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FL Studio 10
The popular PC DAW reaches double digits with plenty of new features
Many computer musicians hold FL Studio dear as their first - and sometimes only - musical love.
If you're not yet familiar with it, here's a crash course: it's a DAW that enables you to record/edit audio, edit MIDI in a piano roll or step sequencer, work with patterns, arrange them into songs and mix the lot down. There's an extensive array of instruments and effects included, the app is stable and solid, and the interface is straightforward and clean. It has a bit of a false reputation as being "for beginners", but there are certainly professionals who use it because it's easy to use.
Owing to its emphasis on MIDI and sample-based production, it's best suited to electronic musicians. Sure, it can handle a few audio tracks, but if you're looking to record a band, you should look elsewhere.
We're reviewing the top-of-the-line Signature Bundle here, although there are packages to suit all pockets. The last 'proper' release of FL Studio 9 was v9.1, and releases since then have been public betas leading up to v10. So, we'll be looking at everything added since v9.1. But first, we need to look at what's been taken away.
FL Studio's long-standing pattern blocks are now being phased out. On launching it they're absent, and while they can be re-enabled in the settings, a message warns that pattern blocks are obsolete and won't be in future versions. In a way, this is good news because the developers can improve the new clips Playlist system without having to accommodate and maintain the old system of pattern blocks.