i like heather

  For what is it worth, I am both an old and new customer (Pro Audio 9 to Sonar 7, with some skips) and this deal is making me consider a return to Sonar. Best, urock

I was pretty peeved to start with, over it now. Looking at the bigger picture, the more new customers cakewalk have from offers and deals, the more money that hopefully goes into development, thus making X1 better for us all, really need to update V-vocal though!!!!!

Thats my thoughts anyway.

and i got a better deal on my nanopod than my daughter did on the ipod she bought 3 years ago. I'm with heather.  i will simply agree ot disagree and leave you to your sense of entitlement

I'm new to MPC type stuff so I don't have anything to compare my padKontrol to but it does seem to drop hits when I start tapping super fast. Also the velocity sensitivity is WHACK. I can hit the same pad with the same force and the velocities vary WILDLY for no apparent reason. It's a little disappointing but I just set it to fixed velocity to avoid this. For now I'll play my parts that way and mess around with velocity after the fact within the step sequencer or piano roll. It makes me wonder how much better the good Akais or Native Instruments pad controllers are for sensitivity. But that stuff is EXPENSIVE and I think I'd be better off sinking that dough into starting a V-Drum kit. I got the pK for under $200 bucks (and the retailer tossed in a footswitch and some other goodies) so it was still a pretty awesome deal. I could see the XY pad being useful for controlling parameters. It's next to useless for rolls and flams on the fly though which is what they tout as the main stand out feature of the unit. They pads do seem to trigger pretty evenly no matter where on the pad you hit them so that's good. The Nano series has many complaints about pads failing or not triggering evenly like they are supposed to... but really what can you expect for $60?

Now that we know officially from Andrew that the Production Suite is their top of the line package for Sonar X1 - what is going to happen for us who bought into Expanded and then the modules separately?

 
The suite is a combination of bits for selling purposes; CW's most expensive "product."
 
But, Sonar Expanded is the top Sonar program, at this time. Hence 4 levels of the Sonar series. Not including the home studio thang, and LE,... 
 
I figger some of the modules will be included in X1-2. 
 
Owning Zeta is not a requirement for anything. Yet.

This whole Pro Channel upgrade path has left a bad taste in some people's mouth. Whether it's intentional or not, it does appear they are milking every last penny out of it by forcing users to upgrade to get certain basic features and expandability. Now this offer to give that away for free to some people really twists the knife so to speak. Business or not, it just comes off as a kick in the gut.

Am I missing something? The production suite isn't a "product" as such is it? I thought it was just X1 expanded, a couple of PC modules, and Z3ta+ 2 sold as a bundle.

I've already got that, just seperately. For any X1 expanded owner the upgrade path is buy z3ta+ 2 which is available at a discount to any X1 Producer user. 

even though I will not be eligible to receive an upgrade path in the future to newer versions of Sonar because I only have Expanded and the modules

 
That is flatly false.  Skylightron was wrong.  It doesn't even make sense.  The "Production Suite" is a special package deal, that's it.  Registered users of Sonar X1 Expanded will have the same "upgrade path" whether they picked up the Production Suite or not.  It's a level playing field, as far as product upgrades are concerned.  Either you're a registered owner of a program or you're not.  The "Production Suite" is not a program. 
 
This whole thing is ridiculous.  I've never seen such sour grapes in my life.... 
 

 
Let's all put on our grown-up britches and get back to making some music.
 
PS: I bought the Production Suite with the 30% off special a while back.  You know, the one available to ALL us loyal customers.  So, uh...yeah.  What was this about, again?

The original upgrade price of 99 was less than what I paid for years, 179-189, plus shipping.

Adding expanded brought it to 159.

Accounting for inflation over the past 12 years means x1 costs about nothing in real dollars.

I want them to double the price, hire some professional writers to document the program's features, and provide some script advice for the videos.

And to have more dollars to fix bugs quicker.

Given that x1 is so cheap I think I will buy another licence for my grandchildren's home computers.

FastBikerBoy: "Am I missing something? The production suite isn't a "product" as such is it? I thought it was just X1 expanded, a couple of PC modules, and Z3ta+ 2 sold as a bundle. I've already got that, just seperately. For any X1 expanded owner the upgrade path is buy z3ta+ 2 which is available at a discount to any X1 Producer user." That's what makes this whole Production Suite thing so weird to me. It's really nothing ... I've never broke it down to see what it cost to buy everything separately as apposed to in the Prod Suite, but I imagine it's cheaper, but not as cheap as buying them separately when there's specials running. I don't get how some people can't grasp the fact that others feel cheated that they had to pay for something that the company later turns around and offers for free. It's not like all this stuff is old and nobody wants it anymore, this is all current product. Anyhoo ... not a big deal. It's all just really weird what's going on Cakewalk right now.

@FBB... and this stuff is CHEAP! Ridiculously cheap! That's what gets me about this thread. $500 for the big box, the whole shabang, enchiladas EVERYWHERE. No specials, no deals, no nothing. $500 and you get everything you need (pretty much) to produce music. To me that is a stellar deal. Anyway... I think I should try to actually buy a cheap keyboard controller to do basic input next month instead of waiting. Preferably something under a hundred bucks. What say you, Cake forum?

" I don't get how some people can't grasp the fact that others feel cheated that they had to pay for something that the company later turns around and offers for free."

I thuink we have all expressed that we do understand what it feels like to buy something and see it offered later chaper or for free.  We all go through it.  Anyone who has a cellphine or cable goes through it.  What we don't grasp is why they aremaking it seem like this is not the norm in most businesses and why they expect something from Cakewalk that is actually far outside the norm. We also are pointing out that Cakealk is actually ahead of the curve in that they do offer something to existing customers.  Many companies do not.  I'm not trying to claim Cakewalk is perfect, but I think people who have complaints that are more Cakewalk specific have a lot more to **** about then people blaming Cakewalk for what is pretty mjuch par for the course in business.

The only thing that got to me a bit was...I bought Sonar X1 producer on May 3rd (for $349.99) and Expanded on May 4th ($49). On May 8th Expanded went on sale for $19 and now the production suite is free. I don't blame anyone for this, It was just bad timing on my part. I really don't feel like I'm missing anything. I need more knowledge and skill. Does that come in a bundle?

@clintmartin that will be in in Sonar Producer extended Expanded Ultra Deluxe Deity Edition Plus Bundle and will come with a free Starbucks card