I’ve been using Cakewalk (Windows only) for many years and now it is free: it has been acquired by Bandlab and is regularly updated. The piano roll view is nice and you can use “notes” on different channels/tracks to send triggers, gates or CV to VCV (using loopback MIDI ports created with the loopMIDI utility).
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I haven’t seen anything that I could help with, yet.
But thank you for your input.
The best bet is to sync with audio and use MIDI just for controls. This tutorial is for Ableton but works great in Reaper. Once it’s set up correctly, I have never had a problem. If you have issues I can certainly offer advise. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PZlfLvzFaFA&feature=emb_logo&ab_channel=OmriCohen
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@agentf64 Thnx for your offer for advise. I’ll certainly keep that in mind. Well. It’s been kinda rocky so far. Syncing via MIDI isn’t working at all, as has been pointed out elsewhere on the forum. So I was thinking of maybe using the DAW as clock and as a timeline track for mutes and fades. Not sure if this is gonna work, but hey… Aside from all that there’s the fact that I was used to working with cubase (I think it was SX at the time) and that reaper is -at first glance- to unfamiliar. I’ll try to give some updates on how things work out -or not- the coming days. Enjoy
@algoritmarte How do you use it? Do you sync vcv? How? Because syncing via midi hasn’t worked out for me. A various posts on the forum confirm. Thsn for possible info on the subject. Enjoy
See if this helps:
External gear also means other DAW’s.
Sorry if this has been mentioned but have you checked Tracktion Waveform? They have a free version Waveform Free | digital audio workstation band editing software - Tracktion
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linked from the top of their homepage is a temporary free license due to the lockdown: https://cockos.com/reaper/reaper_2020_temporary_license.txt?november.txt
they have been doing this for a while, and i expect this will be renewed soon.
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I almost used it to play MIDI sequences without MIDI clock synchronization, but I also made some experiments and used two separate tracks (on dedicated MIDI channels) and “dummy” notes that are used only to pass trigger/gates/ and CV values (using notes velocity) to VCV .
Probably you can also made a track with a dummy note every 1/16th and use it to send a “regular” trigger clock to VCV; but perhaps this doesn’t work if modules use MIDI timestamps or MIDI clock messages.
It would be useful (and probably easy to implement …) a module that maps each note to a different trigger/gate/CV output … in this way in Cakewalk (but also on every “standard” DAW sequencer) you can program / synchronize a ton of triggers/gates in a single and very handy visual representation (the classical piano roll view in which each note-segment corresponds to a trigger/gate). If there is not one out there I can try to implement it … a sort of MIDI note to trigger/gate multiplexer.
I got one called “Polygate” that will do eight triggers from one polyphonic CV/Gate pair. It’s to go along with my piano roll sequencer “Seq++”. These are both free VCV modules if you are interested.
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@algoritmarte As far I can come to grips with the entire rigmarole there’s several issues where sync is concerned: first of, midi clock is apparently not very stable/reliable. Add to that the fact that -according to some sources here on the forum- the midi-cv module (vcv) is also very inaccurate and you get a really fluctuating clock signal. This becomes readily apparent when you connect a clock to the clock output of the midi-cv module; the clock fluctuates like mad around the DAW bpm signature which is also visible on a decent scope. Thus, not workable. Plus there is considerable delay between the DAW clock and the clock in VCV. Regretfully I am not a programmer so I haven’t the faintest idea how all this should be worked out. Nevertheless, I think I found a way to synchronize VCV and Cakewalk but before I pop the champagne I’ll have to do some further testing. I’ve had one succesfull run, but as they say, one swallow doesn’t make a summer. If however I have continued succes with the method I’m testing I’ll keep you in the loop. Enjoy
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I like/use Ardour too, and I like it a lot.
People say that it isn’t very good with MIDI, and that may be true (it’s also possible that the comment applies to older versions). I haven’t done much with MIDI, other than importing MIDI files to drive LV2 plugins, and it works fine for that.
Regardless, it’s probably worth a gander.
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Personally I never managed to get a hybrid Rack/DAW setup that I enjoyed. I would strongly recommend the Entrian Timeline module, it’s a piano roll type sequencer, but it can also output triggers polyphonically (for handling mutes and anything else you’d like to trigger), and voltage ramps (for doing DAW ‘automation’ like fades). I pair stoermelder’s 8Face with its piano roll which allows me to switch between different presets for things like sequencers along the timeline via notes.
It’s a bit weird but I find the more I can do in Rack with a track before heading over to a Daw the better the result is (and the more fun I have). Give it a try!
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If you want help using Jooper and Janneker (the combination was made to do what you are looking for) you kan pm me. I think this way you can do what you want.
oooh, just trying to set that all up, can you share that project file for Reaper pretty please?
Please see this:
MIDI sync. definately works best, currently, with VCV Rack being the master clock. For Rack V2 (any day now) Andrew has made improvements so that the timing of MIDI messages become far more releable. The future looks bright 
Sure. I have the clock pulse sending on ReaRoute #3 because that is what matches my physical card setup when I sync with Ableton using the same techniques. The template has 8 channels (mono) mapped and ready to record. I also included a VCV template patch and a couple of screenshots showing how I have the Reaper transport mapped to MIDI so you can start and stop it from within VCV.
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cool, thanks!
Hi All. I found my free DAW. I went with Cakewalk as it is, indeed, free and most reminiscent of the Cubase version I used to work with back in the day. I only/mostly use it for automating volumes for tracks and the occasional trigger. No audio at all. The last couple of days I’ve been arranging a couple of existing patches and although all this fiddling with automation data isn’t exactly the most exciting part of creating sound/music the fact that I have a clear view of the arrangement is a great help. So yes, I prefer this method over any other I’ve tried so far. Last, but not least, I found a method to sync VCV to the DAW. I will put this in a seperate post ASAP. It isn’t even very difficult and for my needs it does exactly what I had hoped. Well, I’m gonna crack that champagne now. Enjoy.
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Just seen this video on youtube, might help.
(168) Best Free DAWs 2021 
Free Music Production Software For Windows 10 - YouTube