BobF
Thanks for the info Bapu ... I guess I need to scratch some hardware off of the list 

With a high enough credit limit, you CAN have both. IJS.

BobF
Thanks for the info Bapu ... I guess I need to scratch some hardware off of the list 

Or.......just start collaborating!!

Mesh

BobF
Thanks for the info Bapu ... I guess I need to scratch some hardware off of the list 

Or.......just start collaborating!!

Or start coagulating. IJS.

BobF
Thanks for the info Bapu ... I guess I need to scratch some hardware off of the list 

You got Cat Scratch fever?

bapu

BobF
Thanks for the info Bapu ... I guess I need to scratch some hardware off of the list 

With a high enough credit limit, you CAN have both. IJS.

I just realized ... I still have both kidneys - a quick sale and I'm golden!!

OK, I officially hate you guys.
Why should I get BIAB? What do you compare it to? What am I missing?

OK , since a good deal of this thread is about is there anything else out there besides BIAB …
it is my duty to mention one of the best open source freeware  options out there …
Impro-Visor 
https://www.cs.hmc.edu/~keller/jazz/improvisor/ 
 
Impro-Visor when it first came out was geared more towards Jazz players who want to explore the advanced elements of improvisation . As it has grown in acceptance and gotten a larger user base it has added other genres
( I still use it mostly for Jazz and I haven't added the other styles yet ) 
Impro-Visor is not as sophisticated and complex as BIAB when it comes to creating backing tracks of various musical genres , Yet  Impro- Visor does in fact hold its own up against anything I have ever heard when it comes to creating improvised solo's over chord changes …
I have used this program for about 3 or 4 years on and off and I can say the vocabularies  it bases its solos on are shocking …one of my favorites is the Bill Evans vocabulary ….
Anyway , Impro-Visor is a little quirky and takes a little getting used to ….The onboard synth sounds cheesy , but once an export of your song / improvisation is done as a midi file , you have the option to go full tilt in whatever DAW you happen to want to use for your VST sounds….
The main gist of this app is to create solos to play and analyze, so the backing parts are a little light ….
Also Bob Keller's personal site is a goldmine of excellent resources if you happen to be into Jazz oriented learning resources …
 
in other news , 
bapu , I really enjoyed your post and you are making a lot of sense on how you use BIAB …
 
Kenny
 
 
 

bapu
BobF,
 
I've used BIAB for about 4 years now. It's more sophisticated than CP but the results can be magnitudes better. If I didn't have such good friends to collab with (ohgrant, jaymesg1213, daryl1968, Beagle just to name drop a few) I could see myself producing full songs with BIAB being my collaborators.
 
The RealBand soloist feature (for a non soloist like me) can be a real boon to a song. Of course nothing can replace the originality of collaborators. But if you are limited in budget or collaborators BIAB could be just the thing for any composer to explore not only chord progressions but solos as well.
 
The only thing I will say that BIAB suffers from (if one were to use only it for tracks) is drums. It's not a robotic Casio but it's not very expressive. They say you can get the drums MIDI but I've never been all that impressed with what BIAB does with drums. I usually build my own; typically using grooves from the chosen drum VST or the multitude of purchased grooves I own.
 

^ THIS (and back atcha baps!)
I've had BIAB since version 12, IIRC.  the GUI is clunky and very "DOS-like" (8bit graphics, GUI refresh is horrible) and the menus and "finding things" in the menus are complicated and very non-intuitive.
 
But it is WELL worth the effort!  I've released songs with parts of BIAB real tracks and even its MIDI sent through Konktakt or other softsyth before.  I use it regularly still for scratch pad and once I've hashed out a song structure, I'll send a demo to my collaborators using BIAB.  then I'll drag and drop the tracks into Sonar, set up a template with chord changes, measure markers, etc and send that to my collaborators and we'll use that for creating real tracks of our own for use in the master project file for mixing and engineering.
 
beyond that, pg music is an AWESOME customer oriented company!  they will bend over backwards for you!

oh, but also, don't buy it right now!  they always come out with a new version at the end of November or the beginning of December for the new year with new features and new real tracks and they ALWAYS have a "new version sale" when they release it!

After reading this thread, I am going to check out Chord Pulse, but I'll be surprised if it can do as much for me as Jammer Pro has.  I have not used BIAB, but have checked out their demo samples and have the impression that it's very strong in Jazz, but not as strong in Pop and Rock as what I have found in Jammer Pro (but maybe I am missing something).  It's just too bad that Jammer Pro is not actively supported, but can still be bought and used successfully.
 
Like others have mentioned, I also bring the resulting MIDI files into Sonar and use its instruments to improve the sounds and also to lay down a vocal, which can't be done in Jammer Pro.  Since I feel I would be cheating anyone who was willing to pay for me singing, I use my production to get feedback on the song and as a work tape to send to a pro demo studio which has singers on call. 
 
Although I write both music and lyrics, I am not a performing musician so I use a notation program, MuseScore (free), to come up with the original MIDI file for my piano-developed melody which I bring into Jammer Pro, into which I then insert my chord progressions.
 
Don Coyne
http://www.Broadjam.com/doncoyne