What facilities do you want? Do you need multi-tracking? Are you just recording or do you need MIDI sequencing as well? What hardware does it have to work with? Are you expecting to mix using this package?

Both Audacity and Kristal Engine are essentially free and are good at what they are designed to do. However, you may actually be better off paying the relatively small amount of money for a program such as Reaper.

What are the specs on your computer?

With a reasonable Pentium4 or better? It's not free but it is a hell of a package and that is Sony Vegas 7 or 8. Available for only a few hundred dollars. You get full-blown standard definition & high-definition video editing built into a multitrack audio recorder/workstation. Bundled with DVD Architect 4.5, can hardly be beat.

Sure you can use those free software's, another inexpensive one would be Mackie Traction. But I can't praise Vegas enough. It's quickly becoming my favorite program for almost everything I'm doing these days. And remember, it's a beautiful CD editor & burner.

You've spent money on equipment now spend it on something as important as your equipment. After all you're not using a Radio Shaft color computer from 1980 are you? I didn't think so.

Be a manly engineer & get yourself some real manly software.
Ms. Remy Ann David

Remy, do you have any experience with Vegas 6?
A guy I know has it, but never uses it (used it once, I think).
Besides the hazy licensing that would be a problem, does v6 miss anything big from v7?

I'm seeing what Yahoo comes up with, but there's a difference between a corporate webpage and a personal experience.

I'll get back to you on specs, but what I would like to be able to do is just record multi-track and maybe master a bit. I'm only planning on using it for basic recordings for handin out free demos, nothing fancy.

[="http://www.kreatives.org/kristal/index.php"]Kristal[/]="http://www.kreative…"]Kristal[/] is basic.
For real editing you'll want (to pay for) something a little more powerful.

[[url=http://="http://reaper.fm/"]Also[/]="http://reaper.fm/"]Also[/], [="http://audacity.sourceforge.net/"]try[/]="http://audacity.sou…"]try[/] [[url=http://="http://www.mutools…"]some[/]="http://www.mutools…"]some[/] [="http://traverso-daw.org/"]of[/]="http://traverso-daw…"]of[/] [[url=http://="http://www.nch.com…"]these[/]="http://www.nch.com…"]these[/].

Another non-free but very good program is reaper (http://www.reaper.fm). Also, should cost less than Vegas ($50 for a non-commercial license, $225 for a commercial license). Plus it has way better signal routing options than pretty much any other DAW software I know.

I wrote:
"[[url=http://[/URL]="http://reaper.fm/"]Also[/]="http://reaper.fm/"]Also[/],"

The rest of the sentence contained more links to free and awesome programs.

If would recommend Sony Acid software as a cheap yet decen option. Particular if you use loops alot - the functionality for it is top notch.

Codemonkey wrote: I wrote:
"[[url=http://[/URL]="http://reaper.fm/"]Also[/]="http://reaper.fm/"]Also[/],"

The rest of the sentence contained more links to free and awesome programs.

I did notice that, but IMO REAPER deserves more than just one word ;)

Heh.

(Man of few words, until you mention computers, politics, maths, women, or say something I disagree with).