Yeah, I'm all for locking it or deleting it.  It certainly would not be useful to someone who finds it and hopes to see those initial questions answered.
 
MODERATORS: Can you please lock or delete this topic?  It is going nowhere, and is consuming Cakewalk resources.  I'd rather that money go to fixing bugs and adding customisability.  Thanks.
 

Looking for people who are missing 8.5.3 but who will tell you what is better in Platinum. Gotcha. I'll butt out. Sorry for participating in an open internet forum discussion.

Also Still using 8.5.3 Work mostly staff view. Tried the demos new ones. One attempt at cut paste and I was done with them. Have they introduced a format painter yet? Is probably my biggest wish. 
 
Tried to post question about laptops but don't think it made it.
John 

Tripecac
Yeah, I'm all for locking it or deleting it.  It certainly would not be useful to someone who finds it and hopes to see those initial questions answered.
 
MODERATORS: Can you please lock or delete this topic?  It is going nowhere, and is consuming Cakewalk resources.  I'd rather that money go to fixing bugs and adding customisability.  Thanks.
 

I don't know what resources this thread is using up of CW's. Keep in mind that this is a peer to peer forum for helping each other with using Sonar. The reason so many have engaged you on this thread is their wish to help you get a better understanding of Sonar 2016. To persuade you that it is better than 8.5. That should be very clear to you by now. I don't believe you will find many that want to go back. 
 
If you were to have an open mind and give Sonar 2016 a fair test I strongly believe you will come to the same conclusion so many of your fellow users have come to. That 8.5 was good in its day but now Sonar 2016 is a far better DAW. I do know that it will take some effort on your part to accustom yourself to the way Sonar works but once you do you wont want to go back either. I think the others have much the same intent.  

John6528
Tried to post question about laptops but don't think it made it.
John 

There was laptop question posted 2x. One of them still exists http://forum.cakewalk.com/FindPost/3403150

Tripecac
I don't agree with the pro-Xers, and I don't want to hear from those people in this topic.  I want to hear from people like me, who are wishing Sonar would move in the direction of being more customisable, more scriptable, and more personalisable, which seemed like a direction Sonar could have been heading, BEFORE the X series came out, and, for me, X and Premium seem to be moving in the "wrong direction". 
 
Was I not clear?

I feel like the issue here is a fundamental difference of opinion. You are stating as fact that SONAR is less customizable and less personalize able. I feel the exact opposite is true. SONAR is way more customizable. With the Skylight interface and Screensets etc... it is more customizable than ever. One could argue about colors, but new skins and schemes are on the way.
 
What you said is an opinion, not a fact. If we could get over that pee contest, then there would be a lot less heat in this discussion.
 
Just my opinion that I am sharing on a public forum in a SONAR category about SONAR.

My comments for some parts in this thread:
* MIDI route in Sonar is not changed since the time I have installed 8.5 LE. It has generally problematic concept, which was mentioned in this forum more then 10 year ago. Please do not get me wrong, it was working in 8.5 (and probably before) and it is still working. It is just preventing future development in that area till it is replaced.
* I am not intensive CAL user, but what I have used is working in SPlat
* since VST MIDI is a pain in Sonar, I have developed Lua based DX scripting plug-in. Creative programmers with suggestions are welcome. Unlike CAL that can works in "real time", unfortunately unlike CAL the solution is limited to one track processing. But think it can work in any Sonar version, also in 8.5.

John6528
Also Still using 8.5.3 Work mostly staff view. Tried the demos new ones. One attempt at cut paste and I was done with them. Have they introduced a format painter yet? Is probably my biggest wish. 
 
Tried to post question about laptops but don't think it made it.
John 

John, I'm still demo-ing Sonar Pro. Your comment made me look into this, since I do most of my midi editing in staff view, and cutting and pasting is hugely important to me (also, moving groups of notes around). At first I panicked as I did not see a way to do this. I then realized that you have to look under the "Edit" at the very top of the screen, not the one actually on the staff view. So it works. Maybe a bit less direct, but it works. As long as I can maintain my work flow with only minor adjustments, I think the gain stability should be worth it.

MusicforMovies
I've been using Cakewalk since the Twelve-Tone PC; Midi only days; not too happy with the subscription fee thing; will go the one time fee I suppose; would really like to see some better editing capability in the piano roll department along the lines of Cubase.  For some reason I don't mind paying a sub fee for Netflix, but I much prefer an upgrade every several years and one time fee versus the sub model for work software.   Not very happy, but I'll try the new version.

Hi there - I was reading this book-of-a-thread and noticed your post.  I just wanted to make sure that when you stated "subscription fee" above you knew it's just a purchase "option" and it's like a payment plan...  you can still upgrade or buy SONAR the exact same way as before in whole.  I think a lot of folks thought that it was subscription-based when we threw down the word "monthly." PM me if you have any questions on it.  All the best, ~Jimmy

As for MIDI please take a look at the video in the command center "MIDI enhancements". Not all of the fixes and improvements are listed there but it will show how CW is adding to MIDI in Sonar.