Sonar and Plug In Manager taking forever to load?

Have you tried opening a brand new project ?
 
Something is preventing the scan and Sonar from completing the necessary set up task (obviously).
Which in my opinion is probably a plug in. If you are trying to open an already established project and your waiting for ever,
Try opening Sonar in Safe mode.
 
To do this:
Safe mode is activated when you open a file while the SHIFT key is pressed.
 
https://www.cakewalk.com/Documentation?product=SONAR%20X3&language=3&help=Dialogs2.094.html
 
I would be looking for a plug in you may have installed in the last 2 months or so.
Maybe a 32 bit plug in on a 64 bit system. Or a large sample library Synth plug in that is having issues finding the samples.

It's the quantity of plugs you have. You get over 1000 and Sonar will behave this way.

Anderton
Also make sure there's not a plug-in for a splash screen hidden behind another screen. Sometimes if there's no response it will stay up seemingly forever but then time out.

THIS 
 
ALT TAB and find it hidden ... or mimimize the open screens
 
happens to me all the time with buggy plugs

Good point above. Open your Anti virus and make an exclusion for Sonars Plug in manager and any other Exe in that folder including Sonar.Exe.
 
Johnny brought up a good point earlier though, in my travels, it has been some free VST plug in that has reeked havoc.

I wouldn't scan every time either, I have mine set to manual.
Unfortunately though, the plug in manager activated each time Sonar opens even when its not loading plug ins. Trust me I went through extensive testing on this when it was introduced.
Add: Plug in manager.EXE to your exclusions in "C:\Program Files\Cakewalk\Shared Utilities".
Also note there is a difference between the Plug in manger and VstScan.EXE Which is in the same folder.

I use the default scan settings which include automatic background scan. Never had a problem using it.
It seems strange the Plug-in Manager takes so long to start up. All it is doing is reading the registry and populating the different plug-in types. There is no scan going on when starting the Plug-in Manager. This may indicate a problem with the registry. A VST reset will rebuild the the VST Inventory portion of the registry but if the problem is the with the DX entries it may be harder to repair.
 
If you believe it is related to a particular version of SONAR, roll back to a version prior to experiencing the problem. If the problem goes away it may be related to the newer release. If the problem does not go away, it is likely not related to the newer release.
 
WRT slow scanning here are some tips.
 
Make sure the scan options "Rescan Failed Plug-ins" and "Rescan Existing Plug-ins" are not checked. These are used very rarely to fix certain problems.
 
Double-check the scan path. If you are unsure about what to look for in the scan path post it here. The scan path should contain paths to VST plug-ins and not have multiple references to the same folders. For example if there is an entry in the scan path "C:\Program Files\Cakewalk\Vstplugins" there should be no folders under it in the scan path such as "C:\Program Files\Cakewalk\Vstplugins\Rapture." Having redundant paths are a problem.
 
Use Preferences > File > VST settings for scanning operations. Reserve the Plug-in Manager for handling plug-in exclusions, layout maintenance and preset import/export.