I purchased PT9MP (I had an M-Audio interface at the time) as I wanted to see what most of my counterparts in Nashville used.  It didn't seem to be as "Windows friendly" as Sonar.  I even bought a 3rd party book on PT's and tried to understand it.  Eventually I gave up and stayed exclusively Sonar.   I use Sonar mainly as an "analog recorder" but a da**ed good "analog recorder".
 
 
 

Good day all,
Just my 3 cents. I started with PT's long ago, also having m-audio gear (aarrrggghhhh). Really disliked the 'priority' way it was designed. I migrated away happily never looking back. Sonar has been there for all my needs, and in a way a player, not a techy, could understand. I've done sessions with PT tracks being brought to me on thumb drives. You just have to make sure Sonar starts transferring at the beginning. Tracks ended up loading at around 50-60 plus measures. Threw me for a second, until I was  able to move all tracks to beginning of measures. Worked just fine. Like was stated, little specialtis that are unique to PT will not come across. Better to have pure tracks with no added flavors. Many times I've thought back and wondered why PT did "whatever" in such an odd way. As stated. Try it......you'll like it!😎 
 

I think it's good to remember that just because you start using SONAR going forward, your PT will not go away.  I started in Propellerhead Reason and I have slowly but surely been moving towards SONAR.  I still use Reason sometimes, but SONAR has a lot to offer IMHO for the home studio guys (like me) and with Lifetime updates for Platinum, it seems to me to be an excellent deal as well.

Funny, I was thinking of going the other way, so aside from the, costs; apparent steep learning curve and uncreative work flow mentioned;, the feeling of being assimilated by PT-Borgs (LOL); or perhaps what may be the clincher, when potential clients say "Ohhh, you don't use Pro-Tools?".  (Its a somewhat expensive and time intensive proposition, but I may bite the bullet, just so I can honestly say to clients, "Yes, I have Pro-Tools", (but don't necessarily use it, unless forced into submission).
What else would anyone say to discourage me from, crossing over to the dark side and submitting to PT assimilation? 

JohnEgan
 
What else would anyone say to discourage me from, crossing over to the dark side and submitting to PT assimilation? 

I tried Pro Tools First (again) just a couple of months ago. It was the buggiest, crashiest DAW I have ever attempted to use. Just getting it installed was a huge PITA. The same system runs Sonar, Live, FL Studio, Samplitude, Tracktion, ACID, and others with no problems. Also, AVID support is notoriously awful.
 
I used PT8 back in the day, and it worked fine for me.

Hi JDR and welcome to the forum,
Like you, I dabble in music and record for my own entertainment.  If I had to guess I'd say I use about 10-15% of SONAR's capacities.  Because I don't get into SONAR as deep as others I find it's VERY easy to use.  For example, if you want to record audio all you need to do is click two buttons and you're off and running.   I'd say after I got my first version of SONAR, nearly 20 years ago, it probably took me about 30 minutes to figure out the basics of what I wanted to do.  Like the others I'd encourage you to download the demo and work with it a few hours.
 
If you get stuck come back to this forum.  These guys are all very helpful and friendly.
 
Best of luck with your music.

SiberianKhatru59
I started in Propellerhead Reason and I have slowly but surely been moving towards SONAR.  I still use Reason sometimes, but SONAR has a lot to offer IMHO for the home studio guys (like me) and with Lifetime updates for Platinum, it seems to me to be an excellent deal as well.

And...you can rewire Reason into SONAR. It's a great way to get an additional "instrument rack."

Oh and you probably know this, coming from ProTools, but you'll really make your life easier if you learn a few common shortcut keys for often-used operations like navigation, splitting clips etc.

JohnEgan
What else would anyone say to discourage me from, crossing over to the dark side and submitting to PT assimilation? 

You can do what a lot of pros do. They track with Pro Tools so they can say to clients "Yes, I have a Pro Tools studio" but then they take the raw files out and edit them in SONAR. This is what I've always done with the classical projects I've engineered and/or produced, because it was too frustrating/time-consuming to use Pro Tools from start to finish.
 

Time to come up with a Pro Tools skin for Sonar to fool those clients, LOL.