Blacked-Out Clips in Project Window

  Hello -- I'm very much a newbie, but I'm working through X1 Studio tutorials. Can anyone explain why, when I drag a loop into the project window, it shows up as a blacked-out square? When I right-click and drag just a bit on the square, I can see the spikes of the clip but as soon as I release the mouse button, the clip goes black again. I see that clicking the number of the track on and off selects and deselects the track. What I am not seeing is (how can I explain it?) the "wave" shapes you should see in the tracks, e.g., the "spiky" "picture" of the track one lays down. I see the same blank squares when I drag in a synth or play a track on mycuitar. Does this make sense? BTW, I've got computer enough to run this software; just need a little help on some small issues Thanks in advance.

Hi, Carl.
As I asked in your other thread, where are you dragging them from? Have you tried double-clicking instead of dragging?
I thought maybe you might be putting audio clips in a MIDI track, but since Music Creator 6 won't do that (it automatically creates a new audio track where the MIDI track I tried to drag it into was) I assume SHS  won't, either.
Are you sure they're audio clips? Could they be MIDI clips you're trying to drag into an audio track? MIDI clips have no wave forms, just dots and dashes.
 

 Hi-- This blackout problem occurs both with audio and MIDI. The loops and MIDI tracks play back just fine (not muted). I just can't see the spikes in order to edit, cut, etc. Thanks

So, where are you dragging them from? What is the original source of the clips? Internet, disk, CD, something you recorded yourself?
Can you post a screen shot of the clips and the track pane so we can see what you see and all the track's properties?
http://forum.cakewalk.com/tm.aspx?m=2299538
 

 Yes, yes, Greg. I didn't know if it was proper to offer a screen shot. But I will do this at once. You will see that I have dragged a loop from the right hand (Browser?) window. I have dragged it to an audio track. Thanks for the help; you're a gentleman and a scholar! carl

I've been trying to reproduce what you did, but with a different program (which should work the same way) and without those particular clips, I can't make it happen.
Does it happen with every clip you drag into the track? Or just these clips from the same file? Can you insert audio from a different source (like your My Music folder) and does that display properly?
Find these clips on your hard drive with SONAR closed. Right-click one of them and select Open With>SONAR or something like that and see what happens.

  Great suggestions but, alas..... I really appreciate you trying to help me out. It's strange, I have a copy of Mixcraft which is very easy to use, there's no complicated MIDI setup, everything works, the tracks are visible, etc. I can't understand how software that costs four times as much as Mixcraft can be so quirky! Anyway, I'll keep plugging away. Thanks again. Carl