the_user_formally_known_as_glennbo
You have gotten quite good in a very short amount of time with the concept of custom actions in REAPER!
 
When I need some custom actions for things I need, I know who I'll be calling!!! 

It will take some time till I learn the whole thing. In Sonar, there was around 1000 commands and around 100 API calls. In Reaper there there is an order more.

Right now Reaper is my first choice. Let me know if , since I mostly do guitar and bass stuff, I would need a midi priority in my DAW

bayoubill
Right now Reaper is my first choice. Let me know if , since I mostly do guitar and bass stuff, I would need a midi priority in my DAW

I haven't found anything midi wise that I can't do in REAPER that I previously did in Sonar.  I frequently record with the set of V-Drums I'm banging on in my avatar, and use Superior Drummer 2 for my drum sounds. It captures everything I play on the V-Drums, which includes midi continuous controller data from my hi-hat pedal, and Poly Aftertouch when I choke my cymbals.
 
I also do extensive midi input routing, and audio output routing with Superior Drummer, Kontakt, Proteus VX and other VSTi midi instruments with multi-input/output support.  I use the sliders on my Akai MPD26 pad controller to push and pull the drawbars on Native Instruments B4 organ as well.
 
My setup has three midi controllers which are V-Drums, an M-Audio midi keyboard controller, and the desktop Akai MPD26. I can set REAPER to see them all at once on any channel, or isolate them to their own private tracks.
 
And as far as VSTi instruments go, I can put more than one on a track (and there is no midi track vs. audio track), and all of them play which is something you can't do with Sonar.  In fact, you need two tracks in Sonar for a VSTi midi instrument. One for the midi, and another for the audio.  REAPER uses a single track which supports both midi and audio, and you can patch as many VSTi instruments as you want on one single track, rather than having to either duplicate the track, or create a linked copy of it like Sonar does.
 
 
 

Forum must still be up and running for now...
 
Sky, Reaper not a good fit for you. May the wind be to your back, and Studio One will do a killer job for you. A bit less stable, fragile, but can do things Reaper cannot do native if the functions apply to your need.
 
Big respected thanks to Glenbo, to Azslow for all your help. You guys rock. So much effort in helping with the transition to Reaper for those who feel that the switch is appropriate.
 
John
 
emphasizing the point many times made. Sonar ain't going to go belly up tomorrow. May likely work solid for many years to come. There is ample time to take a breath and consider an alternative at leisure.

.

OK - I've been dipping my toes in slightly.
There are *lots* of preferences and options to think about! ;-)
 
2 quick questions:
- Is there any way for Reaper to show me my reported round trip latency?
   I know it's set for 64 samples, and can either force that, or read from my interface - but does it actually tell me in ms what (or what it thinks) my latency is?
 
- I'm sure I'll get to this when I have a better look at layouts, but where is a good place to put the performance meters?
   I'd rather see it all the time, than have it docked. It's in a floating window now, and I can "pin" it, so I guess it won't move - but can you dock it to the top (like I did with the transport bar) or somewhere?
 
PS - I'm just going to do this slowly - and then work my way to doing an actual project, bu tI've got a lot of things to figure out. So far (and I'm sure it will stay this way) everything is there - I just need to find it, and then work out if there is a "better" (ie easier) way...
 
Thanks
 

OK - I'll answer number 1, I found it up on the top right (with a little help from the Reaper forums)
 

 
I chose 24 bit WAV file to render to, but maybe I'll change that to 32 bit (I think that's what SONAR does)
 
I have a long way to go....  

I am currently evaluating Reaper 5.62, so I'm not an experienced user, but I did notice that in the upper right hand corner of the screen it always displays the following information (without the descriptions): sample rate, bit depth, quantity of input and output channels on audio interface, audio buffer sample size, input latency, output latency and audio driver type.
 
I see you found the answer in the time it took me to read your post and respond.

jbraner
OK - I'll answer number 1, I found it up on the top right (with a little help from the Reaper forums)
 

 
I chose 24 bit WAV file to render to, but maybe I'll change that to 32 bit (I think that's what SONAR does)
 
I have a long way to go....  

Interesting John that yours reports 1.8/3.9ms when using 64 samples and 24/44.
 
Mine, using two M-Audio Delta 2496 cards reports 2.4/2.0ms using 64 samples and 24/44.
 
What audio hardware are you using, coz it obviously makes a difference even with other things set the same.
 
Edit: I would also suggest leaving the settings stock for your audio hardware at least for now. If you start making tweaks to things dealing with the audio engine, you might introduce issues that will have you chasing ghosts, rather than testing out recording, editing, and playing back.  Internally it's 64 bit float, but again I wouldn't recommend tweaking things right off the bat. I've *never* made any changes to buffers, latency, offsets, or anything whatsoever on my system, and won't be doing it later unless some actual issue were to arise.  IOW don't FIX it unless it really is BROKE!   ;)

Hi G'bo,
 
I use a MOTU Ultralite AVB. RTL times will always depend on the driver, and the "safety buffers" that they build in. This latest (well, and the one before) built in a little extra "safety" (that you can't change) - so that's what you're seeing.
This is set for 64 samples (buffer) and 48 for "host safety offset". This safety buffer goes right down to 16, and then the actual buffers can go down to 32 (with various safeties) and even 16 (!)
 
When I get to the point of recording some guitar parts - I'll try pushing it, with a lot of (copies of) audio tracks - and see how low we can go ;-)
 
I can play at this setting in SONAR, but only when there's not much going on - then I have to raise it to 128/48 (10.2ms RTL). I've never been sure if this is completely down to SONAR, the driver, or the PDC in th eplugins that I use. It will be interesting to see how similar projects play in Reaper - and I'll be sure to report back.
 

I would also suggest leaving the settings stock for your audio hardware at least for now. If you start making tweaks to things dealing with the audio engine, you might introduce issues that will have you chasing ghosts, rather than testing out recording, editing, and playing back.

Oh no - I'm not touching anything like that! ;-)
I just meant the settings for paths and filenames and behaviour of the MIDI editor and media imports, snap settings yada yada.
 
I *will* get in to this. I actually like tweaking and setting up something new - for a while - but then I like to just "set and forget" and get to playing ;-)
 
I'm just going to work on this a little at a time, while working on a couple of things in SONAR.
 
Then when I'm ready - I'll try a full project in Reaper.
Then if I'm happy - I'll park SONAR ;-)
That's the plan anyway...