Getting ready to upgrade to Platinum and would greatly appreciate guidance on possibly reorganizing where things are installed.
 
My primary use is to record acoustic/electric guitar/vox. Maximum of two tracks at a time. At this stage I don't do much plug-in/instrument type stuff, except for drums, but I want that to evolve over time.
 
 
System: Intel Core i5-4670k cpu @ 3.4GHz, with 16 GB RAM.
Drives: — Win 7 Pro and programs on an SSD that's running out of space;
            — 2 TB HDD dedicated to Sonar projects;
            — 2 TB HDD dedicated to Sonar project backups;
            — and one other totally open 600 GB HDD drive.
 
Currently installed: X3e Producer 32-bit (for DrumCore 3 legacy); X3e Producer 64-bit (for everything else); Dimension Pro 1.5; Rapture 1.2.2; DrumCore 3 (32-bit).
 
Major Issue:

• SSD only has 25 GB left on it, and that's with the pagefile.sys already on a different drive.
• X3e (64-bit) uses up 9.0 GB on the SSD, and X3e 32-bit uses 1.4 GB.
• At this time I cannot redeploy my OS to a larger SSD or other drive.

Questions:

1. How much Program File space will Platinum use on my SSD?
2. Must Platinum and X3e (64-bit & 32-bit) be installed on the OS drive, or can they be installed instead to my available 600 GB drive?
3. If they can be on the alternative drive, how much might that affect performance, and under what type of circumstances?
4. And if the alternative drive scenario is possible, is it advisable?
5. And would I need to uninstall X3e (32- & 64-bit), then reinstall those on the alternative drive, then upgrade? AND, best to do this as a download/install vs. command center?

Thanks!
Chamlin

When installing the Command Center open the Settings page by clicking on the gear in the upper right-hand corner and change the "Download Path" to relocate the installer cache.
 
All you need to install is the "SONAR Platinum" core, Anderton FX Chain Collection and the "Help and Tutorials" package (to get the local help file). Installing the 32bit and 64bit versions of three packages should take less than 3GB. If your previous installation relies on a relocated Cakewalk Content, the GB of tutorials will be installed in the relocated path, otherwise you can move or delete it after install. Recently I looked at the disk usage by a new install http://forum.cakewalk.com/FindPost/3179366.

Thanks, Scook.
So Command Center will allow for an installation to an alternative drive. Cool.

1. If they can be on the alternative drive, how much might that affect performance, and under what type of circumstances?
2. And if the alternative drive scenario is possible, is it advisable?
3. And would I need to uninstall X3e (32- & 64-bit), then reinstall those on the alternative drive, then upgrade?

The command center (C3) will install the application only on the C drive but provides alternate locations for plug-ins and installers. The installers have been broken into smaller packages. There is no need to install the plug-in packages again, they are the same as X3. The Anderton FX Chains install in the Cakewalk Content folder. C3 will only install the version of the application which is native to the OS. IOW, if you are running 64bit Windows, C3 will only install 64bit SONAR. To install 32bit SONAR, you will need to run the installers manually. The installers will be in the download folder you define in the C3 Settings. It is possible to use alternate drives but as I mentioned earlier, if you only install the changes to your existing installation, Platinum will only take a couple of GB on the C drive. Where is your "Cakewalk Content" folder?
 

Getting clearer. :)
 
What is the Content folder?
 
I'm looking at Program Files, and in that 9 GB of the 64-bit version, I'm seeing multiple instances of Dimension, Dimension Pro, with dupes of all the instrument files. Not sure how that happened. Normal?
 
Is there anything in X3e that's NOT in Platinum? So that if I wanted to just clean this mess up and ease the load on my SSD, could I uninstall X3e, entirely, Dimension Pro, Rapture, etc., then just install Platinum, with EVERYTHING, and only put the core program on the SSD, but all the instrument stuff on the other drive?

The default location for "Cakewalk Content" is "C:\Cakewalk Content". It contains several GB of loop libraries and version specific folders for a variety of things used by SONAR. It is easily relocated with a directory junction created by mklink:
1) Use Windows Explorer to move the folder to the D drive
2) Run cmd.exe as administrator and type at the command line:
mklink /j "C:\Cakewalk Content" "D:\Cakewalk Content"
 
The mutliple instances of Dimension and DimPro does not sound correct unless there are old projects with using the P5 synth. Dimension is an old synth which came with Project 5. There never was a 64bit version of Dimension. I have a feeling there may be a need for the old DirectX version of Dimension Pro due to old projects which were never updated to the VST version. If this is the case, it may argue against uninstalling DimPro. The bulk of a Dimension Pro installation is the "C:\Program Files\Dimension Pro\Multisamples" folder. The easiest way to relocate it is just like the method described above for Cakewalk Content. For example, if I wanted to move the dim pro multisamples to D:\Cakewalk\DimPro\Multisamples the steps are:
1) Use Windows Explorer to create a folder "D:\Cakewalk\DimPro"
2) Use Windows Explorer to move "C:\Program Files\Dimension Pro\Multisamples" into "D:\Cakewalk\DimPro"
3) Run cmd.exe as administrator and type at the command line:
mklink /j "C:\Program Files\Cakewalk\Dimension Pro\Multisamples" "D:\Cakewalk\DimPro\Multisamples"
 
You can do the same with Rapture and Studio Instruments (but these are not very big). If you use C3 to change the plug-in installation paths, the rest of the synths put their samples in the VST folders.
 
Perfect Space and Pentagon were dropped from Platinum. If you choose to clean X3 off the PC, those two plug-ins can be added later with an advanced install of X3. 
 
 
 
 

Thank you. Will digest all of this and come up with a plan.
 
If I do uninstall X3e, is there a way to save preferences, options chosen?

The user directory and registry are not touched by the uninstall process, the data will still be there. I am not sure the new installer will pick it up though. It should but there have been a few reports that the migrate dialog did not appear.  Noel does not recommend migrating settings so I no longer do it myself.

Can you delete the contents of CommandCenter/Downloads after you have finished installing?

Yes, the installers may be moved, removed or the path relocated in the Settings screen (click the Gear in the upper right in C3 to access). If C3 ever needs an installer and cannot find it locally, it will be downloaded again.