VST Tuner (for guitar or other instruments, or vocals)

I decided to cut down on physical clutter and use a virtual tuner for my sax practice.
 
I did a search on the net and didn't find much on this topic, except that Cakewalk used to have one, and that there are a few freebies.
 
It turns out I already had the Waves GTR tuner that comes with Platinum, and I also had Melbas's free tuner. But neither of them worked when I inserted them as an effect. The instructions for either do not cover how to actually insert them in a DAW.
 
After fooling around enough I discovered that you need to have the track armed for recording, AND you end to have the echo on. I suppose this makes sense to a computer tech but for me it causes the input of the track to come out of the main speakers. You hear the sax even if it is muted on the recording mixing board. Comes feedback and weird latency echos and general loss of control.
 
The best work around I could find is to insert a second track in Sonar, with the same channel input for the sax mic, arm it for recording, turn on the echo, and then mute it in the track (or direct the output of the track to none).  That way I have a normal recording track with no echo, and then the second track with echo turned on but not actually echoing. Any recordings or data in the second track is to ignore.
 
Anyone have a better way?
 
BTW, the Waves GTR is a real nice tuner.
 
 

If you have an iPhone or iPad try the free PanoTuner  best tuner ever

G-Tune will have the same problems with the mute and record buttons, if I am not mistaken.
 
After reading the replies, I think I will try a smart phone tuner, sounds like a good idea. I use android, but there are plenty available. There is an Android Pano Tuner