One Sonar feature request to cover everything I want - Digital Performer 9

lfm
Plugin slots - select max up to if it is 20
Global VST racks - VRacks that can be used between projects
Already got Mix recalls pretty much like Sonars

Fx chains can be shared globally across projects - same thing and more powerful.

Mix recall - sonas implementation is far more powerful. Buses, routing, fx, automation, selected recall, reset, presets. Dp has a very small subset

Not sure what you mean by plugin slots

Ah I see so its like a synth rack running in a different project (global) but other projects can send to it?
I guess its cool but it seems like it could be a bit of a routing nightmare. What if you change something in the global instance - now all your projects referencing it have changed.
Also how does it save project load time? Even if its a global rack it still needs to be loaded. It would only help if you opened multiple documents sharing it at the same time. Thats not such a common workflow anyway. Does DP even support multiple documents?

Let me jump in, if I might...
 
With respect Noel, I think what the OP is suggesting - and what I'm reading at MOTUs web site - is DP seems to include something akin to Vienna Ensemble Pro, except it may be limited to a single machine.
 
I think you are familiar with VEPro, but for those that aren't - there is a server, and the server can live on any machine on the network (assuming sufficient network, and machine resources). The server hosts one or more instances of pretty much any VSTi you like, including Kontakt and Vienna Player, which are probably two of the more popular applications.
 
Once this is running you can load the Kontakt and Vienna Player instances with as many instruments as your memory allows. And they are just THERE. You connect to them through MIDI out and audio in via the client half of the system, which behaves pretty much like any other MIDI and Audio tracks.

The benefit, and it can be huge, is you don't need to load all the Kontakt, Vienna, or other instruments every time you start, or revisit a project. It might not sound like much, but if you have a large template of instruments that you use regularly it can be a real productivity killer to wait for everything to load.
 
I like DP on a Mac, and I do hope that they get the PC issues cleared up, but I'm not as certain that I'll add it to my arsenal as I once was. For me the big ticket features I'd like to see added to Sonar include:

1. 1) a more flexible tempo map, and maybe even a tempo map integrated into Audio Snap - or the other way around. The remains one of my few serious wishes - possibly I was spoiled by (MIDI only granted) Bars & Pipes Pro?
2. 2) an Arrange feature - think DP, think Texture (for you dinosaurs out there), heck, think the new chunk like feature in Studio One. The idea is that compositions become somewhat more (less?) granular so that you can work in terms of measures and beats, or verse and chorus, or whatever.
3. 3) Nesting Track Folders - or folders of folders. nuff said.
4. 4) Enhance the MusicXML tools - they do work (well, I guess I need to try them in SPLAT, but the worked well enough in X3). My fantasy includes bi-driectional, rule based transfers, so that I can tell the parser in Sonar to assume a window of X ticks and collapse notes into that window so that I don't get 1/128 notes tied together<G>.

That probably sounds like an awful lot - but given that Sonar handles everything else I do so well I don't think of it as a lot...
 
my two cents...

I had a 1 month trial of DP 8 and really wanted to like it (notation was a major reason for me to try it). I have to agree on DP's non-intuitiveness. Perhaps it is due in part to its being a port from Mac but what you would think would work, doesn't. Like the right click menu. I also found the UI fonts to be too small for my use but the most disappointing thing for me was the notation view. There are 2 views and one of  them (I forget which) had a very noticeable lag when entering notes with the mouse. I couldn't get used to it. I'll stick with Sonar and cross my fingers for some basic notation changes.

icontakt

lfm 
DP9 lacking:
Undock of mixer view for second monitor
Still some oddities with certain plugins - synths list among effects etc
Only found plugins slots in mixer/console - but maybe I missed something

 
There's a lot more missing in DP. But what's missing the most IMO is intuitiveness. For example, you think you want to add a new bus in the mixer view, so you right-click in there only to see no right-click menu. That sort of thing. There were a few things I liked, but the only thing I still remember liking was the width of track/bus strips in the mixer view which was "just right." Sonar's normal strip size in CV is just too wide.
 

Yes, it took a while to configure out to do named busses in bundles - but still a bit cumbersome doing two steps, first to a free bundle then to send target from that bundle. Does offer some routing freedom though.
And much, too much, is just keyboard commands - context menues would be more useful, especially when starting out - eventually you learn keyboard options. Now there is Ctrl Alt Shift Win keys with everything else on keyboard - uphill battle that.
 
I also found double click in header of tabs with mixerboard, created an undocked version to place on other monitor. Also found configurable sidebars for plugin bays in different views.
 
Sonar mixer/console looks prettier in some respects, than most daws, but is less efficient with space.
Both Reaper, DP and ProTools are my favorites. And more compact looking sends too. What is it in Sonar 200x200 pixels or something. You can easily get two rows of strips in Reaper and ProTools as I recall.