I crossed over to the dark side.

[Brad]

I've always used Windows for everything, didn't know squat about iAnything. A desktop, Reaper and tons of free VSTs was my way of life. My computer bit it and my new one sucks so I decided to go portable. There's little solid info and a lot of confusion online and at retailers about iPads and outboard music interfaces so here's what I have and what I've found out about it.

1. Used iPad 5th generation mini.
2. Apogee Jam first generation
3. Apple Lightning to USB Camera Adapter
4. GarageBand

All of this was plug n play, couldn't be easier. A bozo at Best Buy said there's no way the Camera Adapter would work with anything but a camera but my Yamaha KX49 worked perfectly the second I plugged it in.
There was some concern about the Apogee Jam working with my guitar and bass since it was so old but once again, plug in and rock out.
No software updates or drivers needed, it was a total no-brainer.
GarageBand is free, loaded with amazing features and easy to use. I have a lot to learn but I love it so far.
I wish I'd made the switch years ago!

Here's Touching Cloth Studio, set up for keyboard usage

[mickey]

Brad Vader?

[Brad]

[Spike]

I love recording with my iPad. I use a Presonus Audiobox iTwo interface. This was plug and play too. I just mentioned in another thread that I was contemplating switching from PC to Mac. Most everything audio is plug and play as well as far as I can tell.

You’ll have to post some stuff for us to listen to.

[Milkman]

LOL, and I just switched from Mac to PC!

I hated recording on my iPad... it’s just too limiting for me, but I can see the appeal. I even played through Amplitube on my iPad through a PA at a jam session once, which was kinda cool.

GarageBand is quite a powerful tool, and will host VSTs as well. There’s a channel on YouTube called GarageBand and Beyond that is really good.

[golem]

I was wondering what the dark side would be. I'm pretty happy with either OSX or Linux generally. Most of the time when I'm on Windows it's something that the company I work for has hobbled horribly in the name of "security".

I literally can't do work-related stuff without Windows somewhere. All the servers, VMs, and containers are running Linux somewhere. People often think they don't use Linux but it's everywhere behind the scenes. Outside of the desktop itself it's the dominant force.

[Brad]

Touching Cloth Studio with Apogee Jam, Strat and Ric.

[eicca]

Just don’t try Logic Pro, you’ll want to buy a Mac.

But in all honesty, spending ~$800 on the old Mac Pro tower will get you a pretty beefy recording rig. I absolutely love mine.

[mighty_duck]

I recently set up my daughter with something similar. She's getting her feet wet in music production, and making progress on garageband.

All it took was an older mac mini. $130 on ebay, and an old monitor, keyboard and mouse I had lying around.

She didnt complain about Covid for a solid 4 days, so money well spent