Kristal is nice, Audacity is Ubiquitous, but for my .02 I'd like to put REAPER as the freebie/demoable DAW software of choice. You can use it as a full featured program for personal study for free ( I think ), and the pro version, which doesn't have anything special added to it, just the pride of knowing you're helping out a cool guy, is only $50. Any of the three will work, as long as you've got a PC. If you're on a mac, use Garageband, and if you're on Linux, god help you

-N

p.s. just google these guys to download them

Hrmm....
Where did I leave that post...

[[url=http://[/URL]="http://recording.or…"]Aha![/]="http://recording.or…"]Aha![/]
Note that about halfway down that thread I post a sentence with 5 separate links in it.

I'm going to use every damn freebie out there and write reviews/a comparison on them all. Then post it here in a massive list.

For now, Kristal if you want to multitrack a lot. Mulab if you want proper effects but limited track count. Audacity if you want a basic waveform editor.

Reaper is available for Mac now and it works on Linux through winE.

basilbowman wrote: I'd like to put REAPER as the freebie/demoable DAW software of choice. You can use it as a full featured program for personal study for free ( I think ), and the pro version, which doesn't have anything special added to it, just the pride of knowing you're helping out a cool guy, is only $50.

Not quite correct. $50 buys you a non commercial license for personal use only. The full 'pro' version (which as you say is exactly the same) costs $225.

The demo period is officially 1 month, but the demo is unrestricted apart from a nag screen, and will run for as long as you want it to. (My own demo period lasted about 3 months... then I accidentally got paid for something I mixed with it, so felt obliged to buy a commercial license!)

basilbowman wrote: Kristal is nice, Audacity is Ubiquitous, but for my .02 I'd like to put REAPER as the freebie/demoable DAW software of choice. You can use it as a full featured program for personal study for free ( I think ), and the pro version, which doesn't have anything special added to it, just the pride of knowing you're helping out a cool guy, is only $50. Any of the three will work, as long as you've got a PC. If you're on a mac, use Garageband, and if you're on Linux, god help you

-N

p.s. just google these guys to download them

Not accurate regarding Reaper licensing. A non-commercial / personal use license is $50. a commercial use license is $250. You are permitted a 30 trial period after which you are expected to pay up or remove it.

obiwankaczynski wrote: I'm also worried that after I get one of these programs it won't recognize the us-122.....

What happened to Cubase LE that came with the Tascam? That's a great bit of software and way more useable than most of the free choices, with the exception of Reaper.

Incidentally, for Linux there is [="http://ardour.org/"]Ardour[/]="http://ardour.org/"]Ardour[/] which is looking pretty darn good these days. It looks as though they are incorporating VST, AU and or Wrapper ability. On the site they have a screenshot showing Waves and SSL plugins.

It's not "free" anymore though you can choose to pay from $0.00-$whatever you have in your pocket.

There's also [[url=http://="http://traverso-daw…"]Traverso[/]="http://traverso-daw…"]Traverso[/], [="http://www.mixxx.org/"]Mixx[/]="http://www.mixxx.or…"]Mixx[/], [[url=http://="http://createdigita…"]Muse LE[/]="http://createdigita…"]Muse LE[/] and I'm sure there are others.