Well there is actually another option

If your using ASIO drivers you can record at a very high latency using direct monitoring ie the signal of the audio that you are recording is split 1 is sent to Sonar and recorded the other goes direct to your monitoring therefore is unnafected by the latency. YOu listen to the monitor output and sonar records the other output and then offsets it by the amount that hte ASIO driver tells it.

When I am recording softsynths in a project that is alreayd mixed, ie adding somethign at a late stafe where its impossible to record at low latency I get round it by setting up a MIDI track and a Audio track, I then use a Keyboard with a soudn similar to the MIDI sound I am planning on using and use the hardware generated sound as my monitor. ONce I have the part down, I can lose the audio input and just keep the MIDI track and point that at a Softsynth.

I do the same when recording midi drums from a electronic drum kit, I take an audio feed frmo the drum brain and use that via direct monitoring as my Monitor, however i simultaneously record the midi input as well. This is so that I can either re-sample the beat using a Softsynth, or I can then use the midi track to re-trigger my drum brain to get seperatino. My brain only outputs in stereo, so what I do is split the midi track into kick snare cymbals etc and re-trigger the drum brain so i get seperate audio for each kit part, this helps when it comes to mixing the drums.

I think the OP has been using a similar technique and that is where his issue lies, either beucase he has not been doing it quite right, or becuase his asio driver isnot handling it well.

Hope that clears it up

ps
Recording audio and midi simultaneously is a good habit to get into. If you planning on using MIDI only having the audio can provide useful quantise info for audio snapping purposes, and if your only planning on using the audio input, having a midi track recorded can be useful at mix if you decide you want to layer in a trigged kick sample underneath the recorded drum for extra impact, its there waiting to be used.

just another thought.

When I first started this project, I had Sonar 4 or Sonar 6 and had a Musical Computers 3.2 hypertheading DAW. I have a seperate mixing board and headphone phone and external effects that I use during recording for monitoring only. I set it up this way so that I would never have to use input monitoring if the track count and plug in count got too high where necessary buffer adjustments hinder musical performances. I got used to working this way. I now have a nice quad core box, but still usually don't use input monitoring. For keyboards I use onboard sounds that will be similar to what I will use in the mix. I am able to send an audio signal to the mixer as well as midi or digital converted audio (depending on what I am working on) to the computer at the same time. With the mixer and outboard effects I can get effective monitoring for recording performances. ex: direct feed from the TD-12 to the mixer, hardware reverbs for vocals, Pod Pro for guitars, etc. With this method, I thought that I would always be safe with a high audio latency setting. For audio, it works fine. For midi, after tracks and plugins build up, that is where the midi recording timing is off. The fix in Sonar 7 was to lower the audio latency to just above the threshhold of clicks and pops and it would tighten up the midi recording. I can live with that. The problem is that that doesn't work for Sonar 8. Many times I do record the audio as well as the midi performances for drums and main piano recordings. It does leave more options open as well as verify the integrity of the midi recording. Noel has given me some more things to try for my next session, so we'll see how it goes.

Again thanks to Cakewalk and the community for responding. It is helping to give me a better understanding of the issue.

My sound card does have ASIO drivers and direct monitoring capability. It is an RME HDSP 9652. 24 channels in ADAT, 24 channels out ADAT. This is generally a very well respected sound card.

And we have a winner.

Drum roll please... (arh arh)

- If you have audio metronome enabled in the project turn it off and retest (switch to MIDI metronome)

I opened my test project tonight and got our drummer to play with the audio metronome on, recording audio and midi using the TD-12 drum module and midi mapping to Session Drummer 2 in Sonar 8. Playback revealed that they weren't synced up. I switched the metronome to midi (I didn't assign a sound) and recorded audio and midi, and playback revealed that they were in snyc. I repeated both of these tests again and got the same results. So apparently the audio metronome in Sonar 8 was the culprit.

Oh and thanks again to Noel for the suggestions and ultimately the solution.

Listening to the audio metronome should not be a problem while tracking a live MIDI instrument as long as you are playing back at the a very low latency. i.e if the drummer is playing to a click that is delayed then the entire part will be recorded late as compared to the project. I don't know why you couldn't slide it after the fact to fix it though. could the drummer have been trying to compensate while playing somehow?

ORIGINAL: gordonrussell76

Jboy, well good for you, heaven forbid that recording techniques should be convoluted, someone might create something interesting that way.

When you get a high track count project with 30-40 plugins on it, and then someone wants to lay down an additional softsynth part, you'll understand the practicality of what I am suggesting.

Or conversely just keep you mind closed nicely shut.

gordonrussell76, you're not really that snarky are you... or just having a bad day?