Pro Tools vs Sonar?

It really depends on what you want do with it and your main workflow-needs. You can do almost everything you want in creating and recording music with SONAR, but like every of its competitors it got its strengths and weaknesses. It is cumbersome and may end in flame-wars to list them for every sequencer-software outthere. Tell us what you wanna do with it, your equipment and which features you expect or are must-haves for you. The SONAR 6-demo will be out soon, so you may better wait a few weeks. Personally I recommend to walk through the online-tutorials under help.

@The Scar:
While it is correct, that searching the forum may (!) help answering many of his questions, it is still not quite sure what he really needs to know. To me it is obvious that "is SONAR better than ProTools M-Powered?" is cleary the wrong question.

" My question is simply this:

Is sonar 6 producer edition($499) better than pro tools m-powered 7($249)? Any opinions or comparisons would be great? "

http://www.digitalmusicdoctor.com/shootout/shootout_summary.htm
Digital Music Doctor - Pro Audio video training for
DigiDesign Pro Tools,
Adobe Audition (Cool Edit),
Steinberg Cubase,
Cakewalk Sonar,
Sony Acid,
Sony Sound Forge,
Apple GarageBand.

I , like the scar, am tired of these type of 'questions'

I have some questions:
Is PT working for you?
Do you own PT ? Or just use it somewhere?
If not, is there a demo you can try out ?
(BTW, Sonar 5 demo is still available, I think. )
Did you try the Sonar demo to see if it fits your needs?

If it's merely a price thing - you will not find a better featured Pro
digital audio workstation application for the price, with support from both Cakewalk
technical and Peer-to-peer ( this forum )

So, my answer is YES !

Get Sonar 6.

ORIGINAL: javahut
I'd say as new features and versions come out of all the audio sequencing softwares, it's perfectly relevant for these types of questions to come up.

I agree. I just reckon there needs to be a separate forum for them... possibly called "DAW wars: come here to debate the pros and cons of different softwares".

T.

ORIGINAL: themidiroom

On the flip side, midi in Pro Tools is down right horrible. If you like softsynths, go with Sonar.

IMO, midi editing isn't all that great in Sonar, in fact I think it could use alot of work. As for the rest of what you are saying, you have a studio, I'm thinking this guy is a home user, so the (hardware) mixer control, and assoitation with other studios I doubt is a concern to the poster. But, I do like sonar, just for home use, and mixing down audio, and live recording. As for midi, I use another ap. I'm not knocking your reply at all, I just think it will be funny if thos thread ends with, "just get Pro Tools HD Accel for 12 grand", when this guy is just doing simple home editing / composing.

ORIGINAL: themidiroom

I will continue to use Sonar for all my midi production and track into Pro Tools from there. The fact that both programs sync well with midi time code makes this work quite well.

I hope I am not hijaking the thread, but I was excited to learn that you have had success using both software packages. I am a Sonar user but I am collaborating with a pro tools user. The plan was for us to be able to record tracks in either program, dump them as individual .wav files to portable storage, and swap between the two for collaboration. Do you have any "gotchas" or advice for someone in my shoes?

Thanks "themidiroom".

]d

ORIGINAL: StormAngel

ORIGINAL: sethbrand_12

I have a simple question. I currently use pro tools mpowered and am thinking of switching to sonar. Not b/c i don't like pro tools, i love it, but because of my computer and my needs, i think for the money and price range sonar may be better. My question is simply this:

Is sonar 6 producer edition($499) better than pro tools m-powered 7($249)? Any opinions or comparisons would be great?

Thanks,
Seth

Just be sure that whatever you decide, understand that "if" you should choose to go with Sonar, you will need to buy a new audio converter becuase I'm pretty sure it remains that Pro Tools does not support Cakewalk software or interface with it.

I'm not going into all the details because you can find plenty of threads around here on Sonar vs Pro Tools - the bottom line is the hardware. Pro Tools is hardware driven and Cakewalk is software driven. Good luck!

Actually SONAR should work just fine with the M-Audio interfaces (i.e. those used in M-powered).

I'm not going into all the details because you can find plenty of threads around here on Sonar vs Pro Tools - the bottom line is the hardware. Pro Tools is hardware driven and Cakewalk is software driven. Good luck!

A full blown Pro Tools HD system is hardware driven - and also very expensive. Pro Tools in a Box (or MBox) is software, or software with sponsorship, like the new Sonar / Edirol deal.

Brian

ORIGINAL: djjd5000

ORIGINAL: themidiroom

I will continue to use Sonar for all my midi production and track into Pro Tools from there. The fact that both programs sync well with midi time code makes this work quite well.

I hope I am not hijaking the thread, but I was excited to learn that you have had success using both software packages. I am a Sonar user but I am collaborating with a pro tools user. The plan was for us to be able to record tracks in either program, dump them as individual .wav files to portable storage, and swap between the two for collaboration. Do you have any "gotchas" or advice for someone in my shoes?

Thanks "themidiroom".

]d

I'm not "themidiroom", but until recently (I am now using PT LE also) I had done this all of the time with the bigger commercial studios in the States and studios in Jamaica that use PT. I would always export my Sonar audio tracks and had them imported into PT. I would usually transfer the tracks on CD/DVD just for the sake of time because of MAc/PC compatiblities. You can use any portable solution just as long as the Mac/PC can read whichever OSes formatted drive.

I do agree with themidiroom in saying the MIDI functions in PT LE 7.1 is still horrible compared to Sonar. Maybe I have to deprogram myself because I have been using Sonar for so long....but the main problem with PT LE for windows is it doesn't seem to follow some of the common functions of most windows apps (but that could be just me)...and I haven't used a mac full time in years.

- KB

Edit: I actually had to correct myself regarding the windows function statements.

Hey Guys!

Thanks for all of the awesome information. I did not mean to start a debate or war...I have seen questions like this as well and they are everywhere...but when i posted my original reply i was in a hurry and forgot to explain everything i probably should have. Right now, i just have a home recording pro tools mpowered set up. I do record full bands and mix for them. I also use midi, but not nearly as much as just recording audio. I want to be able to record full bands, edit, mix, etc. With pro tools, i can do all this just fine, but it doesn't run too smooth on my computer and also i don't like the hardware limitations with pro tools. I was thinking of buying sonar 6 producer edition and then maybe the tascam 1884 to run everything, and use it as a control surface? I mainly wanted to get you guys opinion on what is better for recording, mixing, and editing full bands, solo artists, etc. In other words, if i have a session next week recording a 4 piece rock band, what software would be better to have available too me? I know pro tools hd is obviously world class and ideal, but that is too pricey for me right now. Im comparing pro tools mpowered with sonar 6 producer edition? Can I edit in sonar just as good or better as in pro tools. I also noticed that sonar 6 now has audio snap, which is wonderful and better the pt mpowered beat detective le?
seth

ORIGINAL: xackley

I believe from what I have read, that the PT LE that comes with that box does not support PDC. So if you plan to use any plugins that have latency, be ready to figure out how to compensate for it.

There was a big debate whether that was true or not that at the DUC...some might say, "that dem der are fighting words...."




- KB

ORIGINAL: djjd5000

Thanks much! Could you please expand a bit regarding this quote: "you may need to enforce PC compatibility if Pro Tools is running on a Mac." His version of protools in indeed running on a Mac... What do you mean by enforce PC compatbility?

That is an option you can choose when you create a new Pro Tools session. I'm thinking you may not have to choose this option, but definately make sure you choose wav files as the audio file type instead of aiff. This option is mostly so a session created on a Mac will open on a PC. Like I said, it may not affect the wav files themselves. I would check it anyway to be safe.

One more question: you said "Make sure all the wav files start at the beginning of the song and consolidate any clips/regions so you have one solid block of audio and you can be sure all the tracks line up." How would I go about doing that? If I have a track of audio that is composed of a variety of loops or clips, are you saying I need to do something special before I save that track as a .wav file?

]d

Here's what I do in Sonar: Let's say you have some loops and edited sections in a track and the clips don't start at the beginning of the song. You should use an editing tool (not sure of the name) and drag the beginning of the first clip so that it starts at the 00:00:00. then select everything in that track and do a Bounce to clip. That will make everything on that track on contiguous audio file.
In Pro Tools, it works the same way but the command is Consolidate audio. both of these commands re-write to the wave file so you might want to jot down the file name after you do this so that you know which wav files to copy. I generally go into my audio folder and sort by date then I know the edited wavs are the most current.

I hope this helps. I almost confused myself while writing it
-Marc

ORIGINAL: themidiroom


[Here's what I do in Sonar: Let's say you have some loops and edited sections in a track and the clips don't start at the beginning of the song. You should use an editing tool (not sure of the name) and drag the beginning of the first clip so that it starts at the 00:00:00. then select everything in that track and do a Bounce to clip. That will make everything on that track on contiguous audio file.

Actuially, to save yourself the time, simply export all of your indiviual tracks as Broadcast Waves. They automatically bounce down and align starting at 00:00:00. When you import the tracks in PT, they are all aligned properly into a new session.

- KB

Thanks much! Could you please expand a bit regarding this quote: "you may need to enforce PC compatibility if Pro Tools is running on a Mac." His version of protools in indeed running on a Mac... What do you mean by enforce PC compatbility?

]d

I forget exactly where the break is, but with PT LE 7 and on, there is no option to "Enforce Mac/PC Compatibility." It just works. With older versions (I want to say anything older than 6.9?) you will need to make sure this is checked when you first create your Pro Tools file.

Peace,