I do both. I am looking to make a bit of a name for myself, however. Its much easier to do this with remixes. People do a search for a song they like and you come up and they go "Oh ? A remix of that song I like? Maybe I will check this out. " (etc) :P

To your advice, however, I really haven't posted much of my original stuff, so what I said above is really just supposition. I don't know how to get listeners. If I did, I'd already have them.

I meant to ask, what do you for your remixes and production software?

For a sequencer I use FL Studio 9 64-bit. I have a floating license, but I'm not sure if I'll be unable to use my old configs and stuff if I upgrade so I don't see myself upgrading in the near future.

For sample edits I pretty-much just use Adobe Soundbooth these days. I used to use Sony SoundForge as well, but Soundbooth does just about everything SoundForge does, most stuff much better, and everything else I can do using FL anyway.

For VST synths I use NI Massive a LOT. I also use Sylenth1. I have like a billion other VSTs, but these 2 are my go-to synths. I would say Massive is the best synth in the world. Its basically a "synth creation kit". You can do anything with it including some really wacky bizarre stuff. (Massive basically invented Dubstep, Complextro and a bunch of other genres) So I use that for anything I wanna do that I want a unique sound. Sylenth1 is really good for traditional synths. Very clear and crisp and a bunch of useful stuff you might want to use is just a knob twist away. But its much more limited than Massive. Also its a lot more typical. The ease of getting "good sounding stuff" means everybody uses it. The problem is... then you sound like everybody else.

So typically I use Sylenth for leads, and Massive for all my other instrumentation.

For track and mainline mastering, I use Ozone.

For beats and stuff I just use sample edits. I have a few drum machines, but I find drum machines and drum machine VSTs a pain in the butt to use, and they take way too much processing for little gain. If you really like particular drum machine sounds, the best thing to do is make a drum machine loop and then just rip it as a sample. Then you're not burning up your processing when you're trying to work on other stuff. The drum machine VST I use is BFD2.

sounds like you have a complicated setup their, I figured FL would have everything needed to make most of what you want. I didn't realize it took so many different programs. For FL just send them an email and I am sure they will answer your questions, upgrading should be free also.

So... any sequencer you buy is good for that. It might come with some extra doodads, but if you're serious about music production, you want to get the best stuff from the specialists. Nothing does everything well. You want to get the best synths and sequence with the best sequencer and master it through the best mastering software.

Using just the sequencer... It would be like buying a computer and just using the apps that come with the OS. :P