If you are familiar with another DAW, then you should find the editing process on Cakewalk to be very similar.
The other free programs that come to mind are Audacity, which doesn’t have anything near the level of control or effects quality, and Pro Tools First, which has a limited track count and stock plugin ability. These effects are also quality-sounding and available for every track, including the master fader.įor a beginning audio engineer who doesn’t have a ton of money to invest in plugins, the Pro Channel plugins included with Cakewalk are an excellent option, especially for a free program. For users who don’t have access to Fab Filter EQ’s, the Cakewalk Quadcurve EQ is definitely the best EQ plugin I have ever seen in a free DAW.Īs far as the other modules in the Pro Channel, there is also a Tape Emulator, Console Emulator Bus/Channel, an FX Rack, 2 Reverbs, and a Saturation knob. The gloss button adds a little bit of sheen to the high frequencies, which makes a quick fix for instruments like high-hats & cymbals.
It comes with the standard EQ settings, but you can also change the EQ curve to match traditional analog responses. A keyboard is also displayed above the window, allowing you to quickly match up an errant note and find the corresponding frequency on the EQ. The Quadcurve Equalizer is a graphic EQ that displays the waveform volume across the frequency spectrum in real-time, allowing for precision editing. However, my favorite of these modules is the EQ module. The compressor and tube emulator is decent, but there are other plugins I would prefer to using these. The console emulator adds a light bit of saturation to the track, but the difference isn’t very noticeable. The stock Pro Channel displays 4 modules: a compressor, EQ, tube effect, and console emulator. While slightly more tedious to use than slapping an aftermarket plugin on the track, it is an excellent way to conserve processing power and free up your CPU for more intense tasks. After you open the drop-down menu, the Pro Channel displays a variety of high-quality effects that are instantly usable. The Pro Channel is a special part of the console. The gain knob controls the audio level before any of it hits the special effects, volume, or sends.
Each console track displays the clip gain, a drop-down menu with the Pro Channel, a post/pre effects selector, sends, panning, mute/solo controls, volume, I/O routing information, and the track name. In the console, each of the individual tracks is displayed vertically, similar to a mixing board. One aspect of Cakewalk’s unique layout is the console. In the timeline, the foreground & background color of individual tracks can be changed via Track Properties in the Inspector. Like most other DAW’s, Cake can assign colors to tracks for easier navigation.
BandlLab includes a theme editor, which allows an image editing software to change the colors and style of most of the windows.Īs a default, Cakewalk comes with two themes: Tungsten, a darker theme, and Mercury, a lighter theme. If you find yourself disliking your current mix, or if you want to return to a setting that you had before, select ‘Mix 1’ to instantly restore all of your settings to the moment when you saved your mix.Ĭakewalk gives the users a lot of customization ability, and one where the user has a lot of control is theme customization. Pressing ‘save scene’ creates an exact copy of all of your current levels, plugin settings, instruments, MIDI information, and more. A feature that is unique to Cakewalk is the ability to save and recall mixes. The Mix lens quickly brings the mixing console to the front and center of the screen, and the Make Beats lens brings up the timeline and an empty drum pad matrix.Īt the top of the screen, Cakewalk displays the module section, which contains the transport, tool selection, metronome options, time signature, looper, marker placement, as well as a few others.
The Advanced lens displays the full set of modules, the timeline, console, and folder browser. At the top right corner of the screen, there is a drop-down menu with quick access to workstation view presets. Workspaces in Cakewalk are referred to as lenses. The GUI and layout of Cakewalk is sleek, professional-looking, and largely has the same feel to previous Gibson-owned incarnations. You’ll find a bunch in our sample pack marketplace.
Since MIDI controller names and audio drivers can often have long, unwieldy names that are difficult to remember, users can select the box “Use Friendly Names,” which allows the use to custom rename the drivers and MIDI devices to something shorter. There, the user can select their audio interfaces drivers, activate or deactivate inputs and outputs, setup MIDI controllers, and set the sample rate and bit depth for the session.