I took my first look at the SO3 demo the other night, and chimed in early in this thread about the midi implementation being okay in parts, but clumsier than Sonar's. This evening I fired up SO3 again and took another crack at it, and found it much easier to deal with. I am an ITB guy completely, and I have very particular ways of working and setting up my tracks, and now that I've spent some time getting used to SO3's approach and overall vibe, I actually had a lot less difficulty getting going tonight than I did the other day.
Couple of reasons for that, I think: a) simply the fact that there is a learning curve and you need to start working your way around it, and b) last night I was already cranky and unfocused by the time I got to SO3, after spending the better part of two hours trying to wrestle Samplitude into submission -- on top of being pretty down in the dumps over Cakewalk's demise. So I was not really in any mood to be receptive to a new DAW, or unravel a different style of implementing it.
I am a bit more impressed with SO3 tonight, and had much better results. Felt I should mention that. A lot of us are sort of casting about for answers after this week's sad news, and are trying to figure out how to best proceed in uncertain times, and I didn't want to cast an unfairly negative light on a potential solution. I am probably going to stick with Sonar until the end (whenever that comes), but after tonight, I wouldn't write SO3 off as a potential option, should the need arise down the road.