ampfixer
Instead we're on a monthly release schedule now and that just encourages people to  collect floor sweepings if they don't have something meaningful to deliver.

You're forgetting the DSD update, VocalSync update, Mix Recall update, and 27 fixes. Would you rather not have them now? Do you really think that nothing "meaningful" happens at Cakewalk during a month's time that would be worth giving to members?
 
And I assume you haven't used Bark of Dog if you think it's a "special effect." Try it next time you need to separate kick from bass, or do narration. A very similar plug-in from a different company costs $150 - the price of an entire year's update for SONAR users. But they could charge that much because, well...try it next time you need to separate kick from bass, or do narration. Or bring out the kick from a drum part. Or give a Rickenbacker bass more "bottom" without adding mud.
 
Furthermore, I would hardly call 126 IR impulses, 436 MB of loops (which I spent many, many hours editing and tweaking for proper stretching in both WAV and REX formats), an amp optimized for acoustic guitars, and all the other goodies as "floor sweepings." If you actually knew something about loops, and compared them to other commercially available loops, I highly doubt you would call them "floor sweepings."
 
Anyway, you're going to get a year of loops because I do really good loops , and people use them. The loops I did for M-Audio, Wizoo, and Discrete Drums were some of their best-selling titles. Now members get the same level of quality for free. 
 
No one should expect a new release to consist only of items of interest to them. The reason for including a lot of stuff is so that everyone gets something useful. If Cakewalk keeps up its pace from this release for the next 12 months, even if you don't care about content at all you'll still get 36 features or updated features, and over 300 bug fixes. And you'll get them as soon as they're available (within a month's time frame).
 
 
 

My vote is when Cake has time, to make a new Blog or whatever format... and answer all these questions.  There's too much riding for me to haphazardly just update my working program.
I agree also, the Barking Dog plug is FREE at Boz Labs and while it's nice to have in a ProChannel, seems like sticking a freebie in there is a bit underwhelming.  I don't need it and in fact passed on the +10dB plug as well. 
 
Being "rushed" because of weather is a lame excuse too.  I've LEARNED a LONG time ago that you ALWAYS give your customers truthful reasons for delays.  I'm in a public service type business, and I've NEVER had problems.  If Cake just said: "we need more time"... check our weather"... most *sane* people will understand.  But to slap something out rushed is a poor business decision.  However, I'm not suggesting that's what they did...only judging by what Craig mentioned of them being "rushed".
 
Personally, the CCC needs the overhaul at this point, or Cakes going to start losing credibility with their wonderful product.  Surely that can be put towards the top of the list.  My Platinum is working fine with the Alston update, so it can wait another month for anything.   And yes...go to numerical, sequential update names.  and keep ALL available.  The MA city names is borderline on stupid. 

Anderton
 
And I assume you haven't used Bark of Dog if you think it's a "special effect." Try it next time you need to separate kick from bass, or do narration. A very similar plug-in from a different company costs $150

Bark of the Dog has always been free and available as a VST for some time. It is nice to have PC format but not necessary if someone wanted to use the plug-in.

Can I install Braintree without disturbing my existing Dim Pro or Rapture installations? I already have these installed, and I remember the wrestling match I went through to to get their content located where I needed them to be (programs on D drive and samples on E drive). I don't want to relearn how to do that (including registry editing) and go through that process again.
 
I bought the Platinum upgrade before the March cutoff to save $50. However, now I don't know when I'll ever install it. I would like to wait for a time when Command Center offers installation options other than default, but I doubt that will ever happen. I am capable of installing individual tools, but now this release update seems to require re-installation if Dim Pro and Rapture. I would greatly appreciate any clarification that anyone can offer.
 
thanks
 
Keith
 

scook
 
It represents an unwelcome change in how Cakewalk is handling their product. I can deal with it but it just complicates what use to be a fairly simple process of going to my account, collecting what constituted SONAR and installing. In quick order, Cakewalk introduces a overly simplistic front end for installing their product and complicates the users life further by requiring them to keep track of parts of the product which will not be in the installers beyond one month.

I definitely understand what you're saying, but I don't think it's going to be as worst-case as you fear. A significant conceptual change is that Cakewalk is now becoming a content provider, and merging that aspect with SONAR. Content was never a big part of Cakewalk's gestalt; the same loops have been in there since the dawn of time. The FX chains I came up with were, I believe, the first FX Chain additions since X1. Ditto the ProChannel presets. Those are probably bad examples because they will be considered part of the program, but you get my drift. Cakewalk has pretty much worked only on features and fixes, so any content came about because of arrangements with third parties (even things like Rapture or Dim Pro presets).
 
In the case of Brian's loops, they were created as a commercial product (by an artist with various contracts and encumbrances regarding his work) to be sold like any other loop library. Fortunately, because he's a SONAR user he was kind enough to let members have them for free, AND convince his business manager it was a cool thing to do, but the caveat was one month only. Piracy for commercially available loop libraries is bad enough without having one available for free in perpetuity. Cakewalk could have said "No, we don't want to give people your loops for free for a month, people will complain they're not a permanent part of the installer and that will look bad." But for better or for worse, they made the loops available. (The only reason the Steinberger Rapture pack is also one month only is because it uses the chromatic samples from the loop library.)
 
So basically, after a month the loop library ceases to exist except as a commercial product. But "early adopters" of the membership program will have gotten it for free. The tradeoff of getting it for free is users have to take the responsibility (at least for now) of backing it up, as they would with commercial loop libraries they download from third-party content providers. 
 
All the official statements from Cakewalk indicate they're going to be pretty liberal about what will be part of the program as opposed to exclusive to one particular release. The reality is that this kind of content simply would not have been in SONAR before, so the company has no experience yet with how best to deal with it. 
 
I believe your issue is concern about the addition, or re-installation, of this content being handled in an inelegant or "user-hostile" manner going forward. However, this is the first membership release and only a little more than a month after a major release. Cakewalk pays attention to these forums and I would be extremely surprised if course corrections weren't made over time to take care of issues that weren't thought out well enough beforehand. But that's the advantage of this system. Changes that respond to user feedback can happen relatively quickly; the bug fix list is a good example.
 

mcdonalk
Can I install Braintree without disturbing my existing Dim Pro or Rapture installations?

Keith, I think you can download the products and install them yourself and control where everything goes (although I haven't done this). Beepster is doing it now and can give details. He also has a link to a youtube vid on how it's done.
 
As far as Dim Pro and Rapture are concerned, yes you do not have to touch those. Just install Cakewalk Sonar Platinum but avoid the installers for Dim Pro. I used the Command Center for my installs and it worked fine (but default locations were fine with me). There is a setting for where your plugins go and download path in the CC, but that may not be what you want.

mixmkr
I agree also, the Barking Dog plug is FREE at Boz Labs and while it's nice to have in a ProChannel, seems like sticking a freebie in there is a bit underwhelming.

But it's just one element out of 12. What would be the reason NOT to include a ProChannel version if it's available?
 
Frankly, I think the VocalSync, DSD, and Mix Recall updates, along with 27 fixes would have been a reasonable update, given that it occurred within weeks after a major release and only cost you $12.50. But you got a whole lot of other stuff, too, and I guarantee a lot of people will find at least some of it, if not most of it, very useful. The IR responses alone give a lot of life to electronic instruments by wrapping a room around them.

scook

Anderton
 
And I assume you haven't used Bark of Dog if you think it's a "special effect." Try it next time you need to separate kick from bass, or do narration. A very similar plug-in from a different company costs $150

Bark of the Dog has always been free and available as a VST for some time. It is nice to have PC format but not necessary if someone wanted to use the plug-in.

 
The release documentation specifically states "This version of Bark of Dog is based on a free resonant highpass filter plug-in from Boz, but is making its debut as a ProChannel module for the convenience of SONAR users." I mentioned the price in reference to the concept having value as something other than a "floor sweeping" or "special effect" with limited use.
 
Someone proclaiming all the content is just "floor sweepings" that aren't "meaningful" really rubbed me the wrong way, given how many hours I put into my contributions. The Acoustic Piezo amp alone took several days, including testing with multiple acoustic guitars. I don't even want to think how many hours I spent formatting the loops to work well with both the Acidized WAV and REX formats. But if you compare the range over which the files stretch compared to other commercial libraries, you'll hear the difference. 
 
I'm not asking anyone to sympathize with me, or even to agree that I attained a high standard with my material. But I would hope people would not dismiss outright something they admittedly don't use and/or understand.

mudgel
We also used to have access to previous version updates to download from Cakewalk. All I get now is whatever is the current installer.

So how do you roll back then ?
 
 

 

Paul P

mudgel
We also used to have access to previous version updates to download from Cakewalk. All I get now is whatever is the current installer.

So how do you roll back then ?

Presumably, you'd want to roll back if you had an existing installation, which you can do. If you're doing a new installation, for example on a new computer, then I assume you would be able to install only the latest version as there wouldn't be any history to roll back to.

In the previous model, you could do this by installing older software and then installing updates individually. For example if you didn't want X3e but X3c, you could install X3, then install the X3c update. I wonder how many people actually did that, though.
 
Where a problem would exist would be if, for example, you found out in July that the June update conflicted with some cool 3rd party plug-in, so you rolled back to May for projects using that plug-in. Then your computer died in August but you wanted to run the May installer and the subsequent updates so you could return to May at will.
 
I think it HIGHLY unlikely that Cakewalk will simply erase all previous versions of installers once a new one comes out. So you call tech support and explain your situation. They will of course tell you to go to hell. No, not really. They'll probably provide a solution, like putting the May installer in your store account and letting you carry on from there.
 
There will always be "corner cases," that's why support exists. It will be interesting to see how many people roll back from the current release, and if so, why. I suspect it won't be a lot.