Acid DJ 2.0d

Unlike the other wave sequencing programs reviewed here, Acid is primarily intended for sequencing loops rather than triggering individual sounds. The other three programs focus on constructing drum patterns and melodies with individual notes, but Acid is designed for manipulating existing beats and melodies.
This doesn’t mean that you can’t use Acid to write beats and melodies. The difference is that Acid doesn’t use patterns that are then structured into a song. Instead, you have an audio timeline similar to that found in video software like Adobe Premiere.
You have an unlimited number of tracks, and each track has its own volume and pan controls. Each segment in the timeline has its own pitch control, so you can create melodies with your samples. Any melodies or beats that you do construct manually can be mixed down to another track and used as a loop.
When you load a sound into Acid, it is automatically set to ‘looped’, so if you plan to use a lot of’one-shot’ sounds it can
be time consuming to reset all the channels. There are a couple of shareware and freeware utilities that can batch process samples to automate this task. However, you might find it quicker to do your beat and melody construction in a drum machine-style wave sequencer and use Acid for song construction and remixing.
One of the best features of Acid is its amazing real time pitch shifting. Most programs either speed up or slow down your samples in order to fit them to a particular tempo, but Acid analyses your sample and intelligently time stretches it without altering the pitch, all in real time. You can then tweak the pitch independently if you need to.
This means you can easily mix loops taken from two or more songs written in different keys and at different tempos and match them together accurately. It’s the perfect remix tool.
Acid DI is extremely straightforward to use. The lack of effects is frustrating, but upgrading to the Pro version would give you access to multiple real time DirectX effects channels. Trying to write
a song from scratch can be awkward until you build up enough loops to arrange into a song, but once you reach that stage it’s almost too easy. The best thing about Acid is its combination of features — it lies somewhere between a multitrack program and a wave sequencer, taking aspects from each and adding extra features.