Need Help - Problem with Halion Sympohnic Orchestra and Sonar 8.5 Producer

Screenshot: http://i.imgur.com/Y7baPKx.jpg Halion Symphonic Orchestra works fine in standalone mode. When I try to use it as a soft synth in Sonar, I get no sound from it. I can see activity in Track 1 (the MIDI track) when I press a key on my MIDI controller, but I can't hear any sounds coming from HSO. I can hear the sampled sounds fine when I do the same thing in HSO stand alone. Doesn't seem to matter which instrument I sample or MIDI channel I pick.

I've tried various things, but my troubleshooting approach has been: - open a blank / empty project - add the Halion soft synth (with no tracks checked) - select a sound sample for channel one on Halion Symphonic Orchestra (HSO) - add a MIDI track - add an Audio track - set the input on the MIDI track to my MIDI controller - set the output on the MIDI track channel to HSO - set the input on the audio track to HSO - set the output on the audio track to channels 1&2 on my Toneport

Why not set your audio output for track 2 to Master?

Bob Bone

Typically only the Master bus gets directly routed to your interface outs.

Again, route your audio output to Master and post back.

Bob Bone

I am a bit confused.  Master is the default output option for audio tracks.  Is your track 2 not a regular audio track?  

I will grab a cup of coffee and take a look at your screen shots.

Can you try the following and post back?

1.  Start a new project, using the Normal project template.
2.  Insert a midi track and an audio track
3.  Insert your synth into the synth rack, with only the box checked for opening the synth properties.
4.  Once the synth UI opens, load a sound into it.
5.  In the track inspector, set the input to your audio track to the stereo output of the synth,  The OUTPUT parameter should say Master.  That is the default setting.
6.  Set the input for the midi track to None (should be the default), and set the output to the synth.
7.  Select the midi track, by clicking on the number on the far left of the track in the Track Pane.  This will highlight the number at the far left, and you should see the midi input echo button lit too.  (If it does not automatically do that, there is a setting in preferences to tell it to do so, and that option is set to do that by installation default).
8.  Make sure your midi keyboard/controller is a valid input device in Preferences, and play some notes on the keyboard - making sure that the key range you are playing is in the range of note values that are valid for that particular sound in your synth.  (you can't usually play violin notes that are outside of a normal range of possible notes for a real violin, in most sample players).  You should be hearing output.

Please do the above steps, exactly as indicated, and post back your results.

Thanks, 

Bob Bone

Did you try inserting this as a Simple Instrument Track?  That would be easiest.

If you did, then to set Output to master, you would need to click on the Audio tab at the bottom of the Inspector (on the left).  Master will probably not be an option if you are on the MIDI tab.  That is not especially obvious.

Apologies if you already know all this.
 
The other (remote) possibility: I am aware of a bug in Sonar that blocks audio from a soft synth after a certain number of synths (VIs) have been added to the project.  I cannot isolate the root cause because the number of synths that will work seems to vary by project.  Sometimes, after I have 7 or 8 soft synths, I have to freeze one or two to get the next one to work.  This is not a memory problem as I have lots and Task Manager shows that I am only using a small part.  This is a strange Sonar bug.

This gets evermore maddening. I am able to get HSO to work in Reaper as a Rewire SoftSynth. I am not great with Reaper, but I at least able get HSO to play sounds via MIDI notes in it.