Sorry to do the old DT vs OT thread.
But in my defense, I read through the older posts of this kind and didn’t find an answer to my question.
I am right now debating which one of the two to get and one doubt keeps creeping up on me, when considering the Octatrack.
How fast does one finish a song on it?
I know the OT is a great mixer/mangler/fx unit/sampler/everything…which seems great for live use and jamming out.
BUT
Somehow I get the feeling that making finished songs will be much faster when using the Digitakt with Overbridge as opposed to the OT.
Making simple beats (I make Hip Hop, so nothing fancy) on the DT seems very intuitive and the sampling is quick, which speaks to me coming from the OP-Z.
Making the basic patterns is the part of making beats that I enjoy the most…and arranging is more of a bothersome chore to me.
That makes me think Digitakt would be better, as you can quickly transfer your tracks via Overbridge once you got the main “sketch” done and then arrange in the DAW. Arranging in the DAW seems a lot quicker and easier to me with visual feedback…but then I haven’t tried the Octatrack yet.
What do you guys think? Which device makes you finish songs quicker? DT + Overbridge or the Octatrack?
If you’re working with a hybrid/DAW set up, definitely the Digitakt.
That’s the quickest tool for getting beats/ideas/songs moving forward… use the DT standalone until you need to move over to the DAW via OB.
Octatrack earns its stripes after you have the song done, as a performance tool… either by taking the output of the DT, or by taking stereo samples/stems of your song.
For what you want to do, I’d suggest to go with a DT, especially for the kind of music you want to do. If arranging seems like a chore to you, the arranger on the OT likely won’t change that. The arranger on the OT is very capable, once you learn it, but it is way more cumbersome to set up in comparison to having the visual feedback of a DAW. I switched from OT to DT after the new firmware update (1.3) was released. I had the OT for 2.5 years and although it was fun, finishing songs on it takes much more effort, planning and motivation in comparison to the DT. With the new update, finishing decently mixed songs on the DT is easier than it ever was due to the new filter options, you don’t even need to multitrack audio via overbridge IMO.
Maybe I should mention that I had a DT and DN before owning an OT, so maybe I got used to the smoother work flow and UI and never fully adapted the OT work flow. Since you mentioned the op-z, I also own it and I think this is the fastest machine to get things going and arranged, but DT comes in at the second place.
Eh, I think it’s not that “easy” to make a full songs with the Digitakt simply because it doesn’t support streaming long samples from the +Drive nor does it have song mode. With the OT, you can make your song in parts, record different aspects like the beat or bass line, resample them & play new stuff on top. While it’s a great performance tool, it’s also a fully fledged song writing device as well. Digitakt is more of “just” a groovebox while the OT is capable of much more.
The workflow, once you set it up the way you want it & are familiar with the short cuts and the UI is just as fast as the DT. There’s a lot more options so a lot more to navigate, but now that I don’t find it confusing I don’t find it slow or cumbersome either. You don’t even need to look at the screen half the time.
I think I can live without long samples. The OP-Z only supports 12 second of sampling…so I think the 33 seconds on the DT will feel luxurious.
I believe that people can “fly” on the octatrack, but somehow it seems the everything is at least one more button click away than it is on the DT…of course I am just judging from watching videos
It comes really handy if you want to make full songs. You can program drums & bass for the whole song, record it and then play it back from the HD and play more stuff on top. With the DT, you either need to use the propability trigs or record to an external device if you want to really tweak your drums by hand. So if you’re after a device that can do full songs, OT is much more capable. DT might be a bit slicker, but it’s also a lot more limited.
Maybe if you use the OT in the most rudimentary way. There’s a few extra steps here and there, but there’s also so much you can do with it that’s not possible with any other piece of gear so intuitively.
Sure, the OT can do some amazing things, but for the purpose the op wants to use it, i think the straight forward nature of the DT would be a better fit.
Reading you, using DAW, that style, DT seems more appropriate to start with.
Imho OT main strengths are sampling (stereo), resampling with sequenced rec trigs, and huge mangling control with the crossfader (250 parameters morphing between scenes). 8m28s max recording time vs 33s for DT.
For the OP’s use case, I’d suggest Digitakt, as it sounds like the DAW would be doing a lot of the heavy lifting, arrangement wise, so a lot of the OT’s features wouldn’t really be necessary. If you’re just multi tracking loops into Ableton, DT is the one.
