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Other features

Plug-ins aside, the package also ships with hundreds of loops and samples that are categorised by style, tempo and key, making it easy to quickly knock together tracks, eJay-style. Mixcraft 4 is capable of importing both Acidized WAVs and Apple Loops, and its creators suggest using it as a tool for creating your own bootlegs and mashups.

As with Mixcraft 3, audio tracks can be set to record from your audio interface’s inputs, and multiple tracks can be armed simultaneously, facilitating the recording of drum kits, full bands and the like. You can apply effects to your recordings too, as well as placing them on the master channel (eg, the Kjaerhus Classic Limiter), to create a solid-sounding mixdown that’s ‘ready for CD’.

Other cool features include the ability to trigger multiple layers of instruments from a single track and, as we mentioned, save those mega-patches in a single preset (useful when trying to coax larger-than-life sounds out of soft synths). Track freezing, automatic crossfading and a one-click system that automatically burns your current project to an audio CD are also on offer.

In use

Mixcraft 4 is refreshingly straightforward, much like the Apple software that inspired it. The interface is logically designed and clear-cut, while still retaining a good level of functionality.

Even so, absolute novices may still be scratching their heads on their first go, and the supplied help file would be much more useful if it were a printable PDF with better illustrations.

A more serious concern, though, is that, as in Mixcraft 3, looping playback of a song section results in a glitch whereby a tiny amount (it seems to vary) of the audio after the loop-end point plays before the ‘play head’ returns to the beginning of the loop, meaning that a 4/4 loop can sound more like 17/16 in extreme cases!

This can be quite jarring, and the fact that the glitch is still present is quite infuriating, as Acoustica reckoned it would be fixed for v4.

Summary

Despite a few irritations, Mixcraft 4 is still a great application and possibly represents the best solution yet for PC-based computer music novices. A particularly satisfying aspect of the software is that you can use it at whatever level you feel comfortable with, from an eJay-style drag ’n’ drop fest through to a full-on sequencer, with massive stacked MIDI patches and multitracked parts.

What’s more, Mixcraft’s incredibly reasonable price point and solid features make it one of the most value-packed DAWs we’ve seen to date, and we don’t hesitate to recommend it to those looking to get started or to anyone seeking a more straightforward experience than that offered by the majority of music applications.