Customer Reviews

Pro Tools 8 for Mac OS X and Windows: Visual QuickStart Guide

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(0)
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1 star:		(2)

 

 

I found this a clear, readable,, and well thought out guide to Pro Tools operation, good for both beginners and more experienced users (I'm a little bit of both). I was able to have questions that came up in the middle of PT work answered concisely and quickly by using the index to get to the information I needed quickly. I learned a lot of things I didn't know, even though I've been a PT user for many years as a music professional (though not a professional engineer). Highly reccomended!

This book is what I call information dumping. It does not tell you HOW to use protools in any way. There are no exercises or useful information. I'm hoping to return it. I would just guess that the author just copied the information from some other source. Goes into no detail at all. Waste of money

This "guide" does not explain how to setup and record with Pro Tools and it does not provide a quickstart.

I spent an hour reading the chapters on working with sessions and tracks and learned nothing. For example under track types, the author identifies the controls on the audio track strip then identifies the same controls on the other five types of tracks. This takes up 8 pages! "In the mix window, audio track channel strips include controls for volume, pan, record enable, solo, mute, and group ID; plus selectors for automation, audio input paths, and audio output paths." I don't need a written description of what is right in front of me on the computer screen.

Under opening a session, he states the obvious steps for opening a session with a session template. A beginner's guide shouldn't even mention templates, no reason to discuss templates until the user understands the basic recording functions.

The Reference Guide PDF file and video tutorial that come with the software are more useful for getting up and running.

This book is possibly a better quick "go to" reference for Pro Tools than the documentation from Avid that comes with the program. I also find it more informative and much easier to navigate than the help info integrated into Pro Tools. This book is good for someone new to the program, -as well as for the experienced user who needs to look up how to access some program feature that he or she doesn't use very often.

My only complaints are that the book often doesn't go into a whole lot of detail on some subjects, but since it's supposed to be a "quick start" guide, that's understandable. The book also hasn't been updated for Pro Tools 9 and 10. But those things aside, it's a good quick way to get up and running with Pro Tools, even if you're using a later version.