Background: Long time customer and have invested a ton of time and money on Cakewalk Sonar and DAW hardware over the years. I have an engineering background and am no stranger to a wide range of software, hardware and operating systems. This last bit is only to suggest that although I make plenty of mistakes, lack of experience is not the main issue.
 
I have found my recording and production progress over the last 6 to 9 months stymied by crashes, predominantly related to Melodyne 4. This week alone, probably 80% of my precious DAW time was spent waiting for reboots, and/or trying to find, fix or avoid potholes.  I am at the end of my rope, and neither Cakewalk nor Celemony seem to be on top of the problem.
 
I have started using a Mac for a local community college music class, and the learning curve for the resident DAW software is pretty easy.  Even though it would be a huge (and expensive) leap, I am considering the move to Mac.  My first preference would be to stay with Sonar on Mac, but the silence about the Mac release is ominous given recent history. 
 
My options appear to be:
1. Grind it out and avoid using Melodyne until Cake/Celemony get it together. 
2. Upgrade to Platinum or whatever current version and hope that fixes it.
3. Jump to Mac and new DAW software. 
 
I don't want to spend more time trying to debug this stuff.  I want to make music.  Given the reputation of the Mac and my recent experience,  option 3 is feeling like a leading candidate.
 
Bottom line is: Cake, I want you to win.  But life is short and I've got to have some sign that the ship is not rudderless. 

There's not a day goes by that something goofy doesn't happen with SPLAT.  Seriously.  

Melodyne 4 came out long after Sonar X3 stopped being updated and supported.
 
Why don't you try a demo of Platinum and see if it works with Melodyne 4?

I worked with Sonar and Melodyne 4 all week on my 8 year old computer.  I auto tuned vocals,  Bass Parts...I scored an opening to a Cable TV show on the Live Well Network where I auto tuned anvil and hammer hits to be in tune with my score.  I edited VO for Accenture Cyber Security and I auto tuned a couple of words to sound more like the way the producer wanted.
knock on wood...it has been a long time since anything crashed. Can't remember.  Protools, however crashed on me last week.
 

Bye then!

I prefer your option #2 (if you're asking) > "Upgrade to Platinum or whatever current version and hope that fixes it."
While I agree that Cakewalk and Melodyne don't always get along perfectly, I have found that in using Sonar Platinum with Melodyne 4 (Editor version), for me there are no showstopper bugs. I've learned what makes it crash, so I don't do that. Yes, Annoying workarounds.
 
I don't mean to diminish your frustration, but you're running Melodyne 4 (the latest version) along with Sonar X3 (an outdated older version) ? Correct ?
 
In your post, you mentioned your exposure to a MAC DAW at a college class . . . but you haven't mentioned if you have a crash free Melodyne experience on this MAC DAW ? Just wondering how they compare for you. If you try the Sonar Platinum demo, perhaps you might be able to see if it's working better on your Windows system.

cwestmont
Background: Long time customer and have invested a ton of time and money on Cakewalk Sonar and DAW hardware over the years. I have an engineering background and am no stranger to a wide range of software, hardware and operating systems. This last bit is only to suggest that although I make plenty of mistakes, lack of experience is not the main issue.
 
I have found my recording and production progress over the last 6 to 9 months stymied by crashes, predominantly related to Melodyne 4. This week alone, probably 80% of my precious DAW time was spent waiting for reboots, and/or trying to find, fix or avoid potholes.  I am at the end of my rope, and neither Cakewalk nor Celemony seem to be on top of the problem.
 
I have started using a Mac for a local community college music class, and the learning curve for the resident DAW software is pretty easy.  Even though it would be a huge (and expensive) leap, I am considering the move to Mac.  My first preference would be to stay with Sonar on Mac, but the silence about the Mac release is ominous given recent history. 
 
My options appear to be:
1. Grind it out and avoid using Melodyne until Cake/Celemony get it together. 
2. Upgrade to Platinum or whatever current version and hope that fixes it.
3. Jump to Mac and new DAW software. 
 
I don't want to spend more time trying to debug this stuff.  I want to make music.  Given the reputation of the Mac and my recent experience,  option 3 is feeling like a leading candidate.
 
Bottom line is: Cake, I want you to win.  But life is short and I've got to have some sign that the ship is not rudderless. 

I'm not sure it's fair to say that "Cakewalk [is not] on top of the problem" if you're still running X3. Is X3 even receiving updates at this juncture? (I ask not to needle, but because I am honestly unaware; if not, it is safe to say that your frustration is at least partially, if not substantially, due to your being on an older piece of software rather than the manufacturer's fault in not attempting to keep the software current.) Rlared. I think, hits the best option on the head when he suggests trying Sonar Platinum. FWIW, I'm also in the category of not being to remember the last time SPlat crashed. It is, of course, a fair question to ask when the point is that a company should choose to stop supporting older s/w, but three-plus years with a new flagship DAW in production for more than a year feels like a safe and ethical place to stop support for an older version.
 
Good luck in your endeavors. 
 

Hi cwestmont,
Just a couple quick points. I use Melodyne 4 all the time with SPLAT and, while I had my share of crashes and weirdness with previous versions, the current setup has been remarkably stable. I work with a ton of DAWs and one of the things that has continually brought be back to Sonar is Melodyne integration. Right now among the DAWs that I use, Sonar has the best integration I've found with Melodyne. Might be worth updating just to see if it solves your problems. It's certainly cheaper than a full platform move.
 
Next, don't discount hardware problems. I have been plagued for years with occasional BSOD's, almost always related to audio. They persisted across multiple sound cards, and even multiple computers. I always ground my teeth and worked through them despite the embarrassment it caused given the number of paying clients I see. A month or two ago I finally upgraded my dedicated audio hard drive because I was running out of space. I had been using this hard drive for years, with every audio computer I've had. Suddenly, the crashes all went away. My system is more stable than it's ever been...not one crash since. All that heartburn, for probably 4 or 5 years, because of what must have been a glitchy audio drive. 
 
I guess what I can tell you is that it can be done. Heaven knows Sonar has some problems (Audiosnap to edit 10 mics on a trap kit...sheesh....I don't even try anymore, just export out to a different DAW and edit there. And let's not even get into how Sonar handles mono external effects), but in my joint, I use Melodyne in Sonar for multiple hours every week and it's been great.
 
There are lots of DAWs and I use most of them from time to time, maybe a different one is better for you, but the Melodyne stuff in Sonar really can work.
 
Good luck,
Dean

I agree with the suggestion to try Platinum. You can try the demo version to see if it works for you at no cost, or you can purchase a month by month subscription to get a deeper feel for whether or not it will solve your problems. If it's not for you you're not out a bazillion bucks.
 
I also strongly support the suggestion to check your hardware for issues. The Windows Event Log is a good place to start there. 
 
Good luck!

I've been using Melodyne 4 with great results, although it's the lite version and the editing isn't as involving as some.
I know how frustrating (as many other Cakewalk members) when you have system crash, I've only had "Producer or Platinum" version since Sonar 8.5 but I was also a Protools HD user for many years, very reliable Mac operation.
I recently went through Crashes with Windows 10 Anniv. & Sonar, once I reinstalled "Plug-ins" for the last month has been rock-solid (under many hours of use per day) I really like Sonar and the workflow has been great, look at possible options and Sonar forum is a great resource.