The thing about consumer equipment is that it is getting better all the time.  Memory is not a big problem these days (my phone has 16 gigs + add on).  You don't have to be constrained to mp3 or other lossy formats and transmission speeds.  Of course, just because you can use hi-def stuff might not overcome the inertia of mp3s etc, but it doesn't mean we have to use lesser formats.  And it will give the majors another excuse to put out consumer libraries in another format ;-)
 
Back to SONAR and DSD, in my hypothetical multichannel DSD>analog>DSD stereo set up, simple comping of takes would be the 1st thing that would be necessary digitally.  And yea, w/o a razor blade.
 
@

TomDuffy
There are more aspects to DSD that are all important.   It's easy to pick on the first one and say "but that doesn't matter".
 
Signals can go over PCM 0dBFS - that makes it less important to do brick wall limiting during the mastering, and Tom Duffy (TASCAM)

Tom: Excellent post - can you guide me where to better understand what is actually distinct between DSD and PCM's Full Scale treatment.  That is very interesting to me.  To clarify - 99% of my work is classical music - as you know DSD has been around in that space for years. Somehow I never encountered the Full Scale difference.  Thanks in advance for any info you can direct me to.
Best
 
D

This all seems cool as hell, and certainly supports the notion that Cakewalk remains at the cutting edge of DAW technology, despite what all the annual "Best DAW" polls might suggest.
 
I can't imagine ever actually using DSD, but these sorts of features - oddly, perhaps - are why I keep a Windows machine in my studio and stick with Sonar year after year. I get the impression the bakers are a hell of a lot smarter than I, so I stay hitched to their wagon. It can only elevate my game.

At this point in time DSD is the perfect way to convert your old analog multitrack into a digital format. Wich then can be used for what ever mixdown is needed (DVD BLUE RAY, High res Youtube.... future high res formats). Korg and Tascam make affordable DSD recorders. Once Sony requested Tascam to create a DSD recorder based on their famous 8 track digital (DTRS) recorders (DS-D98). This recorder could track two tracks of DSD. So to record the Eagles they daisy chained a bunch of these recorders to create one multi tracker.
 
PCM audio at 96 khz gives 96/2= 48khz sinewave. So twice what the human ear seems to be able to notice. A perfectly calibrated analog (Studer) multitracker was able to record up to 50khz (on a good day). So DSD seems to be an awesome way to use to transfer the great recordings from yesteryear. 
 
Philips got out the DSD train many moons ago. Sony Oxford was sold to Midas/Klark Teknik. Wich is now owned by Behringer. DSD usually was processed with analog processing. So after D/A and back to A/D. There are two DAW's who seem to be able to work in DSD but this has been very experimental to say the least. Philips made the Mykerinos card for this. But the advances made in the PCM world make it for an experimental format for multi tracking and processing at this point in time. 
 
If you multi track right now in PCM at 96khz you will have a waay cleaner signal than you could in the analog domain. So if you have a multi tracked DSD format.... Then what? So currently PCM recording is the way to go. And the fact that Sonar supports im and export of DSD is incredible. There is however an area where DSD shines. And that's in nature recording. If you want to capture the sound of an earthquake of the sounds of whale talking to another whale and stepping down that sound into the audible range people can hear the signal in order to interpret it. Sonar now can be of assistance... Wich... is absolutely awesome for sound effects or research... 
 
This is what I learned along the way while gathering useless information :))
Two DSD mobile recorders (wich timelock) and a SOUNDFIELD (quadrafonic microphone) would be an ideal sound effect field recorder for 5.1 movies in the I-max format.

Is there any reason you couldn't "splice" DSD tracks in software w/o going pcm?

 
Computers just are not built for it.  Processors, and therefore software, operate with the multi-bit model.  Some conversion is necessary to perform even the simplest edit.
 
You don't really lose anything important with the conversion.  24bit/384kHz, is supreme overkill even for double speed DSD.  24 bit is lower noise (theoretically), and 384kHz allows for an even higher frequency response.  

Very cool and informative thread w/o going all "mathy" on it. 
 
I think it is the Tascam stereo units (or maybe the Korg) could be synced together - 4 of them or so.  But it was "all at once," so you couldn't us them like a multitrack and overdub on one unit after recording.
 
I'm just wondering if there is any possible synergy between Tascam DSD and SONAR.  Cake seems heading there with DSD importing.  And they went up to 384 kHz before being bought by Gibson, if I recall.  No company talks about what they are going to do next, but it sure seems like Cake is putting in some effort in hi-rez audio formats.  Why is a question.
 
@

So no "ceiling" with DSD then? No more loudness war?

Still going to have a ceiling. Everything has a ceiling. What may end the loudness war is EBU R128 and the CALM Act.

A couple DSD comments.
 
It's not just TASCAM, Sony was behind it early on but languished. Now they are pushing it hard again. Remains to be seen what the results will be, but DSD is picking up steam in Japan.
 
The comment about analog tape transfers is spot on. DSD is a great archival medium because it can be decimated into just about any kind of PCM data stream you want.
 
A lot of people think the reason why DSD sounds "better" is not as much because of the technology per se but because the requirements for the output smoothing filter are so relaxed, due to the high clock frequency. You can basically twist a couple wires together and hang them on the output to filter out the clock.
 
As most of you are probably aware by now, I'm not a cork-sniffer who feels that only recording at 384 kHz with 128-bit resolution will do justice to my music. However, I first became aware of DSD at AES many years ago in an event not sponsored by a manufacturer. An immaculately maintained/calibrated 30 IPS tape recorder was used as the "control" and compared against a wide variety of PCM formats and DSD. I was quite surprised that there was an audible smoothness to the DSD that others in the listening group picked up on as well. We listened first and then were told what we were listening to, so it wasn't a "And now, listen to the DSD--isn't it wonderful?!?" situation.
 
I would imaging the ultimate expression of DSD would be recording something like an acoustic concert directly into a device like the DA-3000, then issuing that as a DSD release.
 
I truly don't know how important DSD is to the average SONAR user, but I suspect it isn't all that important. I do have a DA-3000, so it's a little more relevant to me. But Cakewalk tries to keep ahead of the curve, and this is another example. I've already been approached about DSD masters.

I'm a little skeptical of it quality wise vs. good PCM these days just because good multi-bit converters do such a good job. You can kinda see it in specs like if you look at the DA-3000: It gets better SNR in PCM mode than in DSD mode. Not that it matters much, you are talking extremely clean signals either way, but still.
 
Though who knows, maybe a hybrid will develop. Nothing says you have to do a pure PDM stream. You could have a high frequency 4-bit converter and store that bitstream straight, rather than converting it to 24-bit at a lower sample rate.