Audiobus: Use your music apps together.

What is Audiobus?Audiobus is an award-winning music app for iPhone and iPad which lets you use your other music apps together. Chain effects on your favourite synth, run the output of apps or Audio Units into an app like GarageBand or Loopy, or select a different audio interface output for each app. Route MIDI between apps — drive a synth from a MIDI sequencer, or add an arpeggiator to your MIDI keyboard — or sync with your external MIDI gear. And control your entire setup from a MIDI controller.

Download on the App Store

Audiobus is the app that makes the rest of your setup better.

Stay on iPad or go back to PC

edited September 2021 in General App Discussion

This is not another bashing of the iPad platform. it is very capable and I had lots of fun in the last 3 years using it. But I am at a cross road of deciding ipad or pc for my rock/metal music making with my buddy. And if you care to share I would like to hear your input.

I have everything and more in the form of software on iPad I could wish for. But I have a couple of problems with m iPad setup.

1- The ergonomic of spending multi hours every night on the iPad as left me with constant shoulder and neck pain.
2- Not enough power from my (2017 iPad Pro)/to record / mix multi guitars without contant freezing of tracks.
3-No good rock drum Auv3 like Superior drummer on PC

  • For the ergonomic, I guess I will have to get a high stand with mouse and keyboard. How is it working out for you?
  • Will a new M1 iPad fix my power problem ?
  • For the drums I will keep bouncing drums from my pc until somebody fills the void.

I only have a DAW Tracktion and superior drummer on PC. I am very tempted to take advantage of the current group buy at IK multimedia to buy most the software I need to go back to PC.

What do you recommend
  1. What would you do27 votes
    1. Buy a new iPad with more ergonomic setup
      48.15%
    2. Go for IK multimedia group buy and don’t look back.
      51.85%
«13

Comments

  • Why not both?

  • edited September 2021

    @michael_m said:
    Why not both?

    I don’t have the money to keep both platform. Buying a new iPad every 5 years + plus the periferal upgrade that comes with it and upgrading music pc software and pc every wathever is needed.

    Edit: Not that I don’t have the money but I have other plans that requires said money.

  • edited September 2021

    The only thing I prefer my iPad for is the ergonomics. I lay down flat on the couch and have the ipad hanging on a gooseneck stand so I don’t need to hold it. Just rest my elbows beside me and tap the suspended screen. Of course this would be weird in a studio with a band heh.

    Oh and the M1 is a beast. I just had 30+ tracks of audio going with tons of fab filters all over the place. I dont even think of cpu now.

    But my desktop and Maschine is where I make my best stuff. Tried a couch rig with a touchscreen for it but eh, windows software and touch is not good.

  • If you went PC with the IK software will you be satisfied with that or will you be looking at every fancy new iOS app and wishing you had it?

  • How many tracks are you planning on and what daw are you using on iPad?

  • wimwim
    edited September 2021

    I always get noise when tracking guitars on any PC. I would never try to do recording on anything but iOS with battery power.

    That said, it sounds like your problems are largely insurmountable on iOS. Get ready for some serious sticker-shock trying to keep up with apps though.

  • The first question in in this case is: are You doing it as the Pro, or for pleasure only?

  • @wim said:
    I always get noise when tracking guitars on any PC. I would never try to do recording on anything but iOS with battery power.

    That said, it sounds like your problems are largely insurmountable on iOS. Get ready for some serious sticker-shock trying to keep up with apps though.

    @wim : Why “sticker shock”?

  • "> @AudioGus said:

    The only thing I prefer my iPad for is the ergonomics. I lay down flat on the couch and have the ipad hanging on a gooseneck stand so I don’t need to hold it. Just rest my elbows beside me and tap the suspended screen. Of course this would be weird in a studio with a band heh.

    Oh and the M1 is a beast. I just had 30+ tracks of audio going with tons of fab filters all over the place. I dont even think of cpu now.

    Thank you that’s the kind of feed back I was looking for about the M1.

  • @Simon said:
    If you went PC with the IK software will you be satisfied with that or will you be looking at every fancy new iOS app and wishing you had it?

    Not my style. I would be happy with my decision.

  • wimwim
    edited September 2021

    @Telstar5 said:

    @wim said:
    I always get noise when tracking guitars on any PC. I would never try to do recording on anything but iOS with battery power.

    That said, it sounds like your problems are largely insurmountable on iOS. Get ready for some serious sticker-shock trying to keep up with apps though.

    @wim : Why “sticker shock”?

    Desktop apps are significantly more expensive than their iOS equals generally.

  • @ecou - just for clarity, when you say "PC" are you referring to the Windows platform, or a Mac?

  • @mjcouche said:
    How many tracks are you planning on and what daw are you using on iPad?

    Tracktion for the DAW. I been using it since version 3 when it was a Mackie software. Most of our songs have 15 to 20 tracks. About 10 of them are from superior drummer.

  • edited September 2021

    @ecou said:
    1- The ergonomic of spending multi hours every night on the iPad as left me with constant shoulder and neck pain..****

    @AudioGus said:
    The only thing I prefer my iPad for is the ergonomics.

    I was gonna say, it’s the sitting at a desktop that kills me. I’m much more comfortable curled up on the couch, or wherever I find myself comfortable. Sometimes it’s even sitting back at the desk with the iPad plugged into the hub and all, but I can sit back and bring it forward or even on my lap.

    @wim said:
    I always get noise when tracking guitars on any PC. I would never try to do recording on anything but iOS with battery power.

    >
    So true! Glad I’m not the only one who’s discovered this. It’s like night and day! I can finally record guitar without all the noise! It’s probably the main thing that won me over with my
    chosen platform for real!

  • @wim said:
    I always get noise when tracking guitars on any PC. I would never try to do recording on anything but iOS with battery power.

    That said, it sounds like your problems are largely insurmountable on iOS. Get ready for some serious sticker-shock trying to keep up with apps though.

    Yes i have encountered the noise too. The sticker shock as brought me to iOS.

    I would not say insurmontable. I am looking at stand option for the iPad and I am testing a borrowed Bluetooth keyboard and mouse.

    The current group buy from IK is now at 17 software for the price 1. I could get most of what I need for 300$.

    .> @VoytecG said:

    The first question in in this case is: are You doing it as the Pro, or for pleasure only?

    Pleasure. That is the reason why it is even a debate. If I was a pro I would get the tools needed for my trade and that would be a PC with recording software and hardware toys.

    I limit my music spending because it is a hobby.

  • edited September 2021

    @AudioGus said:
    Oh and the M1 is a beast. I just had 30+ tracks of audio going with tons of fab filters all over the place. I dont even think of cpu now.

    Nice! What DAW are you running? I get maybe 1 extra auv3 instrument on the M1 (16gb ram) from a 2018 Pro. The M1 has been a waste of money coming from a 2018 iPad Pro. Grabbing an old 2018-2020 pro until they sort out the optimizations would be my move knowing what I know now.

  • @ipadbeatmaking said:

    @AudioGus said:
    Oh and the M1 is a beast. I just had 30+ tracks of audio going with tons of fab filters all over the place. I dont even think of cpu now.

    Nice! What DAW are you running? I get maybe 1 extra auv3 instrument on the M1 (16gb ram) from a 2018 Pro. The M1 has been a waste of money coming from a 2018 iPad Pro. Grabbing an old 2018-2020 pro until they sort out the optimizations would be my move knowing what I know now.

    For that example it was Cubasis and raw audio being mixed. Tons of Fabs, Toneboosters, FAC all over.

    I had a 2017 10.5 before and it would eventually get to cpu bog In BM3 but now with the M1 I seem to just hover around 35% where the next logical step would be to just export it to desktop anyway. So it is nice to hit that spot for me where the bottleneck is no longer the hardware. It think it will take a good five years before a heavy hitter daw/synths come around that can really take advantage of the hardware for me. The economics , Apple and app store lameness etc of iOS are now the biggest limiting factor imho.

  • Thinking about using Acoustica Mixcraft on PC. Video, tons of instruments and support in the form of videos on YouTube .

  • @wim said:
    I always get noise when tracking guitars on any PC. I would never try to do recording on anything but iOS with battery power.

    This ^^^^

    is a good reason to stay on iPad. When I record high gain pc is noisier. iPad is quiet, on a power bank.

  • I think both is a valid option. I use Bitwig primarily as I found the iPad too small for midi tracking. Now I use the iPad as an instrument in Bitwig and it works great.

  • edited September 2021

    Working by yourself iPad can be fun/tolerable…. As soon as you involve another person in the production the platform shenanigans come screaming to the forefront

  • @Spud said:
    I think both is a valid option. I use Bitwig primarily as I found the iPad too small for midi tracking. Now I use the iPad as an instrument in Bitwig and it works great.

    Do you use Studiomux for that or in another way?

  • I mostly use an iPad for music apps, plus an Octatrack and guitar. But I much prefer tracking and arranging in Ableton. If you’re only arranging audio tracks with eq and basic FX, a low-end PC/Mac will do the trick.

    As for iOS with a mouse, keyboard, trackpad and stand — it’s outstanding for typing, which I do for my job. But for music I prefer touch. The mouse isn’t as fast or accurate as a mouse on desktop IMO.

    I have an iConnect Audio interface which lets you easily use the iPad as an audio module for the Mac, and vice versa. It’s amazing for this.

    @Edward_Alexander said:

    I was gonna say, it’s the sitting at a desktop that kills me. I’m much more comfortable curled up on the couch, or wherever I find myself comfortable. Sometimes it’s even sitting back at the desk with the iPad plugged into the hub and all, but I can sit back and bring it forward or even on my lap.

    How do you get around using hardware boxes on the desk?

  • I am not moving back as such as I started off making music more seriously on the iPad (before that it was OctaMED on the Amiga), I have however recently added an M1 + Logic to my setup. I too have had issues with shoulder pain from all those hours of tapping. I had been using a mouse/keyboard to give the shoulder a rest but then realised I was back at my desk so might as well get a desktop.

    So far the iPad(s) + M1 + Logic combo is working well. I went M1 rather than Windows PC because of the price/power ratio, the amount of functionality you get for the cost of Logic and the smooth workflow between the devices (and I much prefer the OS!). I now spend most of my time in GarageBand on the iPad as I know that whatever I create there can be moved directly into Logic if I get bored of holding the iPad. I'm building a list of 'trusted' M1 cross-compatible AUs such as Sunrizer, Addstation etc which I have tested to work the same if I import a project containing them from the iPad.

    Studiomux is also an essential app now that I have it set up correctly and between this and the massive power already built into Logic I find that I have very little in the way of desktop GAS urges. In a way, I'm probably saving myself money in the long run by adding the desktop gear :)

  • You're going to get a coloured opinion running a poll on a forum dedicated to iOS music-making.

    The reality of the situation is that mobile and desktop production environments are quite simply put, different. You will always have a more flexible tracking, recording, mixing and mastering environment on the desktop (as long as iPadOS remains the way it is). And the IK group buy is a very good way of purchasing a wide range of tools for a relatively small outlay. In simple terms, you will achieve more from an M1 Mac Mini or M1 MacBook Pro than you will from an M1 iPad Pro. macOS is simply a more efficient environment and the majority of sequencers available on macOS will run rings around their iOS siblings, particularly when it comes to leveraging the multicore capabilities of the M1 processor.

    With regards to tracking of acoustic and electric instruments, you should be able to record hum-free with a decent audio interface and isolated/surge-protected power supply. I always used to use Apogee audio interfaces for my desktop system in the past but recently changed to M-Audio as not only is the audio performance a match for most high-end audio interfaces you get a tremendous amount for your money and the fastest latency of any USB C audio interface. You get 8 in 4 and out, twin headphone outs and a round trip latency of 2.59ms when tracking. And this for only £240. You can of course use this interface with both iOS and desktop.

    iOS has many of its own advantages and I couldn't create these days without having both desktop and mobile production environments. However, having both iOS and desktop audio production environments is a luxury. I understand that many have to make a choice between one or the other. And the sad reality is that a high-end iOS device such as the M1 iPad Pro costs far more than an M1 Mac Mini.

    I work with 3d graphics too, so my desktop environment is a dual boot Linux/Windows 10, 32 thread AMD with a pair of Nvidia RTX 3090's as this was a far cheaper build than an equivalent Mac Pro. macOS lags massively behind Linux\Windows 10 with regards to GPU rendering capabilities so that was also a major consideration.

    The biggest advantage of iOS is that you can build a great variety of audio production capabilities for far less of a financial outlay than on an equivalent desktop system. And personally speaking, I find that I produce differently when sketching ideas on iOS. But sketching ideas is generally as far as I go on iOS. I then transfer stems to my desktop environment to continue the project. Plus with apps like StudioMux or by using the native iDAM capabilities of macOS you can easily stream your audio from your iOS device directly to your desktop DAW with a reasonable roundtrip latency (a 2017 iPad Pro is plenty powerful enough to stream audio via StudioMux or iDAM).

    If I were in your shoes, I'd definitely consider augmenting my iOS environment with a modern desktop environment too. But I wouldn't see it as an either/or option. Use both iOS and desktop for their strengths and you'll be in business.

  • @MisplacedDevelopment Sorry to interject here also: Do you render down everything you get through Studiomux on Desktop? Or do you have a system to recall a session?

  • @FloRi89 said:
    Do you use Studiomux for that or in another way?

    No just very simply through a stereo pair on a 16ch interface and midi out to the ipad on another interface.

  • OK also @OP: I started out making music in the iPad but then did a course for EDM that used Ableton. So I got the Live Studio demo for that. After doing that for a while I realized that iOS DAWs aren’t quite there yet for efficiency.

    Everything is there on iOS: Effects, instruments etc. and it‘s just as powerful as on desktop.

    But even Cubasis is nowhere near of what desktop DAWs can do in terms of efficiency. I settled for Studio One Pro now because I was able to get that for cheap secon hand.

    I will continue to use the iPad for sure, it’s a great way to make music and generate ideas. But when I want to make „tracks“ I‘m going to work on desktop. Efficiency isn’t my main goal, but also I don’t habe so much time for making music, so I can’t waste any fighting with my daw.

  • edited September 2021

    @FloRi89 said:
    @MisplacedDevelopment Sorry to interject here also: Do you render down everything you get through Studiomux on Desktop? Or do you have a system to recall a session?

    I'm mainly using it at the moment for recording guitar where the interface is plugged into the Mac. In linear arrangement mode in Logic I have one track which records the dry signal and another which is bussed from that first track, through SM + TH-U/Nembrini on the iPad and records into a wet track. I then have the choice of running the dry signal through a different amp sim later. When jamming in Live Loops you can only record one track at a time so it needs to be either the wet or dry one. At the moment I just pick wet and commit the idea.

    I have tested driving iPad instruments from MIDI in Logic and that also works. I am however trying to avoid doing this as it ties the iPad too much to the Logic project and I don't want that as I'm trying to move away from such complexities. If I really wanted to do this then I would consider using the Logic autosampler to sample my iPad instrument and use that. I had tested that workflow and it was smooth.

  • I think it depends on your use case scenarios as to whether having external iOS devices feeding into e.g. Logic or Live is seen as unnecessary complexity. If you come from a time when DAW's were called Sequencers and had no audio recording capabilities, having external sound-generating 'modules' was the only way to make music. If you're fortunate enough to have old iOS devices available as dedicated 'modules' anything from 6th gen iPad forward makes for invaluable Studiomux channel devices.

    The number of iOS devices you can connect is very much dependent on the quality of your powered hub and the USB internals of your desktop device. With the right combination, your iOS devices will remain charged whilst streaming audio into your desktop DAW. If you upgrade your iPad and iPhone devices every 24 months you've got an incredible amount of processing available with just a pair of 24-month-old iPad and iPhones. This extra processing will help keep your desktop DAW for processing the most processor expensive of fx and VA's, whilst keeping plenty of headroom for momentary peaks.

    Most desktop DAW's have a note-taking capability so it's easy to document your iOS device chains as you go along and more importantly for when you return to a project after a lengthy period. Sure it's not as convenient as everything being saved within a DAW project. But we live in a synthesis and audio processing renascence age, where you have a vast affordable range of musical devices available, external to your DAW, and that includes external iOS devices. So why limit yourself to the instrumentation and processing of your DAW alone.

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