I got started with Synapse Orion. It's not exactly what I'd consider the prime piece to use for a serious production effort, but it IS a very functional sequencer that I found easy to learn without prior production experience. I do owe it some respect for being a good learning platform for when I was first starting out. It is actually a nice piece, although my main complaint is it tends to be unstable. It's compact, doesn't suck down a ton of memory, and is easy to get started with.

The demo is not crippled other than the fact it will not save your work. But you can futz with it to your hearts content.

http://www.synapse-audio.com/demo.php?id=1400

They also have three VSTs up for demo, Hydra, Scorpion and Plucked String, all of which can generate some nice sounds. Orion also has a built in sampler, which will handle soundfonts, and there are many, many free soundfonts on the net (google: free soundfonts) so with that you'll have many sounds to play with.

This would at least give you an idea of how sequencing works without a mile-high learning curve.

I agree on not buying the hardware yet; see if it's something you are going to actually be interested in. In all reality it's perfectly possible to make a track without any hardware, although most people atleast get a decent soundboard and a MIDI keyboard.

Another forum you might enjoy looking over is FutureProducers...
http://www.futureproducers.com/forums/

quote:

Originally posted by palm just buy propelerhead reason to 499$, the best all-in-one application there is. use it for a few years and if ur then able to make good music you can consider using money on other, more expensive gear. i say this in a new thread almost each day now-

These threads seemed to die over the summer but looks like they're back again at full force.

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errr... a few questions.

have you made experience with software? do you know how it works? are you sure you want to spent a bunch of money for equipment you dont realy need, especialy as a noob?

before looking for a midi controller and other useless stuff i would give bigger attention on the program i want to work with. saves alot of money.

:sigh:

Software: Reason 4 (Will be released in 5 weeks)
Soundcard: Echo Audiofire 2.
MIDI Controller: M-Audio Oxygen 49
Monitors: Event TR6
Headphones: AKG k240S

This is all you need imo.

I am still quite undecided on what to recommend someone like this...I have myself started on a crappy celeron 433 mhz, with 64 megs ram, yamaha 715 integrated soundcard and such...had nothing but Reason and I think it wasn't *that* bad...

but then again that was years ago...just think if you like to throw off the money and realize it's not for you later, or not...

not sure really...

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My computer is absolute cack, bog standard sound card, lame cpu etc. but its not too bad working with, I'm going to recommend you splash out on Cubase SX 3 or 4, and Reason as they work really well together, I mainly use cubase and i suggest getting a decent VST plugin, e.g Z3ta + or Styrus or something, but the great thing about reason is it has fantastic samples and good samplers, especially for if you want a realistic sounding piano or strings...

So my recommendations, get Cubase SX 4 and Reason, and any midi keyboard will do unless you want to use it for live purposes i guess, I've got a Microkorg... it works nicely Then when you've mastered the programs, think about upgrading your system, making things run faster etc. unless you don't need to of course... I personally don't think there's any need spending lots of money of hardware synths and mixers bla bla when you can have it all a lot cheeper on your screen as virtual versions
Good luck!

Horizon

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Horizon @ www.myspace.com/studiscostu