Mystery Mix

First let me express thanks for the help I've received on here since my last post. I just wish I had started using this resource earlier. I have two problems that I'm hoping to get some help with:
 
1.) I'm having a problem Bouncing to Tracks. I generally use a self-generated pre-set to do this when I am ready to complete a mix and the selections include everything except "Fast Bounce" and "Live Input". I've  been using this for quite a while and never had any problems. I recently finished mixing a project - and of course - it's as close to a perfect mix as I am ever likely to achieve, completed this "Bounce to Tracks" process and the results aren't even close. The piano track is about 10 times louder than it should be - nothing has maintained it's relative volume. I've been through it a hundred times. There are no live channels unaccounted for, there are no MIDI channels open feeding any additional piano instruments. You guys are my last hope before consulting an exorcist.
 
2.) A different project I am working on closed without issue the last time I worked on it but now I am unable to open it without it crashing SONAR and requiring me to re-boot. (It's just this one file) As far as I can tell, it isn't really CPU intensive ( a lot of my processing is on a UAD card) but I can't even open it to find out what's wrong. Is there a workaround here? I'd hate to lose the tracks.
 
Thanks again you guys
 

1) How are the tracks routed? Is everything going to Master Bus and from there to soundcard?
Also check that no tracks are in offset mode.

2) Is there any "difficult" VST in the project, like Melodyne or other pitch-shifter. Those can be problematic. I always bounce them to tracks before closing the project.

In response to Kalle's questions:
 
1.) I use eight busses (typical, I think - drums, keyboards, backing vocals etc.) and those busses go to outputs 1-8 which is what my "Bounce to Tracks" pre-set is set up to record. That may not be an ideal setup but it's worked on every other occasion which is why I'm kind of confounded this time.  Is there a more reliable way to route this? It's never been a problem before - through hundreds of mixes.
 
2.) None of which I'm aware - at least, none that I haven't used loads of times before.  There is some pitch quantizing on the back-up vocals but I use that quite a bit. Everything else is fairly standard and, as I said, almost all of my effects are from the UAD card. However, I am using the old Cakewalk chorus plug-in on the bass which is automated in and out - could that the problem? Would it effect everything else if it WAS the problem? I mean, with the exception of a little compression, the piano has nothing on it at all and it is the most obvious departure in level from the original mix.
 
Thanks,
 
Nick
 
 

Hi noynekker,
I opened in safe mode and didn't load anything at all - no plug ins whatsoever - and it still crashed the system. It was working fine the last time I closed it but now I can't even get it open. Is there a way to analyze the files from outside for corrupted data? I just can't imagine what's happened to this project.
 
I use busses because I route all my individual drum tracks to a drum bus - which I sometimes compress a little, keyboards, backing vocals etc. However, the "Bounce to Track" command is just taking the output of the sound card and mixing it to a single stereo track. I guess I thought that was a fairly conventional methodology. At least, it's never been a problem before and I can't really see why it would be now. As I said, I was working on this project and it was just fine. I closed down for the night and have never been able to re-open it. I'm stumped.
 

nickl123 . . . hopefully your soundcard drivers are the latest, and you haven't loaded more plugins than your System / RAM is capable of ? Is the stereo wave "bounce to track" you did still saved within the project ?
Are you opening the project by dragging the .cwp project onto Sonar, or going to top menu - file - open ?

. . . if it's not plugins, etc . . .  then somehow your project has become corrupted, and I don't know of any other troubleshooting options for that, except to say that when I had a corrupted project, I submitted it to Cakewalk's tech support, and they eventually had me upload the entire project, including audio so they could take a closer look.

They know their product's inner workings better than us, and were able to point me to what the issue was.

This all took about a week after I finally found someone there to "take the case"
I think that's your best option, to save your time invested on your project.
Let us know how it goes.

For the one you can't open. Is it in X1? If you have an earlier version of Sonar, try opening it with that program. I've had a few earlier versions of X1 produce issues like this and after opening in 8.5 (which stripped out Pro Channel settings and any other new feature data) I could open in X1 just fine (although I did have to redo the Pro Channel stuff.)

Peace,

Tunes

Thanks everyone,

I Use X1 Producer 32 bit. With very few exceptions, all of my plug-ins are UAD which runs on it's own card. To answer noynekker, I don't know if the bounce is still there because I can't get in to see. I open it by going to <File> <Open>. To tunekicker, I don't have 8.5 on this machine so unless I load it (which seems like it might carry it's own set of problems) I can't open it that way. Maybe the Tech solution is best although I submitted this problem to them about ten days ago and still haven't heard anything back except the email confirming ny query. How long do these guys typically take?

All buses and tracks should go to ONE master bus/output. This means only ONE master volume control.

nickl23


Hi noynekker,
I opened in safe mode and didn't load anything at all - no plug ins whatsoever - and it still crashed the system. It was working fine the last time I closed it but now I can't even get it open. Is there a way to analyze the files from outside for corrupted data? I just can't imagine what's happened to this project.
 
I use busses because I route all my individual drum tracks to a drum bus - which I sometimes compress a little, keyboards, backing vocals etc. However, the "Bounce to Track" command is just taking the output of the sound card and mixing it to a single stereo track. I guess I thought that was a fairly conventional methodology. At least, it's never been a problem before and I can't really see why it would be now. As I said, I was working on this project and it was just fine. I closed down for the night and have never been able to re-open it. I'm stumped.
 

Unless you're connecting cables to your sound card outputs and bringing that back in then I'm afraid your sound card has nothing to do with your "Bounce to track" commmand. All done inside SONAR. Yoour sound card only gets involved in bring sound into or out of SONAR.
 
The reason I mention this is to highlight that there are deficiencies in your knowledge which could be contributing to your problems.
 
Are all you busses going to the Master buss?
are all your tracks still going to the Master buss as well as their sub-busses?
Are just some of your tracks going to sub-busses as well as the master buss?
 
These are just some of the questions that spring to mind with this sort of problem. Not picking on you. I know from personal experience how easy it is to get thrown when something out of the normal routine seems to be happening.