I occasionally contribute to a long-form radio program, formerly aired on my country’s public radio. First tried out Ardour some 10 years ago, but, IIRC, back then it used to lag heavily with my typical workfow: a few tracks with 1.5-2 hour source files with possibly several hundred cut/edit points on a single file. I think it must have been Ardour 2.x.
So I switched to Reaper and later (due to studio-side demands) to Pro Tools, whilst also testing out all kinds of other solutions – aiming at the most lightweight and feature-less solution I could get.
Fairly recent discoveries in that light include Wavosaur and Waveshop on Windows, and there is some refreshing simplicity in the GUI and UX of Audacity 1.2.6! (The later versions get too feature-heavy for my taste). A Linux DAW I found really interesting was Non-DAW, where I created a “poor man’s ripple editing mode” by modifying the session file (with loosely-cut regions) from the terminal via an awk script. It was fun and quite usable once my brain got used to it.
Currently I’m working on another of my radio episodes in Reaper, but I’ll probably switch to Ardour for the next one – because I discovered the interview mode! So I’m really eager to test it out. Based on no regarding complaints in this forum, I assume the UI lag I was experiencing with version 2.x (for a source file with several hundred cuts) seems to be solved by now?
I agree that (for my kind of purposes – effective cutting and region movement) Ardour seems to have better default user experience than Reaper. The defaults do seem really sensible; it is kind of easier to find the right commands quickly as a n00b user.
A very relevant downside of Reaper in my case is that it doesn’t display waveforms in logarithmic (db) scale (at least not in the 4.78 version I use). IMO log scale is essential to precise editing of breaths, umms etc. That’s another thing that draws me to Ardour currently, in addition to the Interview mode. I may post some feedback on my experience after battle-testing it more seriously.
Also, I very much enjoy the discussions and the intellectual depth of this forum. Have read many of the more philosophical posts by Paul and others with great interest. Many thanks to all of the devs!