The more I think about it, the more I like having both CbB and Platinum on the same computer, even able to be opened together. This opens up some great possibilities for comparison and testing. For instance since all this happened with Cakewalk, I decided to go back to the most stable version of Plat for me which is 2017.01 with all Win updates frozen for that time period.
 
I now have something to compare CbB to and if I want to I can do some tasks with Plat and others with CbB if I find some differences in stability. I may also find that it's not the newest version of Plat but instead some other software updates or Win updates that caused my instability. 
 
This week I'll start using CbB adn if something goes wrong, I"ll close CbB and I'll just use Plat instead - pretty painless.

Just don't open the same project at the same time in both. I crashed SONAR this morning doing that. Which, I admit, was dumb.
 
The main advantage to having both is that you get all the SPlat goodies that aren't included in the free version of CbB, such as the instruments.
 
 

What  instruments are not included? What else? Missing Pluggins? Dimension Pro is included so is Strum. I've heard Rapture is not

Most of what was exclusive to Platinum and Professional. Lounge Lizard, Strum Session, TruePianos, Z3ta+. 

bitflipper
Most of what was exclusive to Platinum and Professional. Lounge Lizard, Strum Session, TruePianos, Z3ta+. 

What about things like Channel Tools? I love it, luckily it works in Studio One too. Since I have SPLAT installed I cant tell what`s missing or not.
 
 

Not yet. Channel Tools is part of the Engineering FX Suite.

Ahh ok, thank you :-)

After reading the FAQ my understanding is that anything that we have already installed in Plat will show up in CbB, except possibly Rapture, which I don't use. If you use the free version of CbB without any Plat installed then there will be all sorts of things missing. 
 
One thing that may be confusing people is that when you install many VST paths are not present, you have to add them manually to find the missing plugins. Check the VST paths n Plat first. 
 
 I haven't checked it but it seems to me since I  have Engineering FX Suite installed in Plat that I should have Channel Tools also in CbB. If I'm wrong about any of this, please correct me. I'll start using it sometime today.

All plug-ins and content bundled with Platinum should work in CbB.
 
The bundled Rapture has always been the full retail version, not locked to SONAR. Like many of the Cakewalk plug-ins, Rapture works in all vst hosts including CbB.
 
Right now BandLab migrated the Platinum DAW and Artist Instrument Collection and are giving it away for free as Cakewalk by BandLab. This is still an early version similar to the old Early Access Program for SONAR Platinum. In time, they will migrate the other Cakewalk plug-ins. Whether these are free or not depend on which version of SONAR (if any) you had. However, the bundled 3rd party plug-ins and content were not part of the sale so will not be part of CbB. Legacy synths like Cakewalk Sound Center, DPro and Rapture may not get the BandLab treatment because they have been replaced with Rapture Session/Pro. I have not seen any discussion about them.

scook
All plug-ins and content bundled with Platinum should work in CbB.
 
The bundled Rapture has always been the full retail version, not locked to SONAR. Like many of the Cakewalk plug-ins, Rapture works in all vst hosts including CbB.
 
Right now BandLab migrated the Platinum DAW and Artist Instrument Collection and are giving it away for free as Cakewalk by BandLab. This is still an early version similar to the old Early Access Program for SONAR Platinum. In time, they will migrate the other Cakewalk plug-ins. Whether these are free or not depend on which version of SONAR (if any) you had. However, the bundled 3rd party plug-ins and content were not part of the sale so will not be part of CbB. Legacy synths like Cakewalk Sound Center, DPro and Rapture may not get the BandLab treatment because they have been replaced with Rapture Session/Pro. I have not seen any discussion about them.

I guess the big question will be what happens when a Platinum user gets a new computer. Can he install Plat and install all the plugins and soft synths? And then use them with CbB? 
 
Possibly he can't if he's relying on Command Center. Yet I've downloaded every file, serial #'s, etc from every version of Sonar in the last 25 years, so I would assume and hope that I'd be ok. Correct?