A V Man


I've just installed Sonar X1d as an upgrade from Sonar 5 and I am rather disappointed. I can't believe how few improvements have been made over the years since I last upgraded Sonar. I expected a lot more in the way of productivity enhancements. Worse still, a couple of features have actually disappeared or are now slower to use than before. Apart from the ability to group clips together, which I believe was added in Sonar 6, I don't feel that upgrading to X1 has provided me with any advantages over Sonar 5 at all. In fact I've even had to buy a bigger monitor because the new Skylight interface is a pain to use on anything less than 1920x1080.
 
I should point out that I've not even looked at the MIDI side of X1 yet, just audio, I don't use use MIDI as much as I used to. Please forgive me and let me know if any of these features are actually present and I just haven't noticed. I was sort of expecting to find stuff like this in Sonar by now. It would be nice to see most of these suggestions implemented in X1e.
 
At this moment in time it's looking like I've just paid for a downgrade.
 
Feature Requests...
 
A. ability to swap loop markers with jump markers so playback can be made to skip over the selection instead of looping.
 
B. similar to above but more sophisticated... ability to attach simple jump instructions to markers to facilitate non-linear playback. Ideally this would use clickable lists of the existing markers. There should be a number of (or unlimited) rows available. By selecting "verse1" in row 1 for marker "A", the first time the playback reaches marker "A" playback will jump to the marker called "verse1".  Assuming "verse 1" is before "A" then the second time "A" comes around playback will jump to any marker selected in row 2 etc...etc..  If there is no marker in the next row, playback continues normally.
 
C. Saving a large and complex project file can take a long time. Because I have lost work in the past I save all the time and use autosaves but all thise saves are really slowing things down. The CWP file I'm working on at the moment is already 400 MB and it will no doubt grow more. I have to stop working (Sonar stops responding) for about 2-3 minutes while it saves, it is no fun! A solution to this problem would be an incremental save option that creates a file to store only changes since the previous full save. In the event of a system crash or whatever these files could be merged with the last full save to produce an up to date project file. Not only could this make both automatic and manual saves, and hence workflow, faster but it would put less strain on the storage media as well as the operator. Assuming you don't experience a crash or whatever, when you're ready you can save the whole project while you take a break.
 
D. On previous versions, if nothing was armed for recording the on-screen record button was greyed out. Now it looks the same reagardless. The rec button on the mix module changes but not on the transport panel. Please can we have that useful visual feedback again.
 
E. On previous versions you could right-click and add a volume or pan envelope to an audio clip with the selector tool and edit the envelope directly without changing tools. It seems that now you have to switch the entire track over to a clip automation mode. For some reason, on the 64 bit version just opening the menu to select the track mode is slow, and you have to then leave that mode before you can do almost anything else with that track. Can we please have the simple ability to directly modify envelopes on an audio clip. Maybe the pen tool can be used for this. I actually thought that's what it was for on audio tracks but it doesn't seem to serve any purpose at all.
 
F. The left hand side of the of the track strip is a waste of valuable screen space. Please move everything below track number/trackname to the left. Put the peak count digits with the meter when using a horizontal meter. We don't need 2 icons in each track strip, one still remains even when you choose 'no icons'!
 
G. Let's have a much better control bar and track control manager that lets you rearrange the layout and sizes of the control bar and track controls. I'd like to choose between 3 or 4 different button sizes for all buttons, and controls like 'track volume' could have different styles to choose from. Selected controls could be arranged on a grid and could be dragged around and the layouts could be saved as presets. The ability to have two control bars would be nice. Perhaps one for tools and views and the other for controls/transport/markers etc. The tool-toolbar could be made to be a pop-up beside to the cursor when right- or double-clicking on any free area. I'm yet to be convinced that the Skylight reduces the number of necessary trips to the toolbar or keyboard.
 
H. There's more wasted screen space.. The tiny disk monitor/performance percentages display on older versions was great. Like many of the controls on X1 it is much bigger than it needs to be.
 
 
Please fix this bug too... In X1 x64 most attempts at slip editing an audio clip (time stretching a portioned off clip) causes the clip to disappear (visually and audibly), on the 2 occasions when I tried that it didn't disappear the clip jumped to the right on the timeline instead. Bouncing as a new clip first seems to be a successful workaround. 32 bit version doesn't seem to suffer from this issue.
 
And another note... I'm using using Windows 7 64 bit Ultimate yet the 64 bit version of X1 seems slower and clunkier than the 32 bit version. I find this rather odd! Come on Cakewalk/Roland or whoever calls the shots, I paid for an upgrade, please give me one.

Sorry to hear that you have all these problems. I do understand why you feel it aint working at all...but I can tell your computer seem very odd and total crazy?
 
I use projects with over 100 tracks, multi VST Intruments countless of plugins and Pro Channels, 4-6GB RAM in projects and it takes 2-3 sec to save a project. (normal SATA harddrive). Load about 10-30sec for the most huge projects.   
 
I use Windows 7 Ultimate x64, SONAR X1 Expanded D and INTEL SSD for Windows disk and Programs. AUDIO, SAMPLING /Library disks SATA-300 5x 1TB disk in RAID1 mode (Windows Software-RAID) fantastic outstanding performance. 

I use projects with over 100 tracks, multi VST Intruments countless of plugins and Pro Channels, 4-6GB RAM in projects and it takes 2-3 sec to save a project. (normal SATA harddrive). Load about 10-30sec for the most huge projects.   

I'm still pondering that point as well. I'm waiting to here back on the actual size of those cwp files. But I also think a good program like MyDefrag  could do wonders for the speed. 

Hi Guys, don't get me wrong, l like love Sonar, always have done. I was using Cakewalk in the early 90's.  I'm getting along just fine with X1 now I have a bigger screen - using dual screens now. That compensates for a lot of the screen space deficiencies in the interface design. I just feel that Sonar keeps taking one step forward and two steps back... Like they're scared of giving us a really killer tool in case there's nothing to tempt us upgrade wise in future. What I really dislike is the removal of cool, usually subtle features that were originally there. Yes there are new tools to assist workflow but some of the old ones have gone.

Apart from the clip grouping capability, I'd be just as happy using S5.  I haven't figured out yet why the CWP file sizes have got so big but the fact it's got a about 20 hours of 24 bit 44.1k audio tracks in it with all sorts of chops and fades and multiple taks, multitrack clip groups etc. has probably got something to do with it. I do feel that there may be some project file optimization lacking though. The CWP is over 430 MB now that's a hell of a lot of control data. I was hoping not to have to break this project into separate chunks just yet but it looks like I will have to. It's the biggest project I've ever attempted, I figured my new i7 would be up to the job but normal sized project is S5 on a Pentium 4 with 1GB RAM was smoother.
 
For those of you interested I'm using Win7 64 on a DELL XPS laptop with Intel i7, 4GB RAM internal mechanical 640GB HD plus external USB3 1TB HD (both HD's defragged a couple of days ago) M-Audio Fastrack Pro USB interface. File saves take about the same on each drive.  No time to list all my gear right now.  Processor use with X1 has't gone gone over 13% all the time I've been using X1 but then I only have about 6 audio tracks going at a time and not many plugins active.  X1 32 bit seems to be a little smoother and more resonsive than the 64 bit. I'd be interested to hear about typical CWP file sizes for different sized projects. BTW I can't remember the exact figure but the CWP file size for this project was about 730KB when I started working on it in X1. I haven't added any recordings, just edits.. 430 MB's worth of them apparently.

no CWBs guitartrek,  just CWPs

guitartrek


You've got some great ideas A V man.  Some of those I've handed in as feature requests.

As a fellow software developer I must admit I really like X1 despite all the issues.  The way I see it, is they re-wrote a lot of this software from the ground up.  Sure, they used a lot of stuff from before, like most of the antiquated dialogue boxes (why would you want to copy markers, tempo changes, and automation by default in the copy dialogue box?)   Like John said this is like a brand new software package, and they are still like on version one. 

For my work flow - X1 has saved considerable keystrokes and is much better at window management.  That's the reason I like it so much better than the older versions.  But that's just me - you may use the software much differently.

What I would love is Track Folders in the Console view.  The other thing is to not have a "great divide" between tracks and busses.  I may set up for example my power guitars in a certain way that involves a couple audio tracks and a couple of busses.  To me when editing, the tracks and busses should be right next to eachother - All I'm doing is feeding the audio output of one track into another track.  And because I'm doing this, the receiving track must be considered a "buss".  And therefore, whether I'm in consolve view or track view, I have to jump back and forth, and scroll the tracks and the busses to get them into view.   The whole Tracks / Busses thing is because of the old hardware mixing boards which had to be like that, although with inserts you could get around it.  The great thing about software is we can do anything.  Why keep this great divide?

There are many who completely disagree that X1 is "new" software.  I think it's more of a hybrid - some new code and some old is my guess.


Or as a friend of mine jokes;  "X1 is like New York street walker with a new dress ... same old bugs, higher price LOL.
There's plenty of evidence that X1 is both old and new but there's still room to grow and plenty of bugs (old and new) to fix. Some of the old bugs have been in there for close to a decade, if that matters.


And, just for clarity, I am a strong supporter and user -- so my criticisms are intended to help improve not denigrate the product and company.
And there' no doubt X1 is a pretty stable and usable product _now.

Billy - Yes it definitely is a hybrid, of course.   I'm just going by what Noel said about them writing a ton of stuff from the ground up.  And all the pain we went through in 2011 had to have been directly attributed to "new code". 

For example Snap in the old Sonar was dependant on the screen you were on.  With X1 they dumbed it down to having only one "global" snap setting.  After my (and many others') complaints they put in a "local" PRV snap control.  So the Snap function had to have been rewritten from the ground up, which makes me think a ton of other things under the hood were also re-written.  There are many more examples of where functions were "dumbed" down and as the year progressed were restored.  All of this is evidence of re-writing code.

Hang on, you have a 410mb cwp? Mine are all something like 1-2mb for very complex projects with tons of sequencing data. Something is definitely amiss here.

John T


Hang on, you have a 410mb cwp? Mine are all something like 1-2mb for very complex projects with tons of sequencing data. Something is definitely amiss here.

Yes, a few people have mentioned this and I too am struggling to understand how a CWP could have grown so big.  This has to have something to do with the slow saves.

Silicon Audio

John T


Hang on, you have a 410mb cwp? Mine are all something like 1-2mb for very complex projects with tons of sequencing data. Something is definitely amiss here.

Yes, a few people have mentioned this and I too am struggling to understand how a CWP could have grown so big.  This has to have something to do with the slow saves.

Is it somehow duplicating the saves as if they were additions to the file?

A V Man


I did have the 64 bit version of Sonar 5 installed but I copied the pantheon dlls from a 32 bit installation and put them in the x86 shared plugins folder which gets scanned. 

You may need to register the DLLs with regsvr32.exe - although that's not usually required for VSTs.  Are you scanning VSTs at startup?

You could just go back to your Sonar 6 CD and perform a 32-bit install and just choose the plugins you want, without necessarily installing the Sonar application.

-FEATURE REQUESTS-


That Cakewalk stop wasting their time continue build on the x32bit SONAR. It much better they spend all the time and resources coding and building the x64bit version of SONAR only that everyone use or should use in the first place. 
Sees to support Xp32 or any other old x32bit OS, only official support Windows 7 x64bit or later thank you.

90% of all bugs will disappear and SONAR X1 x64 would work even better. Cakewalk could then focus on the future and no need of holding back technology to make it work in Xp32 that it will never work on 100%. We majority users on modern Windows 7 x64 computers suffer of this stupid old coding for support of old x32bit system that less users use everyday.

The policy from Cakewalk should be: If you want to run the latest SONAR X1, upgrade your computer Windows 7 x64, period! 



Cakewalk Feature Request Thank-you Freddie for submitting your feature request.

I like the product.  I will hold on as long as I can afford to do so . I just seem to lose a little faith in cake with each new version of x1, knowing that the foundation is still  flawed .

anniedog

Also proper use of multi threading  and RAM  management in 64 bit operation would improve performance.  
I run 32 gigs of DDR3 RAM 1600 with a 12 thread I7 processor, Gigabyte x79ud5 MB windows 7 64 pro, sonar producer X1  64 bit expanded d and find I had better results with  a 8 thread with i7, 12 gigs of RAM . 

So, what are you hoping the extra memory will buy you?  Honestly, unless you are loading gigabytes of synths, all that memory is no silver bullet that will improve DAW performance - on any platform.


Also, have you even looked at tweaking the ThreadSchedulingModel in the aud.ini file?  How well all your CPU cores will be utilised also depends on the number of tracks and effects in your project.


Unless you are some coding genius, I seriously doubt you know more about this than the Cakewalk bakers.

cwp-Files with 400 MB ?
Our greatest projects (with 50 hours audio) are max. 10 MB. The audio-files are about 1 - 500 GB. Saving the project is 1 second.
Maybe you save cwb (Bundle) - instead of cwp-files (Project)?
You should make daily backups of an external harddrive.
  
Sonar (x64) is much faster than x32. Applying effects goes 2 times faster as in 32-Bit. Even old 32-bit-effects in BitBridhe are 2 times faster as in 32-Bit.

Jon thanks for the tips. With all due respects though, I feel you are nit picking my feature requests and gripes about how good features have been removed. I and other feel they valid points even if you don't see the reasoning behind them.

I fully understand the reasoning behind your thoughts. I have been dealing with this point of view since X1 came out. I also know where it comes from. Features have not been removed from X1. They are still there but it will take you time to learn where they are now.  The fact is only two features are no longer in X1 and one is the Pattern Brush for MIDI and the other Layouts replaced by Screensets.

X1 adds far more than you realize. Just going down the new features wont really tell you just how much has been added.

Its also a major work flow change which once you get the hang of it will impress you greatly.  You have to put aside all you knew from Sonar 5 and conquer X1 as if its a new program.

The time you have spent on it is not enough to have a true idea of what it has to offer.

I have lots of projects that have a lot of audio in them yet the CWP file is very small.  The reason is no audio is in the file at all. Only makers that tell X1 where the audio is to go resides in the file plus other basic project house keeping. FX status but not the actual FX.  Really a CWP file is a file with a bunch of pointers in it and not much else unless you have MIDI in as well. That wont be a much added bytes to the file.

You have a problem with the size of those files. They are way to big. I would submit one to CW for investigation. A save should be nearly instant. Remember X1 has an auto save ability and if saves took as long as you claim then auto save could not work.

Those that agree with you have their own reasons for doing so.  If you look carefully at some you will see that they are unable to run X1 much at all or have machines that simply cause them trouble. Others seem unable to learn X1.

I submit to you that you have gotten more that don't agree with you than do. That should have some weight in considering what is the truth.

Please go through the manual, look at the videos and try out things. If you give X1 a chance it will reward you in the end. 

If I thought my posting would have no impact on you I wouldn't bother. I believe that you are at a crossroads where with a little encouragement you will be far better off with X1 than you ever thought possible.