Question for exeperienced engineers!

I'll start off by saying this is not a thread about what's better, looking for some advice from some more experienced people.

I have been getting very into music production and engineering, I have both tried and as reaper and sonar just to get a feel for them both, I think they are both amazing DAW's.

Now what I am asking is I have a little abit of money a month for a subscription. Would you guys recommend going with sonar subscription and use the plug ins that sonar give you access to or the other option is go with reaper and go for the slate everything bundle.

Open to any information or advice on what to choose and everyone thoughts on how sonar plugins go against slate.

The daw of choice isn't so much an issue but just best value for money mainly.

Thanks.

Thanks for the quick reply,

Yeh, I understand that, how would you say sonar plugins compare to say other third party plug ins?

I'm more amazed at the amount that's available, with sonar you get console emulators, tape, the l-phase multi and eq aswell as the large amount of virtual instruments, even addictive drums.

I guess in a way I like the idea of getting more bang for your buck. Is this normal for higher prices daw's or are sonar just great in that you get your money worths.

Thanks.

This is just my opinion, but I think Slate plugins sound a bit better than the ones included in SONAR.  But, as Larry said in the above post, see what's available in both packages to compare the "Bang for Buck" factor.  However, I would offer this as a caveat: just because one package offers more plugins than the other doesn't make it the best deal.  In my experience I've found that of the 10 zillion plugins I own I probably use about 15 regularly, so I would encourage to you decide what you need, plugins wise, and then see which package fits your needs. 
 
Good luck with your music!

Hi mzagas,
 
You haven't said anything about your level of experience, your background, etc. nor have you said anything about how you plan to use the tools nor anything about the genre(s) you plan to work in.  Similarly to what jude77 said, your particular "biggest bang for the buck" could easily be completely different than someone else's.
 
If you are a programmer with spare time, for example, then building your own stuff should obtain you the biggest bang for the buck but could also be horribly inefficient.  If you're not a programmer or don't have spare time, this isn't even conceivable as an option.
 
If you plan to perform, then you don't need many if any synths.  If you are into EDM, you'll almost certainly want to have a lot of them if not a couple of very powerful ones, the choice between these two options depending on how you like to work.
 
There are so incredibly many options that it's impossible for anyone to give you a good answer with any real assurance.  Also, you may very well have narrowed down your choices prematurely, but that's also impossible to know without information about your background and goals.
 
If you've just decided to jump in and try a bunch of stuff out, then I would say just get a copy of Computer Music Magazine with a DVD and you'd have a lot of pretty good stuff for almost nothing.  Download evaluation copies of several DAWs and have at it.  Save your extra cash until you really know what you want, otherwise you might well regret having spent so much with so little to show for it.
 
Good luck,
Dave Clark
 

rsinger

Can you hear the difference between something like the Quad EQ on its various settings? Can you hear the difference between different EQs? Can you hear the difference between different compressors?

If you can't honestly answer the above questions, don't buy anything yet. Demo all you can to get a start about what you want.

Reaper is a great program for the price. So is Sonar. You will just have to listen and let your ears decide.

mudgel
I just had an opportunity to demo the Slate Everything Bundle.
I have all the Waves plugs, Melda, Ozone plus a couple hundred more.

General comment on Slate. Meh! Don't really need them nor see why the fuss.
Now I'm not against Slate as I run a Raven MTi1 and it's great.

The funny thing though is that as I've become more experienced I use less plugins. Why? I'm glad you asked. Because experience has taught me how to get what's going into the box to be the best it can be, so now that I don't have to fix it in the box let alone in the mix or even the master, plugins have less of a place. They still have their place but now I don't fight with them, or put them n just because I have them.

Of course sometimes the job is to fix something but that's a whole other kettle of fish. The beauty is that there's a plugin for everything. But only when you need it.

Bingo.