Logic does damn near anything you want it to. By purchasing Logic Pro, you don't just get the program, you get the sound library, which is over 40GB on its own. It contains over 18,000 high-quality, royalty-free loops as well as over a hundred very convincing digital instruments, including some exclusives that you can't get with Logic Express unless you upgrade. The software is capable of handling sound files up to 24-bit/96khz quality, which is the highest available at the moment. The sounds that the included instruments produce are pretty fantastic, although a bit basic when you stick to the more basic instruments (i.e. EFM1, EF P, etc). This includes Waveburner, a program for producing album masters, which allows you to get everything exactly as you like. Mainstage allows you to use any plug-ins and presets you've made in Logic in a live environment, including third-party plug-ins. Nine Inch Nails uses this onstage. I don't think I can give a much better example of the quality than that.

There are plenty of fantastic plug-ins and synths that come with Logic, but I'm just going to do a rundown of the most advanced ones and my favorites: Channel EQ - A paragraphic equalizer with four notch filters, two shelving filters, and two cutoff filters. Aside from having a built-in analyzer, you can manipulate the points by actually grabbing onto them on the graph, a feature that I now can't live without unless I absolutely have to. Pro Tools' EQ can sit in a corner and rot, for all I care. Delay Designer - Allows you to add up to thirty-two delay points, timed to the millisecond as you please, each with easily customizable cutoff, volume, pan, resolution, and transposition. Unbelievably powerful. Space Designer - Incredibly realistic and powerful reverb designer. The preset list is all I use, and it has hundreds of environments waiting for you to stick your music into. I have yet to find one that doesn't sound fantastically convincing. Guitar Amp Pro - Choose from multiple cabinet styles and even choose between off-center and centered microphone positioning. ES2 - Still one of the fattest, most versatile, and delicious synths you can imagine. Three oscillators, two filters capable of parallel or series processing (and blending), ten modulation sources, two LFOs, three envelopes, and a vector modulator. There's more, but the big thing about it is the sounds it can make and its ease of use (once you learn it). Sculpture - Quite possibly one of the most sophisticated instrument creators on the market (until Omnisphere came around, anyway). This beast of a synth is more of an instrument modeler than anything else, with a "string" that can be made to mimic nylon, wood, steel, or glass (or a mix between them). With different ways to excite and disturb the "string" and a bunch of different ways to customize this instrument, you're going to need some tutorials, but Sculpture is a stunning piece of work. Ultrabeat - An unconventional and brilliantly designed drum machine. Every single sample has a set of controls that you'd expect on a two hundred dollar synthesizer. With the ability to mix and match and customize your own drum sets with drag and drop ease (as well as powerful step modulation), this is a serious beat creation tool. EXS24 - Almost forgot my favorite little sample. Deceptively simple-looking, this instrument not only works with any EXS patch, but lets you build your own EXS sample-based instrument, layers and all. You'll be hard-pressed to find any DAW that includes a set of tools like this, especially for this price. Also, if you've gotten a MobileMe account through Apple (which I recommend; twenty gigs of online space and synchronized system settings across computers is indispensable), you can actually synchronize your plug-in settings from Logic to your multiple machines! This is truly brilliant, and definitely a good idea. Aside from that, you can share your library of sounds and resources on your wifi network using Bonjour; again, very important if you have a laptop and a desktop. Apple has put a lot of consideration into many different aspects of this program, and you're only going to find more as you take more time to explore. The only downside that I can think of off of the top of my head is that there's no native VST support. After purchasing Kore, I can route any VSTs I want through that, but native support would be nice. Despite this, I never found it to be that big of a deal because most software supports AU as well as VST.

Version 7 would have gotten a 7 from me in this category, but that's been blown away. Version 8 features a full revamp of the interface for much more easily accessible and easy to use functionality. The mixer, sample editor, piano roll, and score (and the hyper editor, which I'm not familiar with) are all easily accessible at the bottom of your arrange window, brought up and tucked away with a keystroke or a click. The inspector on the left shows the basic parameters of the sample you've chosen, the track it's on, and the mixing channel for the track and its output channel. Mixing is smooth and easy, with auxiliary buses and channels being easy to set up and reroute. Color coding is a cinch as well. Essentially, you have everything you need to make the mixing experience as easy as you want it to be. The only complaint I still have is the Environment window, which feels archaic given how the rest of the program is set up. I shouldn't have to work this hard to get a functioning arpeggiator. However, if you learn it, you can do some truly neat stuff (like capturing the arpeggiators output as MIDI notes!).

I use this on my Mac Pro at home and on my Macbook Pro on the go. It doesn't work with the in-computer mic or any USB microphones, but I don't mind. The program is polished and clean, and it's rarely crashed, and the last time that happened to me was a couple of updates (and over a year and a half) ago. If you're trying to do some intensive things, don't be surprised if the program overloads. If it does, though, it'll just stop playing and let you know there's too much going on. Usually, I can just hit play again, though. It seems that it's just the system realizing that Logic needs more of its power. I've been using it since two months after its released, and I have yet to find a bug.

This is a complete set of programs that's going to take care of all of your pre-production, recording/production, and post-production needs. Nothing else out there includes the kinds of plug-ins this has, although Ableton's latest is pretty intense. At the moment, it's a bit unfair to compare this to other tools on the market since several have just released new versions this year and Logic 8 came out in October of '07. Logic 9 is on the way, though, so I recommend waiting for anybody who's eyeing this gem. If you need something NOW, though, you can't go wrong with Logic, and the upgrade won't be nearly as much as the suite anyway. At this price, it's still a mind-blowing deal.

Apple is genuinely helpful and has some of the best support out there. A particular problem I had was upgrading to my Mac Pro last year; I had to re-authorize my installation and I had lost my serial number since I'd bought Logic. I called Apple and let them know my problem. They asked for my receipt number, and since they'd e-mailed me my receipt, I just looked it up and gave it to them. They confirmed my purchase, then immediately e-mailed me a replacement serial number. Very cool, very easy, very friendly service, and I wasn't on hold for more than two minutes the entire time. They really do aim to please.

It's a sexy interface, and the first time I opened Sculpture my jaw dropped (literally, my eyes and mouth went wide). The tools are all practically designed but still beautiful, and the color schemes and aesthetics give the illusion of a real piece of hardware quite regularly. The ES2, Sculpture, and Ultrabeat are the best examples of this when it comes to the instruments, but even when it comes to the interface, it's very clean and professional-looking while still being stylish.

Hobbyist turned Electronic Musician/Recording Engineer/Producer/Sound Engineer

My own. It's hard to categorize, but I guess "techno" would be closest.

Logic allows the user to determine how poor or how great the sound will come out "sounding". To get a great sound it takes practice, it is not something that happens over night. This is the best recording software I've ever used or recorded on. This sounds much better than Cubase and Pro Tools.

Logic Studio comes with everything you need from getting started with a project to finishing up a project. The plug-ins are great and are fairly simple to use.

Back in the day I started with Garageband and the transfer to Logic was fairly simple. I still don't know everything there is to know but I know enough to make a professional sounding project. Read bits and pieces of the manual and you will be fine, I guarantee it. There is also support forums.

The layout of Logic is great and the quality is also great! PROFESSIONAL QUALITY!

The value is unbeatable. PERIOD.

It's Apple! They care about their customers and speak in an understandable language! lol

I would definitely marry this product!

Active Musician, Recording Engineer

Christian Rap

Great sounds,extremely useable.

I got the upgrade from Express 7.2 wich costed me almost the same price.Couldn't believe at the sheer amount of instruments,sounds and professional quality software included.

In comparison with 7 it's more user friendly.

Very high quality throughout the whole package.

In this price range it beats every other softer hands off.

Don't know,never had any issue.

It has to be said that,as with all things Apple,the "I want it" factor always always goes together with both appearance and sheer quality.

Recording musician

BluesRockPop

Producer/Engineer, Recording Artist (Self Produced) and Creative Professional

Everything, But With A Touch of that Future Sound

u can make it sound hella good u just need to learn how to mess wit da EQ'z, and all da other sound stuff. Just keep practicing and u'll learn.

endless possibilities!!!!

So easy a caveman can do it!!!! LOL i started with protools and reason and i hated it, it was just to confusing and hard to make it sound like i wanted it too.

Logic is just logically the best

I wish i would have gotN this before i spent $30,000 on a protools HD3 with 192i/o system but Logic studio 8 didnt exist when i bought the protools system.

MUSIC PRODUCER

BAY AREA SLAPZ (RAP/HIP HOP)

The Sound its awesome, very vintage, I mean, it depends how you wanna make it sound anyways. But beyond that, buy yourself a good interface, and you are good to go.

Talk about features in Logic Pro, it has EVERYTHING you need. From awesome plugins to a drum machine, oh and very nice virtual instruments also.

Like every DAW, you have to sit down and spend a while to get to know that software, but for its was pretty easy, and Im no genius.

well, at the beginning it did have some weird bugs, but now with the upgrades, you dont have to worry about it.

I mean, the price is cut down in half, and you get all those great features, I mean, Your getting The deal, not a deal, THE DEAL.

Never had to call.

It looks great, and the new way you work with all the windows together it makes it a snap to achieve you music.

Very happy with the software - works great with the apogee duet. Pro quality sound

While Logic has loads of great features unfortunately version 8 doesn't bring many new features to the table.

Steeper learning curve than some sequencers

Generally good quality though there are some annoying bugs.

Record label owner

All dance music genres