I started with CEP 2.1 and moved to all the upgrades thru Adobe Audition 2.0. I've been pretty satisfied with AA as far as Audio but along the way I began to need midi support so I purchased MC3 to fill that gap, hoping AA would at some point add midi support along with VSTi support. Recently I purchased Sonar 6PE partly for the above reasons to have what I need in one integrated app, but the most important reason was after the release of AA 2.0 and the total lack of support in fixing fairly major issues with the software in over a year without so much as a "were working on it" I decided I'd waited long enough and went with Sonar.

Other major reasons I went with Sonar were:

Downloadable fully functional demo, I may well have gone with Sonar from the start had this been available when I was evaluating CEP, and other DAW software.
At least from the outside looking in, developers who are more in touch with their users and better support of the products.
No Ilok/PACE
More flexible routing
Better performance with same track/effect count than AA
More features to grow with as I need them. I don't use virtual syth's etc. at this point, but I didn't use midi either when I started, so it's nice to have support for virtual instruments etc. available.

Dan

I switched from an Alesis MMT-8 to Cakewalk 4.0 for DOS. Does that count?

I switched 'cause I had a screamin' Tandy 8088 processor with 640k RAM & no hard drive (& no mouse!) that I just couldn't wait to use for sequencing. As much as I loved my MMT-8, cake 4.0 really kicked its butt. Been a user ever since, though years later, b4 Sonar came out I tried to switch to Cubase because I really wanted to be able to use soft synths. Problem was, I was so used to cake's method of madness that I just couldn't get used to Cubase. I found it to be quite user hostile (though I have to wonder if someone reared on Cubase would find Sonar to be just as foreign). Fortunately for me, about the time I resigned myself to giving up on Cubase, Sonar came out. I've had no infidelity issues since, & now make my living with Sonar 6 PE.

This is all great to hear. Good feedback about what got you to switch, and good feedback about what we need to do to keep you happy. Please keep the "switched" stories coming.

hi,
my name is Lou Pomanti, and i write music for TV and FILM, and am based in Toronto, Canada . I switched to Sonar6PE after being a Logic PC user for many years. I began on the Synclavier system in the early 80s, then started using Notator on the Atari. In the 90s i switched to Logic when they introduced it for the PC. So...when Apple bought Logic 4 or 5 years ago, i was stuck on Logic 5.5 for a long time. I kept putting off switching host sequencers because the thought of it terrified me, as using Logic5 had become 2nd nature for me ( I didn't have to learn an update for 5 years). The option of switching to the Mac platform was never really an option for me, as i've been a PC guy since the very early 80s. I spent a lot of time testing various versions of Cubase, but found the workflow SO difficult to get used to I started to check out Sonar. From the first, it had a familiar feeling to it, and was much simpler to use than Cubase. It's taken me a few months, but i now work exclusively in Sonar, and am loving every minute of it.
I'm currently scoring a labor-intensive CGI-animated show for Aardman, called Chop Socky Chooks. It has premiered in Canada, but doesn't air in the rest of the world (including US) till February. There's a lot of midi manipulation and editing involved, as there is a large synth-ork element to it. I find new features everyday that help me, and am really pleased with the Cakewalk Forums...they are great, and everyone has been a great help, especially Scott Garrigus!

www.loupomanti.com

Thats easy.

Going from quitbase to sonar 6 pe was a no brainier. 1. Surround sound capability's, 2. Didn't lock up 1/3 threw a track. 3. Cost of the cross grade. 4. This forum. 5. Ease of use. 6. Not leaving their customers stranded. 7. Honesty "will do what you say you will do and not with hold information". 8. Works great in vista.


Shall I go on or should I tell you what I really think!

Audio recording has always been my hobby, not a profession - so I can't fund it the way I'd like to. I've grown from 4-track Fostex cassette recorders to the Pro Tool Digi001 which worked great, but their plug-in's or add-on's are too expensive for any hobbyist.

I switched to Sonar 6 Producer for two main reasons: 1) "most" everything you'll ever need comes with in the basic software package, and 2) the sales guy at the music store said he uses it and it is 'the bomb" for any recording project. A close personal friend of mine works at Digidesign and was absolutely "crushed" when I bought Sonar 6, but he had to admit it's an outstanding value once I showed him a demo... (and I'm still learning it !!!)

I started out as an FL Studio user, though it wasn't long before the pattern-based workflow (kinda improved in v7) became a limitation for the kind of work I wanted to do, which involved longer, complicated melodies, often with multi-timbral multi-out plugins.

I'd been advised by many people to go with Cubase, as they claimed it had great MIDI editing (but no demo, so that was a complete non-starter). I used the Sonar 4 web demo for a while, and found myself pleasantly surprised at how robust and feature-rich the software was. It seemed that Home Studio 4 was going to inherit lots of these things, so I became a Home Studio user for a while. Then upgraded to Studio 5 and then Studio 6 (which was a real milestone for me. proper VST automation, which had been a bit glitchy before).

Sonar represents (for me), great value from a great company (clearly involved with its userbase) and one in which the improvements just keep on coming. It just does what it says on the tin.

rictheobscene

I'm totally with you on that! I switched from quitbase about 6 months ago to sonar 6 pe after wasting a year just trying to get past 1 track how pathetic is that.

I am in the process of switching. I am coming over from Cubase SX3, and some recent "issues" with my setup that only reared their head once I got into some intense projects (over 30+ tracks of audio).. and of course Steiny's legendary drop of support for SX/SL line of DAW's while still selling them via their online store or retail.

I have gone to using Sonar LE for now since my PE6 web demo has expired.. and the same projects imported over as wav files from the SX project have been rock solid.

I'm waiting for the upgrade annoucement for 6/7 before doing the official crossgrade.

Feature wise both are similar.. but Cakewalk's level of involvement and care for the end user is a refreshing drink of water in the hot desert of the DAW world =-)

I started recording by trying different softwares, to begin with.. cooledit, adobe audition,vegas,cubase, but one software that i was stuck and used to using is SONAR. I started out witho sonar 2 then eventually to its latest Sonar 6 PE. I have to admit that i havent figured out all the functions of the software and how i wish i could also maximize my learning for a better recording.

Thanks to cakewalk sonar that i have at least finished our album inspite of the lack of our equipments. the software was really helpful tool ong the growth of our music.

I started using Sonar at version 3. I had come from analog, with a little bit of experience with computers/sequencing hosts (Studio Vision), but it was mostly telling someone what I wanted and he'd do it--I didn't know how to operate the computer at the time. I did use Cubase SX 2 for a little bit and liked it just fine, except missed little things I took for granted in Sonar 3--stuff like clip looping, sound effects bin right in the track view, being able to drag effects around between tracks in the bin...etc. I also appreciated the included highend effects in Sonar (SonitusFX and Lexicon Pantheon). According to Paul Galreath's book on MIDI orchestration, Sonar's included effects are the only ones that are high enough quality to mix/master highend orchestral compositions, whereas none of the other sequencing hosts' included effects were deemed high enough quality for that task.

I have a few gripes currently (I'm on version 6 now) though. I think the draw envelop tool is pretty clunky--often I want to select only one node but a bunch of other nodes will get highlighted, and sometimes it's hard to select a node if the now time cursor is in the same spot. It's also hard to select the envelop to change the curve too, as the line is sometimes too thin and you end up selecting everything else around it instead, no matter how hard you try. I use envelop automation extensively (to get a more expressive playback from my orchestral instruments), and it really annoys me. It's bad enough that I might consider switching hosts at this point.

Another problem is how under-powered Sonar's MIDI editing is compared to the competitors--even the lower tiered products in the market have more powerful MIDI editing tools, which I find a bit embarrassing. FL Studio used to be the joke among serious musicians, now it kicks Sonar's ass in several aspects.

Sonar currently has trouble working with some older plugins, and some free ones too. For example, I cannot get Galactix (from Smart Electronics) to work in Sonar. Often, even after several plugin scans, Sonar still cannot pickup some of the plugins in my VST folder. Sometimes it'll see the plugin, and I'll put it in my custom plugin managed layout, but I can't actually use that plugin at all--try to select it and nothing happens.

Sonar's audio editor is pretty rudimentary--I'd like to see more robust/creative audio editing features, so people would never have to open up something like Wavelab or Audition--just do it all in Sonar.

AFAIK, I cannot draw volume/expression (CC7, CC11) data in Sonar's MIDI editor like I can in Cubase. I really want that. I'd prefer that to doing it with envelops in the track view. If I could just draw things like you could with the mod wheel data, I'd be happy.

It would be nice if Sonar had something like the Freefilter, where you can apply one track's sonic characteristics to another track. Sonar's got an analyzer now--might as well make it more useful by giving it something more useful to do than just look pretty.

I never got ACT to work. I read up on it multiple times, from the manual to online forums, to magazine articles, and nothing worked.

I'm in the middle of scoring a game right now, so I can't afford to jump ship, but I'm serious considering it at this point after the score is done. But if Sonar has plans to fix many of these issues in the next version, I might stick around and see if things change.

Aside from playing with trackers on my Amiga, I'd never really done much with computer-based recording/sequencing.

Not that long ago a mate introduced me to Cubase and I gave that a whirl for a short time. To be honest, I just struggled to get anywhere with it... then one day it suddenly decided to stop talking to my computer's soundcard (didn't have a proper audio interface yet) and stubbornly refused to be fixed. I work in IT all day and on the rare occassions I get to spend some time making music, I don't want to be bogged down in tech problems and trying to figure out software.

So I tried Sonar 5 and got moving really quickly. Everything was more or less where my brain expected it to be, and worked how I wanted it to. Upgraded to 6 last year and there's no doubt in my mind I'll be a Sonar user for a long time yet.

I don't have many requests - a rethink on drum maps would be nice though.

i switched in November of 2005. I was using Sony Acid but a lot of people thought down of my work when i told them that I used Acid. Since Hip Hop is totally collaboritive I had to play to others ignorance and went to Guitar Center to buy Cubase Se. They were out and I saw Sonar Home Studio 4 on the shelf for the same price. Said o what the hey why not try it. I dig it but its not my favorite Daw just the one I use until I find something better for what I do. Sonar sounds great tho thats really the only thing besides audio editing imo that is really great about it tho. I use a lot of midi and while it works its kind of quirky when using multiple midi controllers

Used PA9 for several years, which I believe gave a brain like mine the ability to slowly wrap itself around the concept of DAWs. I'm a dinosaur of a guitar player and I didn't like the idea of staring at the screen; I wanna play dammit! Bought the Fostex MR8 and got a little more savvy when I started to import the Fostex audio trax to PA9 and mess with editing. Thought I'd "step up" and bought a low end audio interface that came with Cubase LE. It sure looked a lot cooler than PA9. I spent more time trying to get Cubase just to recognize the USB driver that came on the same stinkin' disk! Never recorded a whole song with it. I wanna play dammit! Bought GTP3 from Musicians Friend and began to learn that I needed "real" hardware if I wanted to use "real" software. Upgraded my PC, bought the Audiophile 24/96, a little mixer/preamp and the fun began! Started to visit this forum and pay attention. Upgraded to HS6 XL thanks to a sweet offer from Cakewalk and I'm finally just plain enjoying myself. The help in this forum is amazing. The experienced users are patient with knuckleheads like me and even if they don't have the answer, they take the time to find out who does. Bottm line: This ol' gitfiddler is a loyal Sonarian. I'm pretty certain I'm ready to move to PE 7 when it hits.

My first upload to acid planet was 04.05.04, and needless to say,
I was using acidexpress the free version.
I was able to get version one the yellow disk in a recording mag.
I was hooked on recording.

using a HP 486 and 512 ram

I tried all of the demos and versions and plugs that came
with any recording, guitar, or PC mag that I bought.

bought a new desk top PC with a 2.6 intel hyperthreading proc / 1 gig ram, then 1.5 gig, then 2 gig.
upgraded the audio to the audigy 4 pro audio card

bought and tried the audiophile24/96 audio card I got cubase le with it

tried the Ableton live thing and the reason thing

Bought and used Homestudio 2004 version for 2 years
bought a GNX-4 guitar modual that came with Pro Tracks.

bought a 3200 AMD 2 core dual x64 with the ASUS wisper motbrd
ordered sonar 5 with the 6 x64 upgrade which is my main Daw.
4 gig 800ddr2 over clocked 10% windows XP Pro 64,
and networked with the intel PC

I do the recording on the new one (64 bit AMD) while I can store on a secordary drive
in the older machine and transfer back and forth easy, but at the same time
I dont nead an anti virus or internet on the 64 bit DAW.

both machines now have 4 gig ram and I use the I/O gear for single
keyboards and mouse with dual monitors.

My soundcard of choice now it the MOTU 828 on my 64 bit DAW
and the 24/96 in the intel
here is what it looked like as I had just installed the MOTU mkll as
a rack mount on top and digitech VR Vocalizer under it with the
peavey delta dual next
.

Heres a dual monitor shot