is cakewalk a good daw?

[dellboy]

a) you did not really get what I was on about

a. Something to do with its not "slippery enough" ?

b. Not being "slippery enough" is a deal breaker but you will hang around here anyway ?

c. You think Sonar is a rubbish DAW and you want an immediate refund !

[jens]

Hell yeah, I want a refund!!! Where the hell are the lifetime Platinum updates that I Paid for???




What? Updates are free for everyone now? But... but.... but I paiud for them! Not fair!!!




No, seriously: it's amazing what you get for free nowadays - buit the restriction I mentioned is a serious issue for most everyone who records a lot of audio - which is what I said in my initial post. If you are mostly a synth-tinkerer or something along those lines instead, like probaly more than 90% of KVR'S inhabitants, it might make no difference for you at all. You may not even get what the f**k I am rambling on about. It's usually exactly the same for me when you guys rant about MIDI features and I can't even begin to be interested in what on earth you are on about. MIDI? Is that still a thing in 2020 anyway?

[jens]

hit quote instead of edit

[JoseC.]

c) still apparently could not possibly resist the urge to defend your favourite host from my mean attack

Nope, you got it wrong. I don´t care about that, but am always curious when people seem to think that they know the One Twue Way of doing things. Have a good one.

[Danilo Villanova]

I didn't know about the slip edit issue, it actually can be a problem for audio recording. Hopefully they'll address it as they have done with the incredible improvements they've done so far. I can see CbB becoming better and better and I soon may switch to it completeley but I'm actually enjoying REAPER more and more. I'll keep my eye on it.

[Saffran]

Since the TS (topic starter) = OP have tried CbB and prefer the workflow of Cubase i suggest this topic to be locked.
We don't need more trash talk about daws.

With top ten daws having hundreds of functions each, there have to be differences and thus different effectivity for some of the things.

[FapFilter]

Yes, and since the function to instantly bounce different audio clips on different tracks to a new one by a simple key command that i first seen when i was on Acid and later when i was using my Sonar doesn't actually seems to be the pretty common function i thought it to be, i hereby declare every single DAW that doesn't support this as cack.

Maybe i must drop my Reaper immediately and crawl back to Sonar. Or Acid.

[dellboy]

variaudio I would like , where as even the free version of reason has pitch correction , cubase elements only has the basic pitch correction plug in , cakewalk didn’t have any

I guess you mean something like autotune which is realtime ?

Cakewalk Bandlab has a 30 day trial of Melodyne with Ara2 support. And if you have the basic melodyne which comes free with some other DAWs it will integrate and give basic offline pitch editing.

[Monsum]

My last version of Cakewalk Sonar was X1 which promised a lot but delivered mainly bugs and a muddled interface.
So yesterday I tried Cakewalk by Bandlab and...yes they fixed all the bugs but the interface is still too confusing.
It looks like in every little corner of the screen there is a tab or icon which gives another roll-up menu.
And the pro channel - great idea but poor execution. If you have a few pro channel effects they won't fit within the mixer view.
You end up scrolling up and down to get to the effect controls or channel fader.
Yes, you can fold up a pro channel module and then unfold it if you need to use it again but that defeats the purpose of the pro channel idea - is folding/unfolding not the same as opening/closing a plugin from fx bin? To me it is but the second solution is less messy.

I remember now why I left Sonar. It's free but I'd prefer to use something better designed with less features than a fully featured DAW with things getting in your way.

But I always liked some earlier versions of Cakewalk software like Sonar 8.5, Cakewalk Pro 8, Guitar Tracks 2 and 3.

[Roman Empire]

+1 vote for cakewalk. I´ve been using Cubase for 25 years, and will not stop to do so. But a friend of mine and me decided to start writing songs together in a raw and not so overperfectionistic fashion, and needed to find a platform that would be compatible for both of us. Cakewalk ended up being the choice because it´s free and unlike any other freebie outthere seems to have no limitations at all. I do find it a bit hard to get used to how moving segments around, and other workflow related things, since I´m used to how it´s done in Cubase and the look of it is not as great as Cubase. But this is stuff you´ll get used to, and I´m getting there. I´ve had one crash these last two months, and I´m not so sure if that´s a plugin causing it. I´ve had crashes in Cubase too though, so I would not consider cakewalk less stable.

Ah one thing: I found it rediculously hard to find out how to install it, after having downloaded Bandlab but I finally got there.

Have you tried the new Arranger for moving sections around?

https://youtu.be/-tneNJJVq2k

Nope! Do I just need to tell cakewalk to update itself?
What I don´t like is that unlike in cubase, I can´t just mark a section with the mouse and then move it. I first have to select the selection tool, and then the moving tool. And, I find that sometimes I struggle to mark everything and have to manually add parts afterwards with SHIFT held down. Also, as far as I can see, zooming can´t be done with the scroll wheel as in cubase, so the whole moving, copying process just doesn´t have the same easy feeling where a mouse is all you need.
But I may be wrong, I´m just a beginner in cakewalk
Ah yeah, and I don´t like also that it will not automatically unselect the record button next to a track, if you select it at another one. It´s good of course that you CAN record at multiple tracks at the same time, but most of the time that´s not what you want (IMO).

[Danilo Villanova]

+1 vote for cakewalk. I´ve been using Cubase for 25 years, and will not stop to do so. But a friend of mine and me decided to start writing songs together in a raw and not so overperfectionistic fashion, and needed to find a platform that would be compatible for both of us. Cakewalk ended up being the choice because it´s free and unlike any other freebie outthere seems to have no limitations at all. I do find it a bit hard to get used to how moving segments around, and other workflow related things, since I´m used to how it´s done in Cubase and the look of it is not as great as Cubase. But this is stuff you´ll get used to, and I´m getting there. I´ve had one crash these last two months, and I´m not so sure if that´s a plugin causing it. I´ve had crashes in Cubase too though, so I would not consider cakewalk less stable.

Ah one thing: I found it rediculously hard to find out how to install it, after having downloaded Bandlab but I finally got there.

Have you tried the new Arranger for moving sections around?

https://youtu.be/-tneNJJVq2k

Nope! Do I just need to tell cakewalk to update itself?
What I don´t like is that unlike in cubase, I can´t just mark a section with the mouse and then move it. I first have to select the selection tool, and then the moving tool. And, I find that sometimes I struggle to mark everything and have to manually add parts afterwards with SHIFT held down. Also, as far as I can see, zooming can´t be done with the scroll wheel as in cubase, so the whole moving, copying process just doesn´t have the same easy feeling where a mouse is all you need.
But I may be wrong, I´m just a beginner in cakewalk
Ah yeah, and I don´t like also that it will not automatically unselect the record button next to a track, if you select it at another one. It´s good of course that you CAN record at multiple tracks at the same time, but most of the time that´s not what you want (IMO).

You should get a toast notification to update if your PC is connected to the Internet. The Arranger functions does what you need, I think.

[arjanm]

What I don´t like is that unlike in cubase, I can´t just mark a section with the mouse and then move it. I first have to select the selection tool, and then the moving tool.

cakewalk_move.gif

You don't have to use the Select and Move tools.
Just using the Smart tool, you can select clips using the RIGHT mouse button and then move them by dragging one of the selected clips from their title bar with the LEFT mouse button.

[lfm]

Ah yeah, and I don´t like also that it will not automatically unselect the record button next to a track, if you select it at another one. It´s good of course that you CAN record at multiple tracks at the same time, but most of the time that´s not what you want (IMO).

It's a settings in Cubase and so in Cakewalk as well whether to automatically arm a selected track for record.

"Toggle Track Arm for selected track" default Alt+R key combination swaps this behavior.

Manual is pretty good for Cakewalk, spend some time with it.
What I miss in manual is a content index in pdf, but if using another pdf reader than Adobe's like PDF Xchange Editor(free) you can build your own bookmarks over time or add to any pdf own bookmarks.

I wondered from Sonar over to Cubase a bit due to notation features, but am back and Cakewalk is my main daw.

[Roman Empire]

What I don´t like is that unlike in cubase, I can´t just mark a section with the mouse and then move it. I first have to select the selection tool, and then the moving tool.

cakewalk_move.gif

You don't have to use the Select and Move tools.
Just using the Smart tool, you can select clips using the RIGHT mouse button and then move them by dragging one of the selected clips from their title bar with the LEFT mouse button.

Thanks, my cakewalk tells me it´s the latest, so I´ll have to play with that!

[Roman Empire]

Ah yeah, and I don´t like also that it will not automatically unselect the record button next to a track, if you select it at another one. It´s good of course that you CAN record at multiple tracks at the same time, but most of the time that´s not what you want (IMO).

It's a settings in Cubase and so in Cakewalk as well whether to automatically arm a selected track for record.

"Toggle Track Arm for selected track" default Alt+R key combination swaps this behavior.

Manual is pretty good for Cakewalk, spend some time with it.
What I miss in manual is a content index in pdf, but if using another pdf reader than Adobe's like PDF Xchange Editor(free) you can build your own bookmarks over time or add to any pdf own bookmarks.

I wondered from Sonar over to Cubase a bit due to notation features, but am back and Cakewalk is my main daw.

Thanks for that, just too used to Cubase but if it can be switched off this easily, it´s certainly great!