I've just raised a support ticket to try to find out what's happened with the long awaited feature to be able to address hardware inserts in mono; I mean send a mono channel source to just the LEFT insert port and then use the RIGHT insert port for another channel.
 
I got excited this evening as you can now address e.g. insert send 1 LEFT separately from insert send 1 RIGHT.  However my excitement was short lived as I found that addressing e.g. insert send 1 LEFT, then insert send 1 RIGHT disappears from the available ports.
 
Has anyone else come across this update that doesn't actually seem to solve the issue?

Hi kickstart,
When you mention "Hardware Inserts", if you're talking about the External Insert plugin consuming both channels of a stereo pair even when used in mono, it's been a long standing annoyance of mine as well. A couple years back it was brought up and at the time Noel said they had no plans to address it:
 
http://forum.cakewalk.com/FindPost/3012142
 
Not sure if anything has changed since then, but I'm not holding my breath.
 
Dean
 

While they're adding mono support ;) they should let us give the insert a usable name.
Like H3000 for example.

bitman
While they're adding mono support ;) they should let us give the insert a usable name.

isn't that taken care of by the "friendly name"?

Razorwit
Hi kickstart,
When you mention "Hardware Inserts", if you're talking about the External Insert plugin consuming both channels of a stereo pair even when used in mono, it's been a long standing annoyance of mine as well. A couple years back it was brought up and at the time Noel said they had no plans to address it:
 

 
Not sure if anything has changed since then, but I'm not holding my breath.
 
Dean
 

Yes that's correct Dean.  The crazy thing is that you can address the insert return LEFT and RIGHT ports separately.
You just can't do that with the insert sends!  I have lots of hardware gear (mostly mono EQs and Compressors) which I'm using more and more during mixdown and so I'm faced with having to buy a ton more converters just to get the extra inserts sends.
Let's see what the support guys at Cakewalk say...
 
Robert

Wouldn't the friendly name be than global for all hardware inserts in a project?

kickstart
 
Yes that's correct Dean.  The crazy thing is that you can address the insert return LEFT and RIGHT ports separately.
You just can't do that with the insert sends!  I have lots of hardware gear (mostly mono EQs and Compressors) which I'm using more and more during mixdown and so I'm faced with having to buy a ton more converters just to get the extra inserts sends.
Let's see what the support guys at Cakewalk say...
 
Robert

Hey Kickstart, one more thing. I submitted a bug report on this very behavior back in 2014, CWBRN-24189. It was submitted to development that same year, updated in some fashion in 2015, but hasn't been updated since:
 
https://www.cakewalk.com/Support/Contact/Problem-Report-Status/24189
 
This is just my opinion, but I think that what it comes down to is that Cake just doesn't have a large user-base making use of External Inserts, and so the cost/benefit calculation for fixing it isn't very compelling. That's unfortunate for folks like us, but is probably the reality.
 
Dean

Razorwit

kickstart
 
Yes that's correct Dean.  The crazy thing is that you can address the insert return LEFT and RIGHT ports separately.
You just can't do that with the insert sends!  I have lots of hardware gear (mostly mono EQs and Compressors) which I'm using more and more during mixdown and so I'm faced with having to buy a ton more converters just to get the extra inserts sends.
Let's see what the support guys at Cakewalk say...
 
Robert

Hey Kickstart, one more thing. I submitted a bug report on this very behavior back in 2014, CWBRN-24189. It was submitted to development that same year, updated in some fashion in 2015, but hasn't been updated since:
 

 
This is just my opinion, but I think that what it comes down to is that Cake just doesn't have a large user-base making use of External Inserts, and so the cost/benefit calculation for fixing it isn't very compelling. That's unfortunate for folks like us, but is probably the reality.
 
Dean

Hi Dean
 
Well I finally got a one line response from Cakewalk Tech Support today indicating the problem was due to an inability to address my MOTU converter D/A outputs individually.  So they were implying it wasn't a SONAR issue but rather an issue with my converters.
 
I thought this was strange, so I pickup up the phone (from the UK) and called the guys at MOTU.  Got through straight away and had the chat.  There is no issue to address MOTU converter outputs individually. They have tested with all the big DAW software including Cubase, Reaper, Digital Performer, Samplitude and so on.  No problem.  MOTU use a standard implementation of the ASIO protocol which allows each (mono) port to be addressed separately.  So this appears to be an issue unique to Sonar.
 
So I have replied to Cakewalk Tech Support with this information and asked them to look again.
 
I suspect this is a piece of half completed software update.  I am certain that last year you could only address stereo pairs within the Sonar 'hardware' channel insert sends.  Now you can address Left and Right individually, but as I said before, if you allocate the Left to a mono insert send, then the right disappears and can longer be addressed.
 
I'm going to download a demo of Cubase to see what's possible on that platform.
 
This is a big deal for me.  I have a lot of analogue kit (much of it mono) and I want to be able to connect it to by Sonar setup, but I'll be dammed if I'm going to have to write of 50% of my D/As.
 
Watch this space for the reply from Cakewalk Tech Support. 
 
Robert

Hm...something may be funny here. I have always been able to select only a left or right channel in E.I. (as long as "Show Mono Outputs" was checked in Audio preferences, ie https://www.cakewalk.com/Documentation?product=SONAR%20X3&language=3&help=Dialogs2.051.html), the problem in CWBRN-24189 is that when doing so Sonar marks both channels as "used" and will not let you use either of them in other channels. 
 
For example, on my current RME HDSPe-MADIfx if I use output 73 (the left channel of output 73/74) in an E.I. going to one channel of a 2-1176, I can no longer use channel 74 (the other channel in the 2-1176) anywhere in the project, even though it's not in use. Sonar has marked both channels of the stereo pair as used, and thus unavailable. 
 
AFAIK this has always been the case....or at least going back as far as I can remember. Are we talking about the same problem?
 
Dean

So I downloaded the demo version of Cubase 9 Pro (which has hardware inserts) and had no trouble configuring 8 mono inserts using my MOTU Utralite mk3.
I've sent tech support an image showing the 8 mono inserts in Cubase.
So now I'm chasing for an acknowledgement that my hardware is not the issue and that this is a bug.  Now I cannot get a response!
I'd appreciate any advice on how to get a response.  I understand that calling is almost impossible.  Does anyone have a direct e-mail for the CEO or COO? or anyone senior at Cakewalk?
Regards
Robert