I do 90% midi and external modules.  From my research, I'm going to have to go to Cubase.

bitflipper
You all seem to be working from the assumption that SONAR is going to stop working on Friday. It won't.

I think it's more case of "jump now" or "jump later" and people like certainty (besides the obvious things) .. I'm still using camel audio alchemy and other things like kore 2..
 
also the whole thing of learning something again, or the ways to do stuff that is slightly different.
 
I still use my commodore 64 and apple ii.. both still have new software even in 2017 ;-)
 
think how many bits of hardware you got rid of, due to drivers.. because the makers would rather you get a new product.
 
there will be things 3rd party, that "break" code that won't be fixed.
 

husker
Anyone with first hand experience with S1 Midi implementation?  I do 90% stuff with midi and external modules.

in what respect, you can select multi midi channels.  it does have templates, and you can make one / save it.. and you can add more. does depend on what you using.  I haven't got into it in depth yet, as I use more virtual synths / fx.
 
I don't know how others work, but you can setup templates in most things.. where you don't have to re-setup things and they are quick to recall instead.
 
you can try the demo and see for yourself.

Thanks.   Doesn't support external bank change though.  As much as I hate the dongle,  the Midi implementation of Cubase is legendary. 

bitflipper
You all seem to be working from the assumption that SONAR is going to stop working on Friday. It won't.

What I would be worried about , is Windows 10 downloading and installing one of it's periodic updates that suddenly doesn't jibe with Splats code and no Cakewalk engineers to issue a newer lifetime version/bug fix. That's maybe a longer term view....Should be OK in the short term but who knows.

Rimshot
 No need to panik now but just think about at least getting your tracks exported sometime soon so that whatever new DAW you go with, you will be ready to import that data. 
 

 
It would be so easy if you could just open a .BUN file in something else...hundreds of them over the years is a lot of .wav exporting

chuckebaby
its this thing that used to be called the industry standard.
I cant use Pro tools.

May I ask why?
Thank you
 

Nobody has mentioned it yet and a bit out of left-field but Waveform by Tracktion looks nice. I do a mix of MIDI/virtual instruments, wav and REX loops, and live recording. It looks like it's worth a trial download. Current prices are $99-$200 depending on how many extras you get. Maybe I'm easily impressed but the intro video was impressive.


 
 

dcumpian
At this point, IMO, the closest thing to Sonar at the moment is probably Studio One. I'll likely start there and if that doesn't work for me, then Cubase or Reaper are top contenders. I've tried Reaper and could make it do what I wanted, but it sure takes a lot of work to get it setup.
 
Regards,
Dan

Have been messing around with Studio One Prime, Cubase Elements, and Reaper, this past year.
 
IMHO, Studio One offers a convenient workflow that should be comfortable to most Sonar users. 
 
Cubase is a legendary mainstay in DAW platforms that should be respected, but it may take some time to climb their learning curve.  Reaper is very flexible, but every time I use it, I spend too much time trying to find options.  If you use it every day it may be fine, but for secondary use it is easy to forget the workflow, and the user guide needs to be nearby!

Has anyone considered this daw, http://motu.com/products/software/dp
I don't know it, but I'm going to check out
the demo... I have Mixbus and Cubase 9 Elements,
but they just don't totally cut it for me
like Sonar did.