What’s said, and what is, are often very different. If not, what works for some, does not work for all.
The point is, if it was my money, I would do as much research as I possibly could. Work through the list, one item at the time. Read reviews, do comparisons of what is available, at what cost, and which have features that satisfies My needs, and get what fits Me best.
What really matters, is to choose that which will enhance Your situation the most.
An example… for ME, and this will work for some, I use Cubase with a CC121, an MR816 and a Midex8. It works great for me, but there are some people in the forum that has problems with one or more of these items. Now, what may not be apparent from my example “advice”, is that I have a Midex8 which implies MIDI gear. Well, loads of it. In fact, so much that I am limiting myself to a relatively small set of VST instruments (at the moment), which may be one reason why I don’t have the problems that others are experiencing. The point here is that people will give advice and forget a lot of surrounding arguments, or think that “this” or “that” is the answer within their setup. Which is not necessarily true. Oh, I use the VST instrument HALion 5 quite a bit. So I may be Steinberg biased (I’ve been using Cubase since before it was named Cubase even) and I am perhaps missing out on some rather exciting stuff, I wouldn’t know what (since I am not in the market to buy), but what I have works really good for ME, and Steinberg do make awesomeness!
Unfortunately for you, market people are pretty slippery (in class with lawyers). Promises of more gold, greener grass and all that. There are a lot of knowledgeable users out here in the forums, but it’s hard to pick them out among the other grazing animals. So again, I think you need to take the time to research and hang around places to see what attracts your senses. IMHO, you need to take that time, if you want the most out of your money.