So, are Take Lanes REALLY that useful?

I am sure if you looked at the longer threads about take lanes you will find users that find them useful for just what take lanes are intended for, takes. That is not to say that take lanes are in their final form. There are quite a few enhancements and fixes for that claim.

It might be a better solution to address the issues with take lanes rather than adding back layers, which also had it's faults. It is hard to imagine that they would reintroduce layers, add the logic to control whether a project uses layers or lanes (or would this happen at the track level) and add methods to convert lanes to layers. Even with all of that added, CW would still need to address issues lanes and possibly sign up to fix layers too. Time will tell which way CW goes.

Thanks guys. So essentially Take Lanes simply put subsequent takes automatically on to a new track or "lane"? Isn't this already possible using the existing CW methodology? 
I mean what is the real advantage to learning to use them? Especially when it seems the tool is so flaky.

Okay thanks - I might try and see if I can get some time to try them out.
 
Cheers

Take lanes are for comping, meaning creating a composite from multiple takes. For instance a singer might try 4 takes of a vocal track. Then you would select the best parts from the 4 takes to create the composite. Take lanes and the tools they provide should make this an extremely easy process. If using take lanes is not easier than using 4 different tracks for comping there is something wrong with take lanes.

Karl explains a comping method here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=teGGxrYGvO8 that gives some rationale to using lanes instead of tracks

I find them very useful for what I do - I definitely like them better than the old layers.  However, there could be some modifications; but, right now I work within the parameters...

WDI
Take lanes are for comping, meaning creating a composite from multiple takes. For instance a singer might try 4 takes of a vocal track. Then you would select the best parts from the 4 takes to create the composite. Take lanes and the tools they provide should make this an extremely easy process. If using take lanes is not easier than using 4 different tracks for comping there is something wrong with take lanes.

What's odd about the most common need for Lanes is the one thing they simply don't do well, which is comping. Recording onto new Lanes for multiple takes is easy and works fairly well. However, the actual act of comping reveals more problems than I've ever had with Sonar. It failed horribly for me in this respect. Lots of doing things 2-3 times to get it right, simply because of weirdness.

They are extremely, extremely useful and a dream come true. They feed into the holy grail of a "zero commitment, total retention, total choice" workflow -- keep everything, be forced to use nothing, and choose anything.  

Recording with Take Lanes on a single vocal or guitar line, for example is a dream; no arguments there. It's after that is done and you need to start "comping" the takes into one.
 
Try building a new single Take Lane from a collection of others by dragging little bits from other Take Lanes, such as a Vocal comp. If you're not doing that, to try and widdle down the number of Lanes you have, you may not see an issue. However, Take Lanes can eat up a LOT of real-estate if you have more than 20 Lanes. Cut and Paste parts of a Lane to another Lane and see what happens.
 
Everyone's needs are different, which is great that at least 80% of their needs can all be met in one way or another. However, no matter how many people have an error-free experience, I can say that I've routinely had issues with Take Lanes, and for me, they're useful, but not very. Again, the idea is awesome! But when it breaks, you're less likely to continue using broken code.

I don't use X2 mainly because I dislike working with take lanes.  I'm super fast with layers.  Organizing take lanes is a mess from my experience and folding them to see muted clips rather than what is actively playing drives me away from X2.
 
I haven't seen a video guide posted on how to edit, say, 12 tracks of drum mics with 3 different takes crossfading slip edits and whatnot.  All videos I've seen simply cut to a grid and mute.  Show me how to slip-edit using lanes.  Music isn't always gridded, so slip-editing and doing the edits a few times is often necessary.

tayzonday
Fooman . . . you mix down 12 tracks of drum mics (to be clear, you mean *tracks,* not lanes or takes or layers) . . .  I'm assuming this is because you mic drums with 12 mics, record simultaneously and do 3 takes each? 
 
I'll also assume you want to be able to quickly "audition" whether right room mic, left room, center room, kick, etc. "sounds" best in a mix as it plays . . . 
 
Take lanes are the best way I can imagine to do this on each individual track. You just select all and "K" to mute, use "S" to slice all take lanes into clips by the beat, measure, or whatever unit you want to audition in the song . . . loop that measure if desired and then use "k" to unmute whatever clip(s) you wish to commit to.
 
If you want automatic cross-fading when sizing clips, it's easy to keep takes in the same lane by just hitting "record" on that lane. I see zero loss over X1's arrangement and numerous gains. You can make take lanes work like layers did prior, you just have more control. 

12 tracks, yes as in 12 mics. 3 takes of a song (just as an example of how my sessions usually go).
 
I just found that editing using lanes was slower for me.  I'd love to see a video of someone editing live drums without using a grid with crossfades and whatnot.  I truly don't see a gain on lanes over layers.
 
With layers I blew up a track to 1/2 my monitor height, and edited using that one track as a guide with the rest of the clips all grouped together on the other 11 mics/tracks.  With take lanes it's not as easy to resize things.  Sure you can do it, but it takes longer from what I remember.  That seems to be the story with a lot of lanes vs layers comparisons.  You can do it, and maybe a bit more, but it takes longer to get there and requires more effort.  Once again, just my experience.
 
When you fold the parent track, you often see mostly the muted clips no matter the order they appear below the parent track.  When you are using visual cues with folded tracks it's not a small issue.  I tried to tackle this issue for a good amount of time before I gave up.  I even asked on here a few times.
 
I'm not arguing that you are wrong or I'm right, I'm just relaying my experience to the OP.  Maybe there is a video I have to purchase to show me how to use the software correctly... ;)

Surely the best advantage of having all your takes in lots of lanes within the one track is when you have that track bussed out to various effects.
 
If you're doing lots of takes that are running through reverbs and filters or whatever then you're going to lose all that if you tell cakewalk to record to a new separate track for each take.
 
Steve

I would find them more useful if they didn't change the start times of the clip when loop recording. If I record 5 takes, each of them will start at different times and will have to be manually edited so they all line up. I got tired of doing that real fast. So That's not a feature I find useful at all.

Beepster
What I would like to see is a way to select which lanes you want to work with and then have those appear in the parent track for more traditional editing. The others are omitted. That way I can still audition the various takes but comping, crossfades, etc are done in one lane without extra clutter. Or even better have kind of a sandbox lane(or lanes) to do this in and then when you are happy with it you can apply it to the parent track. That way all the original takes remain exactly as recorded (unless you you edit them directly in their specific take lane) for easy access should want to start over. Man that would be awesome.

Novel idea, there. In other words, to be able to maybe hide Lanes like you can Tracks.
 
And to steve_c's credit, I do get use out of Take Lanes, like many others, even though I was happy with Layers. I just curse a lot during editing/comping when Lanes fight with me, like misbehaving magnets, or clips disappear in odd places.