Introducing the new SONAR: New lineup, new features, plus membership

[vintagevibe]

However, there's one big bug that's pissing me off, and it's got me using Sonar at the moment: the click bug. The click goes inaudible at random times, and when you start recording at a non-exact bar time. There's threads about this on the Steinberg forum. It really pissed me off when this wasn't fixed in the latest update, 8.0.5. One of the Steiny guys posted that it wouldn't be fixed in the first update, though, it's still pretty crappy that this bug is present.

I still have the disappearing time line in Sonar X3e. I have to frequently reboot just to get any work done. I only use Sonar when I have to for older files but I'm stuck a major show stopper that will never be fixed. BTW I'm on Cubase 7.5 and will upgrade after a few updates. Couldn't be happier.

[yessongs]

I've installed x3 on 2 computers and it had a bug in one that went away when I right clicked and ran the program as administrator. That may fix your bug as well.

[yessongs]

Graphics problems like you describe could also be peculiar to your system due to a lack of graphics resources or the particular driver used in your computer. There are so many different drivers out there these days CW cannot be expected to test their program in all of them. Your computer manufacturer may have alternative graphics drivers and if worse came to worse perhaps you could install an upgraded graphics card to do a better job rendering the timeline. PC's can vary in configurations to such a degree that it is always hit or miss with what will work on your system and if you have a bug it can always be related to a problem due to a bad fit of thrown together components that a PC manufacturer experimented with but failed to tell you about it. This calls for being smart in buying hardware and learning how to buy computers with higher quality components. I just returned my black friday special due to a failure in the graphics driver and instead opted to fix my problem in my older laptop. The graphics driver would periodically crash and go blank for a few seconds for no reason at all. Eventually I will get rack mount desktop computer and build it with all trusted components. The audio interface I will add in to the mix will be a mackie onyx firewire which has a reputation among engineers who test interfaces for RTL (round trip latency ) This particular unit can even be modded to perform better. Read about it here. http://blacklionaudio.com/product/macki ... bird-mods/ Sonar for me is the single best DAW and as it evolves they seem to be adding features that I like so I am sticking with it.

[yessongs]

http://www.cakewalk.com/Documentation?p ... p=toc.html here is the new online documentation I notice there is no pdf users manual released to the public yet. They are probably still writing in changes to it.

[vintagevibe]

Graphics problems like you describe could also be peculiar to your system due to a lack of graphics resources or the particular driver used in your computer. There are so many different drivers out there these days CW cannot be expected to test their program in all of them. Your computer manufacturer may have alternative graphics drivers and if worse came to worse perhaps you could install an upgraded graphics card to do a better job rendering the timeline. PC's can vary in configurations to such a degree that it is always hit or miss with what will work on your system and if you have a bug it can always be related to a problem due to a bad fit of thrown together components that a PC manufacturer experimented with but failed to tell you about it. This calls for being smart in buying hardware and learning how to buy computers with higher quality components. I just returned my black friday special due to a failure in the graphics driver and instead opted to fix my problem in my older laptop. The graphics driver would periodically crash and go blank for a few seconds for no reason at all. Eventually I will get rack mount desktop computer and build it with all trusted components. The audio interface I will add in to the mix will be a mackie onyx firewire which has a reputation among engineers who test interfaces for RTL (round trip latency ) This particular unit can even be modded to perform better. Read about it here. http://blacklionaudio.com/product/macki ... bird-mods/ Sonar for me is the single best DAW and as it evolves they seem to be adding features that I like so I am sticking with it.

I built my system using a Radeon HD 5450 w/current drivers. This is a widely used card knonw to work with Sonar and is not the problem. They released a "fix" but it did not fix for all users.

[Gonga]

Graphics problems like you describe could also be peculiar to your system due to a lack of graphics resources or the particular driver used in your computer. There are so many different drivers out there these days CW cannot be expected to test their program in all of them. Your computer manufacturer may have alternative graphics drivers and if worse came to worse perhaps you could install an upgraded graphics card to do a better job rendering the timeline. PC's can vary in configurations to such a degree that it is always hit or miss with what will work on your system and if you have a bug it can always be related to a problem due to a bad fit of thrown together components that a PC manufacturer experimented with but failed to tell you about it. This calls for being smart in buying hardware and learning how to buy computers with higher quality components. I just returned my black friday special due to a failure in the graphics driver and instead opted to fix my problem in my older laptop. The graphics driver would periodically crash and go blank for a few seconds for no reason at all. Eventually I will get rack mount desktop computer and build it with all trusted components. The audio interface I will add in to the mix will be a mackie onyx firewire which has a reputation among engineers who test interfaces for RTL (round trip latency ) This particular unit can even be modded to perform better. Read about it here. http://blacklionaudio.com/product/macki ... bird-mods/ Sonar for me is the single best DAW and as it evolves they seem to be adding features that I like so I am sticking with it.

I have a Mackie Onyx 1640i Mixer and it's solved all my problems in my little studio! It has a round-trip latency of about 6ms with buffer at 128 samples, or round-trip 2.9ms at 64 samples, and is rock-solid, even though I've got the older version with the older drivers. The newer version has some new features. The other great thing is I have a huge analog mixer for all my gear - no more fishing around behind gear for wires - now I just push buttons and move sliders! And I have 16 discreet audio channels in and out, super great mic pres, very musical EQ on every channel, tons of sub mix sections, etc. So I can bring in audio from my keyboards, my rack mounts, iPhone, turntable, my SONOS, my tape decks, etc. and send audio to the SONOS system (with that I can send audio from any source to anywhere in the house), various monitor pairs, whatever. Basically, I have complete flexibility and no more wires to deal with. The Mackie is the best hardware I have bought in the last 20 years. You might want to consider a Mackie mixer as an audio interface instead of just a rackmount

[Sweet Tooth]

From my post paymnet via Cakewalk store. I report, you decide.

Subscription?

[vespesian]

From my post paymnet via Cakewalk store. I report, you decide.

Subscription?

Frankly, it's a lost cause trying to debate this point (or anything else unflattering to CW) with many of the prissy Cakewalk Forum Elders. It will be interesting to see what the company line becomes a year from now...

[GeorgeZ]

This was asked on the first page by someone else (and I checked up to page 4 for a reply, none, so... ). I have X3 Prod, which includes some of the plugins that are now in Platinum only. If I "upgrade" to Professional, not Platinum, do I loose those plugins?

EDIT: checking the CW forums now as well, maybe it's in a FAQ there?

BTW, CW answered on FB. If you leave the X3 Producer pluggies installed, you can use your ProChannel modules in Producer 2015.

[trimph1]

Megh...

[She Changed Her Mind]

Considering next year.. from what upgrade does someone have to pay, if that person is planning to use Sonar only a few months based on this 12 month's concept? And which month's upgrade will they use if they won't start in january?
Example: Let's say someone wants to pay for september only. Which upgrade does this customer get?
Next year the same customer does the same. They want to use Sonar regarded to september only.
Does this customer pay only for two terms in this case?
Or for thirteen months? Or even sixteen....???
And again.. which month's upgrade will be used in both cases to start with?
I guess that makes a big difference lol

[poonna]

Considering next year.. from what upgrade does someone have to pay, if that person is planning to use Sonar only a few months based on this 12 month's concept? And which month's upgrade will they use if they won't start in january?
Example: Let's say someone wants to pay for september only. Which upgrade does this customer get?
Next year the same customer does the same. They want to use Sonar regarded to september only.
Does this customer pay only for two terms in this case?
Or for thirteen months? Or even sixteen....???
And again.. which month's upgrade will be used in both cases to start with?
I guess that makes a big difference lol

If they want to use Sonar only in September, then subscribe for monthly membership on September, and cancel the next month when they are done using it. Next year do the same. They will be paying only like $19 a year for that. It's just that it will revert to demo after September, but that's not a problem if they only want to use it in September.

Regarding version, it will always be the latest version, whichever it is.

Assuming they already have a version of Sonar, of course, so they get the $19 upgrade price. Otherwise it will be $49 a month for the new user.

[lfm]

If they want to use Sonar only in September, then subscribe for monthly membership on September, and cancel the next month when they are done using it. Next year do the same. They will be paying only like $19 a year for that. It's just that it will revert to demo after September, but that's not a problem if they only want to use it in September.

Regarding version, it will always be the latest version, whichever it is.

Assuming they already have a version of Sonar, of course, so they get the $19 upgrade price. Otherwise it will be $49 a month for the new user.

I think you should read up a bit on that.
There were some clause that a full 12 months need to be fulfilled if doing monthly payments not exceeding 12 months. So you cannot do like that - and I assume the license is somewhat timerestricted as well if going monthly(but not sure yet about latter part).

[poonna]

If they want to use Sonar only in September, then subscribe for monthly membership on September, and cancel the next month when they are done using it. Next year do the same. They will be paying only like $19 a year for that. It's just that it will revert to demo after September, but that's not a problem if they only want to use it in September.

Regarding version, it will always be the latest version, whichever it is.

Assuming they already have a version of Sonar, of course, so they get the $19 upgrade price. Otherwise it will be $49 a month for the new user.

I think you should read up a bit on that.
There were some clause that a full 12 months need to be fulfilled if doing monthly payments not exceeding 12 months. So you cannot do like that - and I assume the license is somewhat timerestricted as well if going monthly(but not sure yet about latter part).

Not really. Since you wanted to use it for only one month in the whole year, you wouldn't really need to own it (which requires you to pay a full 12-month period). In this case, you could just subscribe for the month you would use it. In other words, you could just rent it.

In their own words (Cakewalk FAQ):

If I choose Monthly Membership payments, can I cancel before 12 Months?

Yes, but 12 consecutive monthly payments are required to permanently activate SONAR and any updates you have received. If you cancel payment or don’t pay for at least 12 months, SONAR will revert to demo mode. This means you can’t save or export projects, however anything you saved up to that point will still open and play in the demo. Once you resume payments, you can make new edits and save them.

[dsan@mail.com]

The way I understand this, poonna is sort of right, but missing the part about reverting to previous version. The software will revert to your last full version if you default on the 12 month plan and the current version will go into demo (which he/she did state).

lfm is absolutely right in that there is a 12 month subscription needed to be fulfilled to keep the current version and use without restriction. That is not as a demo version.

IE, you now own Sonar X3 Producer, fully outright.

You opt to upgrade to Sonar Platinum during the month of September at a rate of $19 per month for a 12 month subscription (hypothetical).

This gives you all current features and updates up until the time you opt in. If any new features/updates appear during the month of September you get those.

At the end of September you decide not to continue your subscription and cancel.

Your version of Sonar now reverts to the last fully paid version you have, in this case scenario, Sonar X3, while Sonar Platinum now runs as a demo version subject to the rules/restrictions of the demo.

What remains unclear to me is whether or not both versions will reside on the same computer; Sonar X3 Producer full and Sonar Platinum demo. Given Cakewalks history and the way it installs I think this can be made to happen.

Happy Musiking!
dsan