Plug-ins can get expensive but there's a whole ton of freebies that work fine for most stuff. Cubase came with a drum machine, a couple of synths and all the reverbs, echoes and compression plug-ins you'd ever need.
...and betamax is still better than VHS, althought both are outdated now with DVD's and hard drive recorders.
And my Sonly PCM701ES is still pretty good for making digital recordings on video tape.