PT LE vs Logic Studio (8)

[bigedawg]

I'm trying to decide between PT LE and Logic Studio (8). I'll run on a MBP 2.2ghz, 2 gig of ram. I mainly record accoustic instruments and run loops in reason/live for praise/worship. what the pros vs. cons of each

[gracejames]

bigedawg: Honestly, i would get both. Most people who argue for either software have valid points but i'm surprised that most people don't just get both. L8 is incredible and has better compositional tools. PT has the audio editing and Beat Detective for drums. So, go for both with your situation. If you can afford a MBP, you can afford both software.
Thats all i gotsa to say about that.

[megahurt]

Wow... gracejames seems to be on a different level financially than most of us.

[lwilliam]

I wouldn't think so. Most of us who make money from music have many thousands (or tens of thousands) of dollars invested in music equipment including guitars, keyboards, mics, amps, monitors, etc.

Another $500 for a whole new set of tools to create music is really not that big of an investment. I have way more than that invested in just my Waves plugins. Producing one song using Logic will more than pay for the package.

I'm not comfortable using LP8 in front of paying clients yet, but I'm coming up to speed over time with it.

[EDurney]

What is the hardest part - from a pro tools user perspective- to understand about Logic pro 8? i`m planning to buy it too....but..is it too different?

share your opinions....

[lwilliam]

There are still some bugs such as no independent control over multi-instruments like for Kontakt2 or SampleTank. In PT, you create multiple midi tracks for independent control of each instrument loaded - volume and pan, for instance. You can still have stereo outputs or you can route each instrument to an independent output using an aux channel in PT.

In Logic, you cannot control the volume of each instrument that way. You lower the value of CC7 in one midi track, it affects the overall output of all instruments, not just the one on that channel. Apparently, this is the way Logic has "always worked". It's still a bug to me since it doesn't follow the midi spec on independent control based on separate midi channels. The "workaround" is to use separate outputs for each instrument and control the volume that way. This just seems convoluted to me and is simply wrong (no other midi app works that way) - especially for an app that is supposed to be so "midi-savvy".

There is no audiosuite equivalent in Logic Pro. Logic users are requesting a "bounce in place" feature. For now, you typically automate whatever plugin you might want to affect only a part of the track.

Another bug is that LP8 currently won't save any assignment you do to Rewire devices like Reason. You can bring up the tracks and assign them to Reason instruments, but the next time you open that song, it will have forgotten which instruments were assigned to which tracks.

When editing audio, you have to switch tools all the time depending on whether you are cutting, crossfading, changing the region length, etc. With PT, you just move the multi-purpose tool the the correct part of the waveform or region.

There is no pre or post roll in Logic. Bummer. I really love that about both PT and DP.

Muting and solo are different in Logic (track mute vs fader mute) and they aren't necessarily linked (in LP8, you can now at least link them as an option).

In PT, you can set whatever nudge factor your want in milliseconds, beats, etc. In Logic, there are only preset nudge amounts. For instance, I have my PTLE nudge set to 10ms. In Logic, the closest setting is "1/2 frame". Go figure...

In Logic, if you copy/paste a region, it creates an alias, not an independent copy. This is simply weird and caught me a couple of times because when you modify the pasted copy, you also modify the original. Making an alias is handy at times, but not as a default option for copy/paste.

However, LP8 is a LOT better than LP7.2.3. I totally gave up on 7.2.3 because of the buggy behavior (one time re-opened a session and it had transposed half of my midi horn parts for no apparent reason).

Overall, I really think LP8 is better than 7.2.3, but Apple really needs to make an 8.1 pretty soon. Logic DOES have PDC, Freeze tracks, and bouncing faster than real time, all of which we've been screaming for in PTLE for years.

Logic also includes virtually everything that Digi offers in the AIR instruments in the $500 price. All kinds of synths, a very respectable sampler, tons of apple loops (if you want them), a bounce to MP3 option, Waveburner, and now they've thrown in Soundtrack Pro and Mainstage (I haven't used either yet). It's quite a package, but it's still got some stabilizing to do IMHO.

It's also much more CPU efficient than PTLE - and of course, LOTS and LOTS of tracks are available.

PTLE does have Beat Detective and will very soon have liquid audio. I use BD all the time and really can't live without it. Liquid audio is rumored to be the successor to BD, so we'll see...

[gracejames]

heh...nah. I'm just a songwriter/home studio type. Not a big studio with
10 different mic-pres and tons of mics. If you can't afford
the 500, get Express for 199 and also Mbox Mini for 299. Thats pretty reasonable
for best of both world results. Another thought,...with Leopard coming out, you may want to get going
on Logic first till PT8/Leopard is ready.

[GTBannah]

IWilliam seems to have the handles on both apps, man!

I am thinking of getting Logic Express to go with PT LE. I also want to get a MBP with the 4Gb RAM option as a mobile solution. Do you think that would be able to run ALL the A.I.R. instruments, along with the "Structure" samples comfortably?

[lwilliam]

I would certainly hope so. You should be able to run multiple instances of the AIR plugins - how many, I'm not sure. I don't think any of them are THAT CPU instensive, but I would post on the Virtual Instruments board here to see what the CPU utilization is for Velvet and the others.

[Stiff]

There are still some bugs such as no independent control over multi-instruments like for Kontakt2 or SampleTank.

I got Kontakt 3 two days ago, installed it yesterday. Got SampleTank 2.5 a few days ago as well. It's gonna be "fun" to see this as I haven't experienced it yet.

When editing audio, you have to switch tools all the time depending on whether you are cutting, crossfading, changing the region length, etc. With PT, you just move the multi-purpose tool the the correct part of the waveform or region.

Or use key commands! This is certainly one of the more annoying things with Logic. Sure, the ESC button works OK but I'll never get up to the speed I have in PT.

In Logic, if you copy/paste a region, it creates an alias, not an independent copy. This is simply weird and caught me a couple of times because when you modify the pasted copy, you also modify the original. Making an alias is handy at times, but not as a default option for copy/paste.

Eh? Have you checked your options? Copy+paste doesn't create aliases for me.

Liquid audio is rumored to be the successor to BD, so we'll see...

There's a video of it from AES for all you who haven't seen it. Looks pretty good.