to get up and running for being a DAW. Emagic was quick to adopt Audio Units and was then subsequently bought by Apple. To this day there are parts of Logic that are ancient, the Click and Ports layer in the Environment is old time MIDI, they built a few features that DP and others can't do in there. I had a MIDI step sequencer in the style of the old analog ones in there that was pretty cool back in around 2004.

It's not necessarily accurate to say Logic is geared just towards loops though, that seems to be a common theme here, and it's... interesting. There are at least a half dozen other DAWs that do Loops at a higher (or more drastically important part of the DNA of the DAW) level.

Mostly Logic does things that make sense on a computer only, with no equivalent in a hardware studio of yesteryear. Multi instruments is probably the best example, Logic make what I could only call "aux instrument" tracks for multi instruments like Kontakt etc. So you set up 8 tracks for a multi and you get what looks like identical instrument tracks complete with MIDI in out to Kontakt, but it sorta looks like you have 9 instances of Kontakt. This isn't intuitive at all, but it's really useful once you get used to it not being like a hardware mixer and/or a MIDI sequencer to sampler/synth etc. setup like the way DP treats it. In DP though you would have a total of 17 tracks for 8 multi outs from Kontakt: the instrument track, 8 MIDI tracks, and 8 Aux or Audio tracks. Along with setting up the bussing for all of that; the whole process is miles faster in Logic because Logic doesn't emulate hardware in it's wiring. Personally I find it kind of disconcerting at first, but it makes much more sense in the digital realm to just address the problem rather than clutter an arrangement. It should be noted that this is the last phase of many that multi instrument handling went though in Logic.
Another big distinction is VEP handling, Logic does 16 MIDI channels requiring far more iterations of the VEP plug in to handle large setups, and I don't know how it can get above 256 since it doesn't differentiate by port at input.? There's an Environment hack to lower the CPU use in Logic, but this is where DP's studio paradigm pays off, MAS can handle 768 MIDI channels over 48 ports.

Logic does confront you with a lot of Garage Band things, loops, the AI drummer, easy setup assistant, but the core is almost as old as DP, so there is advanced MIDI and audio editing under the hood. It's still my second choice for an old school DAW if DP takes a dive, I think it's miles better than Cubase, Pro Tools, Studio One, etc. You do have to spend some time making it behave when you first get into it, but I think that's true of DP, setting up a better shortcut for the track selector, understanding the importance of using Clippings for faster templates etc. etc.

Basically all I'm saying is non recording studio based UX =/= looping tool.

[mhschmieder]

I can't think of a DAW that is more stable, reliable, and better at passing plug-ins than DP, but recently on GS someone said it's one of the worst. Then they listed the ones that are better, and they're ones I never use. So I stand by my claim, conditionally, as it is WAY better than StudioOne (which I finally sold, but before the brand-new version that just came out), Cubase, or Logic Pro.

Logic is the worst for AU validation, ironically. It crashes constantly, and has the lowest ratio of passed validations. Of course it doesn't do VST.

Cubase is VST-only, and it can be confusing once the app is running whether you have a VST2 or VST3 instance and/or which ones failed validation. I'm going to have to bone up on this soon though as I now do plug-in development for a living. I really don't use Cubase even though I own it. It can freeze up a lot during validation, as most windows go behind and can't be unhidden or unblocked. Run-time status of validation in Cubase is the worst of all.

StudioOne's validation of both AU and VST began to improve shortly before I sold it. A few years back, it had the highest failure rate of any DAW that I own or have owned. Not to mention the slowest (though that award probably goes to Cubase these days, as Logic is now faster than it used to be).

The DAW whose name cannot be said, is for better or worse now mandated as part of my job, and is supposed to become my primary validation tool for the work that I do. My free trial ends soon and for reasons that have been discussed on this forum years ago, I am not cool with spending money on it. But I have no choice due to my job. What I don't yet know, is how good its plug-in validation is in comparison, and whether I'd get a false sense of security if my plug-in passes. It does seem more lenient than the others, in initial comparisons, but I still haven't delved into it that deeply.