hardware mixing desks vs virtual desks and linear vs non linear

This part of the blog is to taken the pros and cons of hardware mixing desks against virtual desks and well as the pros and cons of linear media vs non linear.
Hardware mixing desks and virtual desks pros and cons:
First off one main benefit of the hardware desk is that everything is laid out in front of you. You can visually see all channels and easily control any of them from where you are. It allows you to do many things at once if you have a free hand. On virtual desks however they can be in different windows and you have to switch between them and you have to select multiple things with a mouse then turn them up or down and only one person can operate it at a time whereas on a desk you could have assistants helping you doing multiple things at once.
One con of the hardware desk would be the fact that it takes up room and depending how many channels you desk has that could be a lot! this isn't the case for the virtual desks as they run from out of your computer and you can add as many track as your cpu can handle.
Hardware desks require maintenance and house keeping for example cleaning out the faders,knobs etc. and doing so with the wrong cleaning products could seriously damage your desk. On the other hand computers are susceptible to virus which can cause the loss of all your software if bad enough. Macs are much less prone to viruses than PCs but they still have some virus prone to them.

Linear vs non-linear media:
Linear media in music production is tape whilst non linear is the more modern audio files and data used in DAWs. Both have various pro and cons. First off the must obvious pro of non linear media is the fact that its non destructive i.e. you can chop and change it the put it back exactly the way it was as long as you still have the audio files. This is extremely helpful as it essentially allows you to be worry free when editing your sessions. This brings me to the con of tape in that once you cut it cut it there no going back and any editing you do is very time consuming using it.
Also tape requires storage space whereas digital tracks can be stored on your computer or external hard drive or memory stick etc.
Tape degrades over time and also each time an original tape is copied sound quality degrades slightly each time whereas digital can last forever technically.
one advantage of tape though is that its got a unique warm analogue sound and even though you could technically recreate it on digital it is not fully there yet. Many modern bands would still use tape just for that sound.