Reason 2.5 First Impressions

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Tue Jun 15, 2004 10:38 am

I bought a laptop and Reason because I travel a lot. I won't consider a Magama at this time. This software is a great value and is really catching on. One similarity with the SFP is that it has a teeny tiny annoying and tedious GUI which for some idiotic reason was designed to mimic hardware. I also wonder why the drum machines only have 32 patterns? Never mind that point though since most of us will be using it with another sequencer. Don't ever make the mistake of renaming a drive after you started using this or you will lose your sampler settings for your own patches. For me the auto replace feature didn't work at all. I thought of putting the name of the drive back to what it was but I forgot it

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Nisse · Post by **Nisse** » Tue Jun 15, 2004 12:12 pm

Im getting a laptop too in august to be able to make music when Im not home. Since Im not going to haul my Pulsars around I´ll use reason and a couple of other plugs in it.

What are the specs on your laptop and how well does it run with Reason? Im interested to know how it works out.

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Tue Jun 15, 2004 12:35 pm

From what I have heard Reason will run well on just about any decent laptop. I can't say I have fully tested it yet but I have a Fujitsu Lifebook 5010 3 gigahertz. It seems very fast and cheaply built. The Dell Inspiron series is also very fast and cheaply built and possibly a better vaulue. You might want to consider an Echo Audio Indigo card for that although right now they are having a lot of defects. I had to send mine back twice. An alternative would be the free http://michael.tippach.bei.t-online.de/asio4all/ ASIO driver for any audio card!

Nisse · Post by **Nisse** » Tue Jun 15, 2004 12:47 pm

How easy is it to change audio card and put in extra ram in a laptop? Is it possible at all? I have no experience at all with laptops.

Im getting an Fujitsu Siemens Amilo D1840 with 3ghz and 512 MB ram. Not sure exactly what audio card it features. I´ll run Cubase SX, Reason 2,5, Halion and a couple of more soft synths on it.

Edit: That Asio driver for any audio card thingie looks promising.

_________________
An eye for an eye, and soon the whole world is blind.

/Mahatma Gandhi

[ This Message was edited by: Nisse on 2004-06-15 13:49 ]

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Tue Jun 15, 2004 12:59 pm

Most laptops come with a sound card built in. The Indigo plugs into a slot on the side and then you tell your software to use that card's driver rather than the built in audio. Adding RAM is very easy from what I have been told. You can buy it online at sites such as kingston.com.

borg · Post by **borg** » Tue Jun 15, 2004 5:16 pm

the only laptops providing excellent latency performance and audio quality with built in soundcards are macs, afaik. but then you'll still only have stereo out. (i think sony vayo has good built in audio as well)

the echodj (or something) has had great user reports by ableton live users. it's a 'pcmcia card' (the same interface as magma and RME multiface).
if you want multiple i/o and workable latency, at a 'reasonable' price, firewire is the way to go. like the m audio fw 410

here's ableton's shop with above mentionned cards bundled with live. (so you can just get the idea).

reason must be the most stable and lightweight audio app and runs on almost any computer indeed. mainly because it's a closed environment: no vst(i)'s, midi out,... only rewire.
what reason3 will bring seems a big secret, but they'd better be quick, before ableton take a real big bite with their new version.

you might gonna like it too much i'm really happy with a 1Ghz P3 toshiba satellite, RME multiface, Lacie fw 60Gig drive. this has become the 'controlling center' and 'recording room' of my DAW. the old G3 mac has three CW cards and that's that. all connected thru adat and midi
a few weeks back, i went to a friends' studio, with just a laptop bag and my old A8 (adat to RME) under my arm. we effortlessly dumped a 16 track 2" tape from his huge tascam recorder to ableton live on the laptop. on the spot, i ran the master output through some vst's... this tape fetishist couldn't believe what he was hearing, laughing with disbelief. and then we still had to head to my place to run it through scope.
excuse my carrying away. mere mortal men have so much power at their fingertips. that is if your lucky enough to land your feet on the right spot at birth. and people here still complain, feel threatened and vote for an extremist and, by court convicted, racist party.

_________________
andy
 the lunatics are in the hall 

[ This Message was edited by: borg on 2004-06-15 18:17 ]

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Tue Jun 15, 2004 5:29 pm

ASIO4All is excellent. It gives any sound card acceptable latency. I am using it while I wait for my Echo Audio Indigo. There has been a great buzz about Ableton Live. I'll probably end up getting it next year.

[ This Message was edited by: braincell on 2004-06-15 18:33 ]

samplaire · Post by **samplaire** » Tue Jun 15, 2004 5:30 pm

On 2004-06-15 18:16, borg wrote:
the only laptops providing excellent latency performance and audio quality with built in soundcards are macs, afaik.

Not only :
1. http://michael.tippach.bei.t-online.de/asio4all/
2. http://www.asio2ks.de/download.html

3. http://www.usb-audio.com/download.html

samplaire · Post by **samplaire** » Tue Jun 15, 2004 5:31 pm

I was a minute later

borg · Post by **borg** » Tue Jun 15, 2004 6:36 pm

ah, thanks... that looks good. that is, if your laptop has a decent output. the minijack out of my toshiba wiggles, and sometimes has bad contact.

Nisse · Post by **Nisse** » Tue Jun 15, 2004 7:47 pm

This is excellent info. Thanks guys!

I presume my laptop wont ship with an uber card, ASIO drivers and minuscule latency, but the things you tell me here about them drivers and the indigo cards gives me great hope.

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Wed Jun 16, 2004 1:04 am

I know what you mean. That happened to my little radio. I hate the way things are so poorly made these days.

On 2004-06-15 19:36, borg wrote:
ah, thanks... that looks good. that is, if your laptop has a decent output. the minijack out of my toshiba wiggles, and sometimes has bad contact.

samplaire · Post by **samplaire** » Wed Jun 16, 2004 2:37 am

My Luna (SPDIF) had a bad contact, too. Or I don't know; it just stopped working one day

This is strange BTW - the SPDIF output works 100% while the in doesn't at all. It worked bad since the beginning (sync dropouts) and on day just died

I don't know if I could do anything about it. I just got used to it...

[ This Message was edited by: samplaire on 2004-06-16 03:38 ]

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Wed Jun 16, 2004 3:02 pm

My SPDIF input has not worked for a long time on my Pulsar I and my Luna II. The SPDIF output works though. I contacted supoort a few times with no reply and I gave up on it. It used to work years ago. I think they changed something in the software which made it flake out. I haven't tried it with version 4 yet though.