Dangerous 2-BUS with Sonar X3 problem (SOLVED - for now)

Hello Everyone.
After many hours of searching and trying to solve an issue with my setup, I finally gave up and thought to ask you for your help.
I have Sonar X3 running in Windows 8. I have 3 Fireface UC interfaces connected together and sending the signal to the Dangerous Source monitoring device. Everything works great.
The problem is when introducing the Dangerous 2-BUS LT. The are no hardware related issues with the setup, I can rout the signal (total of 16 channels) from the 3 Firefaces combined to the 2_BUS which are routed back to one of the Firfaces' inputs and then to the monitors.
The problem is with the routing inside Sonar. I want to mix through the 2-BUS. So, to hear the processed signal after going through the 2_BUS, I have to create an audio track that receives it. All good till now and I can receive the processed signal just fine. However, any plugins on this track will not be recorder/printed when recording the signal from this track (although you can hear their effects). So if I want to put a compressor, for instance, on that audio track I can hear its effect but when I hit the record button on that track to print my mix it will not include this effect. I've seen a video in the Dangerous Music's youtube channel doing this exact setup but with Pro Tools. But the guy uses a combination of an Audio track and an Aux track where he made the signal coming from the 2-BUS go first to the input of the Aux track and out to the Audio track which made any effect be captured.
Unfortunately, I could not do that because Sonar's buses don't let you choose your input. Also with this setup I lost my Master Bus functionality (not receiving anything because every track is sent directly to one of the outputs of the interfaces).
So is there a way to change the inputs of a bus in Sonar? Or is there another way this could work?
I am really lost right now and hope someone here could help.
 
Thanks and sorry for the long post :)

thank you for your reply, and sorry for the confusion.
Yes, I want to put a VST plugin to affect the incoming signal, and to treat that track as my master bus (since the master bus is of no use in this situation).
So from your answer it seems that it is not possible to mix through the 2-BUS in Sonar (because there is no master bus or audio track that I can treat as a master track to put any VST on (like limiter or the like) to affect the whole mix?
Then my only other option is to have another DAW for mixing through the 2-BUS. I was hoping to do that in Sonar which is my main DAW and I like to work in it exclusively.
 
Thank you again.

Why would you need to print the VST to the track upon recording? You need to export the audio eventually anyway, I don't really see how it makes a difference?

Unfortunately, that is how digital effects work in the computer.  You can hear them "live" but they don't print, unless you have separate dsp (like my TC Konnect or the Apollo, etc.).  Same as if you put an effect in the box on a live performance.  You hear it, but that isn't saved as an audio file.
 
There is really no difference between what you "hear" live during mixdown and bouncing the stereo track w/ effects afterwards.  In your case you just copy or drag your master buss effect you've used during mixing over to the input mix. Try it yourself. You should hear exactly the same result and bouncing that track will give you the "final" master.
 
The only other alternative is mixing through a separate dsp unit like the Apollo etc. and recording that to your input tracks during mixdown.
@

Hi Toledoo1,
I know exactly what you're talking about. I mix through an external device as well (mine's an SSL but the process is the same). There are some DAW's that let you print fx on a track as you record to them (PT with an aux and Studio One come to mind here), but Sonar isn't one of them. Fortunately that's not a big deal and it only requires a few extra seconds (and is probably better anyway). Here's what I do:
 
Route your stems to the summing device (SSL/2-bus/whatever) and then back to an input on your audio I/O, create a track whose input is that stereo pair and enable input monitoring. That track then is the only track that feeds your monitors. That is the important part...the only track that is feeding your monitors must be that track. Name it "Print" or something. When input monitoring is enabled on that "Print" track you'll then hear whatever is coming into that track as well as any FX on that track, so this is where your 2-bus (or Master bus if you prefer) FX go.
 
Once you have everything mixed to your liking you'll need to record the signal coming into your "Print" track, just like you would with any other track. Now, you're not quite done because your 2-bus fx in the bin of your "Print" track aren't printed to your mixdown. to do that just bounce that track. Usually I just bounce to a new track and name it according to my filenaming convention...something like "AwesomeSong-1.6-mixdown-08-26-2014a". Then I'll put each of those mixdown tracks into a track folder called "MIXDOWNS" that is muted or archived.
 
In my setup the routing looks like this:
Tracks get bussed to stem busses (vox, drums, fx etc).
Stem busses get sent to RME Outputs 1-16
RME Outputs 1-16 -> SSL inputs 1-16 (In your case this is your Dangerous box...this is where they are summed and then potentially routed through other hardware)
SSL outputs 1-2 -> RME Inputs 47/48
RME inputs 47/48 -> Audio track in Sonar called "Print"
Sonar "Print" track with FX on it (saturation, Ozone, a "talent" button, whatever) -> speakers (or a bus with ARC/room eq on it that goes to speakers). THIS IS THE ONLY THING THAT FEEDS MY SPEAKERS!
When done, bounce the print track to mixdown tracks or export (only that track) to a wave file on your hard drive.

Let me know if you have questions and I'll try to help out.
Dean
 

Thank you for replying.
Razorwit: That was very helpful. But I need clarification on one thing.
So after doing all the routing from the interface to the 2-Bus back to the interface and creating the audio track which is receiving that signal (already done), and after finish mixing down my other tracks to my liking and using whatever vst on all tracks (and the PRINT track), then you said to record it and bounce it. Do you mean to hit the record button to record the signal in real time which will print the signal from the 2-Bus minus the vst effects on that track, and then bounce that track again to print the vst effects on the same file?
 
Sock Monkey: No, that is not what I am trying to do (Razorwit got it right). I know the 2-Bus is only a summing box and I only want to use the signal comming from it to the DAW to apply vst effect on it (not hardware effects) and during the mixing phase (not after). So I am not mastering one track, I am mixing through the 2-Bus while applying effects on its' signal (just as putting vst effects on the master bus).
Sorry to confuse you, English is not my main language.
 
Appreciate everyone's input. Thank you

John, thank you for your reply
Other DAWs I was talking about are also non-destructive, but on top of that they provide other options for the rest of us who need certain things to make our setup work as we want/prefer.
Don't get me wrong, Sonar is my number one DAW and I work exclusively in Sonar (and I own most of the other DAWs). But when I am faced with such dilemmas and see these features available in other DAWs and not in my preferred DAW, I try to make it work until such features become available. And I always get things worked out with the help of you guys in this forum.
 
Thank you again.

They are, but anyway, not the scope of this thread.
 
Best

toledoo1
Thanks for your replies.
Sanderxpander:
What I wanted to do is to start my mixing process with a little compression/tape saturation on the master bus to affect the whole mix from the beginning, so when I make decisions about the individual tracks' eq and other processes I am doing that based on the sound I am getting from the 2-BUS and the compression/tape saturation plugins on the master bus (putting these after the mix has finished will not produce the same results as mixing with them from the start).
So when using the 2-BUS the way I explained, there is no signal going through to the master bus, and I am stuck on relying on the audio track that I created to receive the signal back from the 2-BUS into Sonar (which when record enabled won't allow processing the effects from the compressor/tape saturation plugins).
 
Leadfoot: doing it that way I will end up with only one stereo track. But I wanted to be able to mix all tracks and finish the whole mix then print them to one stereo track.
 
Any other ideas?
Thanks

I still don't get it. If you want to mix with some eq and compression on the track, it makes no difference whether they are printed to the audio or in the bin running live (except a tiny amount of CPU). Any audio going out of Sonar any way at all can go through as many fx as you like. There is no need to print to audio before the final bounce unless you run into CPU or latency compensation issues.

In other words, in order to export a nice clean stereo wave of exactly the region/length that you want, you will have to bounce anyway after your recording. Any VSTs that you have on any track will be printed to the final file at that time. In addition, if you have fx on your track during recording, you can hear what they sound like while the recording is running. So in reaching the end product there really is no workflow difference between
1. Printing the fx output to the recording track, then exporting your final wav, and
2. Recording the track dry but listening through the fx for monitoring, then exporting your final wav, including fx.

Dean, thank you very much for your help, it worked. You saved me big time with your recommendations, I was ready to throw the towel and you came and made my day. I can't tell you enough to what extent you were able to help me. I've just started mixing and learning and try to navigate my way through all the mixing learning process and just when I was ready to do an actual work I hit this wall. So thank you again, It is really appreciated.
And thanks to everyone else who tried to help. I hope this experience/thread will help others as well.
Here is to hope the next version of Sonar will solve this issue with a better implementation.
 
Best

You are missing something, there is no audio signal/wave file on that track for the effects to affect at this point. Sonar only "hearing" the signal, but the track is actually empty. that is until I print the signal on that track.
 
Best

Thank you, you too :)

Leadfoot
I am still in the experimenting phase, I am just starting to mix through it.
For now what I can tell you is that I am hearing a much better separation for each instrument in the stereo field and a louder signal, that is for sure. But I want to mix through it to learn more about its effect.
I sure will give you my thoughts about it very soon.
 
Best