Each has it’s own particular pros and cons, indeed I’ve been known to complain about things I don’t see as ideal, on this and other forums, but sometimes you just have to use the tools available and get the job done. I have to take issue with such blanket statements - I develop on many different platforms, including Windows, Linux and macOS. I’m not sure what more you were looking for, but unless it is specifically more Windows focused hand-holding you are unlikely to find it elsewhere.ĭeveloping on Windows is a horrible experience. Whether you pay for a single version or subscribe or not, you can still create an account on the bug reporting system to report problems, and I have never seen anyone ask about financial contributions before answering questions on the forums, IRC channel, etc. If you feel generous you can pay more, if you do not have the financial means or feel it is not worth as much as the commercial equivalents for some reason you are free to choose a lower amount.

The demo is free, if you like it you get to pick your own price you are willing to pay for the binary version. Or were you actually just looking for freeware when you said open source? Ardour is of course open source, is distributed under GPL license terms, so is considered free software, and has one of the most generous support options you are ever going to find. Are you only picking from software that you can compile yourself? If so it seems weird to complain about having to compile the software.

That seems like an odd criteria to use in deciding what editing software to use. If I decide to download the source and am successful in compiling it to run on Windows I’ll let you know. I assume that is probably not counting the linux users who use the distribution compiled versions they get from Fedora, Ubuntu flavors, etc., so hard to know the actual breakdown of users including those who compile from source and get distribution provided binaries. I of course know that 90% + of desktop users in general are on Windows, I’m just surprised that given the pretty non-existent promotion of Windows from the core developers that enough Windows users found their way here to become a majority. The Windows users came very late to the party, and I am a little bit surprised that the majority of users are now on Windows. It eventually grew to encompass editing as well as recording, and only after it had become a very full featured multi-track recording application did it get enough interest that some Windows users were willing to work at porting it to Windows. If a majority of users are on Windows one has to wonder why on earth Windows wouldn’t be the primary development platform.īecause Ardour was primarily developed specifically for Linux, because at the time there were no decent Linux audio recording applications. if I can find the time I’ll download the source and see how hard it is to compile it for Windows.

I still may give Ardour a try as it looks like you guys have done a lot of good work… but it looks like to me that it is not a traditional Open Source program… as I have come to expect….That said, I know there is just no way to get folks to change their views on this topic… like trying to get an Apple user out of the “walled garden” … ain’t gonna happen.of course I also rant and rave myself when I can’t figure out how get it do do something I think it should… but ultimately, if I dig, I either find out why that feature/function is not available… or not as I expected… or I ultimately find out how to get the darn thing to do what I want.I also do some programming… all on the Windows platform… and have had no issues that I can blame on the OS….As a tech guy I know a ton of software engineers and developers who use Linux at home… and they all rant and rave about how bad the Windows OS is… but, of course, Windows work is how they make their living, support their families, save for retirement, and send their kids to college.Paying is done via where you have the choice to name your own single-payment price, or to subscribe at one of three different levels. The problems you’ll run into with Ardour on Windows will be the same problems you’d encounter on macOS or Linux. We use cross-platform toolkits and libraries, and as a result of a lot of hard work by a very small number of people, there are very few platform-specific issues with Ardour anymore. We’re not Windows people, and we don’t wish to be. Which is still used by at least 95% of all desktop computing users.

Windows, despite the excellent work of some people at Microsoft over the years, is fundamentally a poorly designed and cruft-laden operating system. If it works for you, because of history, or the plethora of available plugins, or whatever, then that’s just fine. We just can’t in good conscience recommend the use of platform of such marked technical inferiority.

Ardour for windows