Yeah...more power to them.  Except the ones that get big headed and become rock star rappers after a 3 week honeymoon of having their friends ooh...and aah...over Sony Music created loops.

I'm not knocking the program or even the end result.  It's the "want it now" mentality that seems to surface.

Beepster
Having somewhat limited experience with other DAWs (and the previous one I used extensively was very old) I gotta ask the more seasoned/well rounded folks...
 
Am I mistaken in the impression that Sonar X series is a completely different animal compared to some of the other major players? Based on my limited experience and many video tuts that employed these other platforms they all seem to share some very similar themes and procedures.
 
I'm just wondering because I know when I first started with Sonar it seemed like everything was kind of strange and confusing until I learned my way around things. Personally I think once those growing pains are done with it's actually more intuitive, especially with X3, but I feel perhaps that is what trips a lot of newcomers up. I mean we even see a ton of pre X series users flipping out about how radically different things are until they figure things out and start singing it's praises.
 
I may have had a bit of an advantage in the sense that I was, for all real intents and purposes, a n00b so I wasn't breaking years or decades long habits when I made the switch. I think I would freak out much worse than an old timer engineer trying Sonar the first time if I was trying to do stuff on one of the more "traditional" DAWs. A perfect example is how busses are handle in some of those other programs. That crap just looks annoying as all heck.
 
Also Sonar users seem to have a MAJOR advantage as far as free learning resources. The company really does seem to provide what you'd have to spend thousands on college courses to learn about the other programs... and then there is this forum which is the fastest moving of all the company provided discussion boards.
 
Meh... just some thoughts and queries from a "n00b". I've only been at it two years and those two years have been filled with MASSIVE distractions which kept interrupting my studies but I really have no problems accomplishing anything with Sonar now. If I stumble I just do a google search. If that fails I annoy you guys. It always gets done though.

I really hope this doesn't sound like an old guy talking to the kid kinda post. BUT.  When I started out digital audio was new at least to most people. MIDI was out but it hadn't been around all that long a time either. Both seemed very difficult to understand. It took me awhile to get handle on just what they were.  The term DAW was for  dedicated hardware that could record and to some degree edit digital audio.  There were a handful of computer based programs that worked with audio. Some only worked with MIDI. What was best to use was mainly a question of what one could afford not which was easier to use. Pro Audio when it came out was $1200.  BTW Cakewalk the program was not all that user friendly and was MIDI only. It was the first DOS sequencer. 
 
All that as background sets the notion that it wasn't so much what was easier to use but rather what did the job. When CW brought MIDI and audio together they did their best to make the two work well together with the introduction of Pro Audio. Think about this for a moment Pro Audio and Sonar had the same key board shortcuts. When X1 appeared the way CW had developed Sonar changed for the second time but this everthing changed.The iconic button system of Pro Audio and Sonar and its keyboard shortcuts all were replaced with a totally new menu system. 
 
Its no wonder that many had a huge problem making the transition from Sonar to X1.  But the really important thing was that the fundamentals had not. MIDI was still MIDI and audio was still audio. Once you know what they are and how you go about accessing and editing them it becomes simple to adopt to a new way of doing things.
 
A new user coming to X3 for the first time without any MIDI or audio background is going to feel "overwhelmed". I think Craig got it right in his opening post making it clear that starting from scratch is tough but it is doable.
 
I recall you posting delightful chronicles on your experiences with learning X1. You knew what you wanted the software to do and why. You started with an idea about what could be done it was just a matter of figuring how it is done in X1. That is learning the language of the parts of the program and executing a workflow.        
 
 

As always Craig great post! you offer great insight.
I started recording with a Tascam cassette 4 track, ping ponging tracks and building up my recordings, then progressed to Guitar Tracks 2 on an old 486 with a whole 128 bytes of Ram and 40 meg of hard drive, another great Cakewalk product, then Sonar and the Pentium processors came out and I had to get my head around midi and a new keyboard, workstation all at the same time as a new operating system windows 95 then 98B.
Sonar has been my stable recording platform through all the computer and hardware changes until a power spike took out my both my MOTU 828 sound card interfaces and my Firewire and scsi card.
So now I use a Presonus 16.4.2 Digital mixer as my soundcard, still use firewire but now have 2 terabyte drives and 16 Gigabytes of RAM
So then came all the Versions of sonar between Sonar 1 up to Sonar X3 with each version it just kept getting better and more functional.
This home recording DAW is a complete non stop learning commitment, you owe it to yourself to put the time into learning and mastering it.
I am glad I stuck with cakewalk recording programs as I found them the easiest to get my limited brain power around.
Sonar X3 is packed with features beyond my wildest imaginations.
So far the Modern DAW and Sonar X3 WHEW... what a ride!!!
 
 

John
You forgot to mention MIDI! Outstanding post Craig. 
 
 
Also I would add of all the DAWs out there I believe Sonar to be the easiest to figure out. In Cubase you don't record to a track you have to setup inputs and record to them.  Logic as I recall was all about the "environment". It was everything.  Don't understand that and you will be lost. Reaper is one big gigantic menu.
 
Sonar acts like a Windows program and is simple in how it has things organized.
 
 
 
 

Studio One is pretty easy to use...easier than Sonar I find...although some may say it's more a toy than a pro DAW. Not sure why you turned the opening post into a passive aggressive DAW showdown though. The theme of the opening post is about how daunting it is to have so much at your fingertips. In a breath, you've gone and embroiled Cubase, Logic and Reaper in a potential dick measuring competition when all you had to do was say...haha...yeah...it's a jungle out there in DAWland.

Oh and when I was talking about things being weird and foreign for me at first it was mostly the context menus and clip hotspots really. It was just a little hard to get used to as opposed to almost everything being in the global menus at the top or just simply non existent. There has even been a new learning curve with X3 in regards to clip hotspots but as I said... once it's understood it all make more sense. Even if I forget where something is I just poke around where it MIGHT be and usually it's there.

furry muff, but i do think "walk before you run" is a good idea, and i mean sonar has so many functions that there's no way everyone uses all of them, so finding pout what you want/need before spending bucks just seems like common sense

montezuma

John
You forgot to mention MIDI! Outstanding post Craig. 
 
 
Also I would add of all the DAWs out there I believe Sonar to be the easiest to figure out. In Cubase you don't record to a track you have to setup inputs and record to them.  Logic as I recall was all about the "environment". It was everything.  Don't understand that and you will be lost. Reaper is one big gigantic menu.
 
Sonar acts like a Windows program and is simple in how it has things organized.
 
 
 
 

Studio One is pretty easy to use...easier than Sonar I find...although some may say it's more a toy than a pro DAW. Not sure why you turned the opening post into a passive aggressive DAW showdown though. The theme of the opening post is about how daunting it is to have so much at your fingertips. In a breath, you've gone and embroiled Cubase, Logic and Reaper in a potential dick measuring competition when all you had to do was say...haha...yeah...it's a jungle out there in DAWland.

Studio One wasn't around when I was learning Logic on the PC. I don't put Studio One in the same league as the above DAWs. Working with Cubase was also difficult for me. Sonar was not. That was my only point. 
 
And no it is not a jungle out there. I know what I wanted to say and I did. Too bad you found fault. I don't need someone to rewrite my posts. 

dubdisciple

mixmkr
Yeah...more power to them.  Except the ones that get big headed and become rock star rappers after a 3 week honeymoon of having their friends ooh...and aah...over Sony Music created loops.

I'm not knocking the program or even the end result.  It's the "want it now" mentality that seems to surface.

Honestly, this stereotype is beyond dated. Modern popular rap stopped being loop based long ago. You would be very hard pressed to find a rapper who is a star now based on sony loops. In fact their whole catalog seems aimed at people who dont actually listen to rap or have not listened to it in the last 15 years. Even the few rap producers I have encountered who use Acid use it for its ease of use in chopping their own samples. I just peeped at billboards rap chart and it is absolutely dominated by synth and 808 heavy production.

I'm thinking you're just getting defensive about rap music.  Actually my comment was describing the 14 yr old that after 3 weeks of making beatz, decided on HIS OWN, that he was a star.  Whether it's *current* or not is besides the point.  I'd be pretty surprised to find a musically and financially successful rapper, using stock loops from the Sony library....especially unaltered.  However, that IS exactly what I see in my neck of the woods, with the younger crowd nowadays....and kinda was my point.  The "fact" that they don't go thru the learning curve that Craig so described in a grand way, isn't a short cut to becoming better in this field.  In fact, I tend to think they're really missing out and are just doing the music to impress others...  which is better left to shred guitar players :-D

Anderton
...here's a little story.
 
It’s the early 90s, and you’re about to do your first album. Amazingly, you’re given a price of a mere $4,000 to record an album from start to finish—with unlimited studio time!—in a world-class recording facility. You can’t believe your good fortune.
 
You walk into the studio, and see two 48-track Sony DASH machine synched together for a whopping 96 tracks, feeding into a giant console with more channels than you can count. What’s more, there’s per-channel automation with moving faders and behind the console is a wall of rack mount gear with dozens of sophisticated signal processors. Even better, there are several guitar amps, cabinets, stomp boxes, and over 20 synthesizers and other keyboards sitting around to help flesh out your tracks further.
 
Of course, you’re thrilled...until the person who let you in says “Well, gotta go. Good luck!” And there you are, all by yourself, with a mountain of equipment you’ve never seen before. You’re not even sure where the on-off switch is.
 
Panic sets in. How can you possibly record, let alone be productive or inspired, under those circumstances?
 
Well, you can’t. But the studio scenario I’ve just described is almost exactly what you get with a Windows computer and Sonar X3. Panic sets in. How can you possibly record, let alone be productive, under those circumstances?
 
Well, you can’t, any more than you can walk into a music store, buy a guitar, and expect to play like Jimi Hendrix by next Tuesday. So it’s no wonder many people are flying blind. How any times have you seen threads like “This software sucks! It doesn’t record!”—until the person realized you need to record-enable a track first. What’s more, today’s musicians have to struggle with operating systems, latency, sample buffers, and more. How are you going to become an instant expert on something like how to apply EQ?
 
People used to accumulate knowledge over time. I see people with hundreds of plug-ins who haven’t mastered any of them. So learn one dynamics processor, one multiband EQ, and one reverb—you’re covered for 90% of your signal processing needs. Learn a program’s basics, like input and outputs. Eventually, you’ll figure out automation.
 
You don’t learn how to play an instrument in a day, a week, or even a year. So cut yourself some slack, and expect to take some time to learn how to “play” a virtual studio, too. It's not Sonar's fault, and it's not your fault. You're not trying to learn a program; you're trying to learn the equivalent of what used to be a multi-million dollar recording studio.

Epic Post ….you bring up some very good points and the tone of it overall seems to have a lot of encouragement 
 
as a guitarist / musician  who has spent a great deal of time ( in the past ) in some very well know recording studios in NYC and LA as a hired guitarist , I would like to bring up a couple of points that I hope aren't OT….
 
Just about every studio I ever set foot in had a full team of people that worked there 
ex.. ,    the studio  owner , buisness associates ( partners , producers  ) dedicated engineers and equipment maintenance personal ,  techs in training , gofhers , reception , ect ect ….
all of those people brought accumulated knowledge and experience to the table to help keep the studio running smoothly …
my point .. a lot happens behind the scenes even in the metaphoric studio you described and those are the hats we all have to wear as independents 
 
a little OT for a second , 
the biggest limiting factor that I keep having to deal with is not the learning curve itself when learning how to use the software tools I have already ….
I know what it's like to hang a do not disturb shingle on the woodshed …. 
I did that with the guitar many times over the years and still do 
The thing that causes me the most frustration with using a DAW for music production is something I hope to change in the near future ...I live in an apt with thin walls,  
I'm surrounded on all ends ..left , right , above , below…in front , in back …….it sucks …. 
this impacts every aspect of my music production …all my mic's , amp's ..are rendered useless ... 
my whole selection of acoustic instruments …unusable at home …same goes for trying to mix ….
I never know what it really sounds like because I have to mix at mouse whisper levels ...
 
Oh Yeah I sure want to book a ticket to that studio you mentioned …. the thought of doing music in a treated room / studio sounds like heaven to me .
 
 
Kenny
 
 
 

John

montezuma

John
You forgot to mention MIDI! Outstanding post Craig. 
 
 
Also I would add of all the DAWs out there I believe Sonar to be the easiest to figure out. In Cubase you don't record to a track you have to setup inputs and record to them.  Logic as I recall was all about the "environment". It was everything.  Don't understand that and you will be lost. Reaper is one big gigantic menu.
 
Sonar acts like a Windows program and is simple in how it has things organized.
 
 
 
 

Studio One is pretty easy to use...easier than Sonar I find...although some may say it's more a toy than a pro DAW. Not sure why you turned the opening post into a passive aggressive DAW showdown though. The theme of the opening post is about how daunting it is to have so much at your fingertips. In a breath, you've gone and embroiled Cubase, Logic and Reaper in a potential dick measuring competition when all you had to do was say...haha...yeah...it's a jungle out there in DAWland.

Studio One wasn't around when I was learning Logic on the PC. I don't put Studio One in the same league as the above DAWs. Working with Cubase was also difficult for me. Sonar was not. That was my only point. 
 
And no it is not a jungle out there. I know what I wanted to say and I did. Too bad you found fault. I don't need someone to rewrite my posts. 

With all due respect...John...I think you do

Let's not get into all that - it detracts from the wonderful post and has nothing to do with it.  :)
 
Bob Bone

olemon
But, I got help here, and from S. Garrigus' Power Books

Thanks for reading my books, Scott! Glad they were able to help you utilize SONAR.
 
Scott

--
Scott R. Garrigus - http://garrigus.com - SONAR X3 Power! - http://garrigus.com/?SonarX3Power
* Author of the Cakewalk Sonar and Sony Sound Forge Power book series: http://garrigus.com/?PowerBooks
* Author of the Cakewalk Sonar ProAudioTutor video tutorial series: http://garrigus.com/?ProAudioTutor
* Publisher of the DigiFreq free music technology newsletter: http://digifreq.com/?DigiFreq
* Publisher of the NewTechReview free consumer technology newsletter: http://newtechreview.com/?NewTechReview