Fractal ICONS Plugin

Oh, I didn't want to spoil you with all of the beauty. My bad.

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But yes... mixers and levels are super important....

With Cubase, when I'm in the heat of recording I can very clearly see if I'm clipping anything. When I'm mixing I can very quickly and clearly judge my gain staging; audio engineering 101 stuff that Reaper really massively fails at; even with the different layouts in the TCP and MCP.
Now that they finally made the folder/group track combo in Cubendo it's finally a reasonable workflow again.

But prior after messing with Studio One I went back to ProTools and Sequoia and that's like coming home.

Funnily enough I started on DAWs on Logic 4 and that's like the last option id go to.
 
It looks like a DAW yeah.

I mean I look at that and honestly I think - what am I missing? what's so different than what Reaper has?
Who Knows Idk GIF
Honestly... if you don't get it, you don't get it. Suffice to say, I've been using Reaper almost daily since 2008 for work and for band stuff, and right now in 2026 I still think it is:

1. Pig ugly.
2. Difficult to use, difficult to develop flow with.
3. Requires so much bloody customisation, and once you do it all you quickly realise... oh... I've just made it conform to normal human expectation, just like all the other DAWs...

As part of my history in music tech, I've had to have a good handle on using pretty much every major DAW, and I can comfortably say that the two biggest knobheads in the room are Reaper and Digital Performer.
 
Re-installed Reaper to see what I've been missing. I’ve used it off and on since V1. There's barely any organisation or structure to where things are in the menus. All the options are there but there's no context to what is put in front of you. This is stuff that was all described in that blog posted I linked before that was posted in 2017.

Anyway.

First thing I see looks like this.

Screenshot 2026-04-15 at 15.23.43.png


Then to work out how to change resolution and sizing settings requires diving around google. The internal help and search bars don't point towards any scaling settings but digging through these menus with tiny text and tons of options we get to scale it.

Screenshot 2026-04-15 at 15.25.19.png


Setting it to 2x scaling helps in some areas, but does nothing in others. So you're left with a right mess of some things being too big (where there's not even enough space for the text to fit (like the meters), some being way too small.

That’s before even doing anything but when software is so reliant on having long lists within every menu, and every dialog box having tons of options crammed in, they at least need to be somewhat visible. Pretty sure every Reaper user has to default to googling whatever they need to do because the naming conventions and locations for things will require so much digging around.

DID sOmEoNe sAy rEaPeR sUx rEeEeEeEeEeE
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I modified the "reapertips" guy (Alejandro) free preset, love the colour scheme.

I'm in the midst off switching to FENDER studio and some of the workflows are weird and one plugin is crashing there so I have to email the dev (aurora tsk tsk). But yeah they all have their quirks.... reaper has the benefit of being insanely cheap so at least you dont feel bad dumping $500 to feel bad about your bad mixing skills.

Still just looks awful to me. So much stuff is tiny to read, tiny to click and just using space badly. I know it’s possible to get used to it, and adapt it to try to minimise the pain but it’s just a mess. I’ve used basically every DAW out there at some point in my life and while others have their quirks, Reaper is in a whole different league of pain for me to use.
 
Now that they finally made the folder/group track combo in Cubendo it's finally a reasonable workflow again.
Yeah right!? I really like that addition!

So much stuff is tiny to read, tiny to click and just using space badly.
This. 100000% this. And going back to my comment about the tech stack; it is entirely down to their internal UI tech. There's nearly nothing that a theme designer can do to solve it. Even if the work White Tie does wasn't bad (imo).

In Cubase and Studio One, Ableton Live, Bitwig Studio, I can perform every thing I need to do without squinting once. Reaper is Squint City.

Reaper Reaper, destroyer of Peepers.
 
If this is fine, then it's a very low hurdle to clear. I'd say its more that you are happy enough to endure it, which is absolutely fine.

I'm sure there are better skins out there which would fix some of these issues (and some are just things you can tweak yourself in the current skin) I'd say there are obvious issues with how space is used (or left blank), the size of buttons, the contrast of text. It's so so so bad. Credit where its due though, at least you are using a paid version.
 
I love Reaper. Just used it, Cubase and Cakewolk (in another life, a long long tima ago). So I´ve got not too much of a comparison in my head.

But I just don´t have time to explore DAWs, master them, and them decide I´d try another one just in case I´m not in the best scenario. And even less if money is a factor. I just paid a license years ago for Reaper (and I could´ve even not done it, since it´s "de facto" free). They update ir constantly, and it gives me the functionality I need.

But yeah... I hear you. I´m sure it´s not the most streamlined DAW out there...
 
Re-installed Reaper to see what I've been missing. I’ve used it off and on since V1. There's barely any organisation or structure to where things are in the menus. All the options are there but there's no context to what is put in front of you. This is stuff that was all described in that blog posted I linked before that was posted in 2017.

Anyway.

First thing I see looks like this.

View attachment 61693

Then to work out how to change resolution and sizing settings requires diving around google. The internal help and search bars don't point towards any scaling settings but digging through these menus with tiny text and tons of options we get to scale it.

View attachment 61694

Setting it to 2x scaling helps in some areas, but does nothing in others. So you're left with a right mess of some things being too big (where there's not even enough space for the text to fit (like the meters), some being way too small.

That’s before even doing anything but when software is so reliant on having long lists within every menu, and every dialog box having tons of options crammed in, they at least need to be somewhat visible. Pretty sure every Reaper user has to default to googling whatever they need to do because the naming conventions and locations for things will require so much digging around.



Still just looks awful to me. So much stuff is tiny to read, tiny to click and just using space badly. I know it’s possible to get used to it, and adapt it to try to minimise the pain but it’s just a mess. I’ve used basically every DAW out there at some point in my life and while others have their quirks, Reaper is in a whole different league of pain for me to use.
Magnify Rick Moranis GIF
 
I remember Reaper on my last computer was tiny like that and I had to change a setting to fix it. On my current computer it wasn't like that, so I think that issue is GPU dependent.

I used Cubase SX to learn, but have used Reaper for years. I don't really see the need to pay more for hacking around with plugins at home. If I did it professionally as a job I could see wanting something more streamlined.
 
What I was thinking would be REALLY awesome is if FAS did an Icons plugin of just effects. Like a virtual VP4. that would be amaze-balls.
Definitely. I kinda wanted this with hx native too. Or just have them as breakout plugins on their own or in a plugin per category. Lot of work I suppose.
 
Or just have them as breakout plugins on their own
I'd be up for seeing the FX broken out individually and just see Fractal run loose with the concept without any kind of reigns on them. Would be awesome to see what they come up with that can only exist as a plugin. For the FX I think a plugin version of the HW is kind of short sighted...
 
I'd be up for seeing the FX broken out individually and just see Fractal run loose with the concept without any kind of reigns on them. Would be awesome to see what they come up with that can only exist as a plugin. For the FX I think a plugin version of the HW is kind of short sighted...
Would love just a reverb and delay plugin from FAS. :love
 
My VP4 landed on my doorstep four hours ago.

I'm already clamouring for VP4 Native. Having all those sounds in a DAW, MC6 Pro control everything... yyyyyyyyyyyeah.
From what I can remember, there's been talk of such a possibility. I'd imagine it depends on how well the ICONS line does overall. Cliff recently said that an updated Reverb plugin is landing soon too.
 
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