Best:
Alesis ADAT black face $4000 - Got a lot of songs recorded on it and still have them in wav files. Gave unit away after 10 years.
Mackie 24.8 mixer $4000 - One of the first USA made ones, got 12 years use out of it and sold it for $900 cash. Good usable preamps.
Yamaha NS-10m speakers $319 - Used for 12 years then sold for $550 on e-bay WOW !
AKG C-414BULS $900 - Used for 13 years and sold for $500, great sound, no problems. Broke me, but also broke me from buying lots of mics trying get a good sound. There were no cheap condensors in those days.
----Note: All the above gear purchased in the early 90s.----

Worst:
Fostex 450 mixer $900, did not get one good track or mix made with it, preamps hissed, gave it away to non-musician, so bad I was too embarrased to try to sell it.
Alesis PCR card (ADAT Edit system) $400, OK, I did get it to work on Windows 95 but the drivers were never updated for any other operating system and it was a real trick getting a good transfer from the ADAT took several tries and you had to listen to make sure there were no glitches. Total loss, have not bought a single Alesis product since.

Best money I ever spent was on bass traps, auralex, and the bloke who told me where to put them.
Oh, and my Fostex E16 (20 years old this week) and my Revox A77 (34 years old) both which work as they did on the day they were bought.

Best purchase: About 6 months ago, I bought a used Roland JV-1010 synth module from Guitar Center for $100. Last week, I bought a "60's & 70's Keyboards" expansion board. Upon installing it, much to my surprise, there was already a "Country Collection" board installed. Just yesterday, one of these boards sold on ebay for $145. The way it worked out in the end, Guitar Center essentially gave me $45 to take the module off their hands. All because whoever traded it in forgot or didn't know to remove the board first.

The JV-1010 is a great module. If I had the patience to mess with programming & bouncing from external hardware, I would still have mine. The string ensemble patches were actually quite good. I used to audition them with clips from the 3rd movement of Rachmaninoff's 2nd symphony. That was FUN.

Best: RealTraps, Studio Projects C1, custom DAW for Sonar (Liquid DAW), custom DAW for GS3E (ADK Pro Audio), Purrrfect Drums, UAD-1.

Worst: Autotune (PACE infested. Took down 2 DAWs), RBC Voice Tweaker (Could not install on new DAW and could not get any support from RBC)

and....................





Guess which is which

a picture says a thousand words...

ah, but the Kore controller is so purdy! I was this close to buying one, it was silly cheap in Dubai where I was living when it came out, but something told me no, don't believe the hype, nor the pretty lights, this way madness lies. Considering the amount of stuff they ended up giving away with it to try to keep people happy, I almost wished I had for a while... almost...

whatever the thousand words that monkey says, or the freaky vibrating pig, I think I am glad I cannot hear. Truly Disturbing!

BEST sonar 6 producer it has not failed me yet

WORST, right now it's lookin like b.f.d sad to say

best sonar 6

worst its lookin like b.f.d

ORIGINAL: subtlearts

a picture says a thousand words...

ah, but the Kore controller is so purdy! I was this close to buying one, it was silly cheap in Dubai where I was living when it came out, but something told me no, don't believe the hype, nor the pretty lights, this way madness lies. Considering the amount of stuff they ended up giving away with it to try to keep people happy, I almost wished I had for a while... almost...

whatever the thousand words that monkey says, or the freaky vibrating pig, I think I am glad I cannot hear. Truly Disturbing!

And I've been using it since before it was released (I'm the KORE forum moderator) with both 2.2 XL and 6 PE (I didn't update Sonar from 2.2 until a couple months ago; I've been a Sonar user since 1.0). I haven't had issues with it in either one.

ew