I have a slight different view on this ...



I Have a equip (4 dj/ produc.) shop in Portugal with a buddie of mine (fuc*** hard being a pioneer on a country where no many people have a resonable paycheque).. so I see both sides of the coin... If u really can't afford hardware.. go down the software but at least doi it in style... a PC like Mark suggested is a must + RME soundcard (2 me the are only matched by Motu, Digidesign -top stuff- , and Creamware).... then slowly build on that...

Again I stress that u should use what ever u use and use it's particular character 2 your advantadge... a lot of people we admire from the past used very minimal "shi**" setups but still rocked ...



I can use my exem. (no that I'm some kind of reference or anything 2 go by) : my 1st 4 ep's were all produced with Roland XP50 ... the same as the JV1080 but with Keyboard... I must have spent a all x-mas just creating bleeps and noises (at the time I didn't know sh*** about synthesis.. but still loved 2 tweek ... I learned a lot from there!!)... me grannie was looking at me with headphones on pounding the keys, like ""wot tha fu**!!??"... Now this isn't really a techno machine but I was doing some mean hard/minimal techno with it... when it came out on Djax everyone was like "how did u get that sound out of yer TB303 and Tr909, SH101.." eheheh



So 4 a while forget about technical stuff and jus focus on havin a lot of fun... later it will all come 2gether!



I have a nice "studio at my shop" but never have the time 2 use it... At home (recently got a ) 909 and a Futureretro 777 + rme multiface+pcmcia.. external lacie HD firewire and a toshiba laptop!! I have donne countless trackz just on fruity... but then again I have lots of my own samples so the character lies there..



What Mark ment about fruity is just the more technical side of things... in fact 4 sketching a track fruity really rocks.. but for the mixing/ eq/ dynamics.. pre-mastering.. that's were the weaknesses of fruity start 2 show over something like SX! (but if u use stuff like waves plug ins and similar, u can almost get 'round this prob!).



PS- Hardware gear is just a thing 4 us older geezers.. someone who comes from a software background finds them very complicate and limited!! But there is just a certain "je ne sai quoit" about hardware that I love... dirty fat big knobs!! ehehehe



my 2 cents,



Z