Totally "underwhelmed" by MIDI in both Reaper and Mixcraft!

i really love doing midi in Sonar.. so simple

Thanks - I'll have a look, but I feel the Elements will not be enough, and the Cubase is way WAY over my budget.

THambrecht
If MIDI is important to you, you may take a look at Steinberg CUBASE.
The small version (Elements) for 99.- Euro has pretty much functions. Very similar to SONAR.

Agreed.  I've used a ton of DAW's and for Windows platform Cubase is the only one in the same realm as Sonar, as both program's heritage comes from being software sequencers.  That maturity in it's product is clear.  Midi in everything else (including Pro Tools) is just a slapped on bandage that problems frequently appear.

I decide to stick with Sonar in the end, but I noticed in Reaper you can actually type in your own Midi Clock PPQN. The default is 960 per quarter note, but in the settings you can type any value you want. 

Not sure about Mixcraft, but with Reaper... All set of existing modern VST MIDI processors should work and there is endless possibilities to create own when required.
I mean Sonar had CAL and MFX. Both so to say far from perfect at the framework level (may be that was ok 20 years ago) and long time not advanced.
For MIDI routing, I do not think there is something in Sonar which work better then in Reaper. Not forget about nasty clashing with Surfaces and Remote Control functionality in Sonar.
I can not say much about the editor yet. I have not found some "super features" recently added into Sonar and I have not managed to change note colors, but basic editing works and staff view (rather convenient to switch into) looks reasonable.
 
What exactly is "underwhelming"?
 
PS. In Reaper, almost everything is not intuitive at first. But even in default layout, once you learn where/what/how, it is possible to understand what is there, why it is there and how to operate it. It is logical. May be not with the logic particular person except, but logical. And finally, there is quite some flexibility in modifying things (instead of the claims "we have (re)defined it the way we think is better and you should adopt to that...").

Skyline_UK
The sad thing is that nothing compares to Sonar's sheer elegance.
 

Sigh, I wish Merging would take Sonar's MIDI editing side and add it to Pyramix. I really like Sonar's MIDI. 
 

Cubase excels with the most robust midi features of any of the daws I've used. It's not Sonar, doesn't work the same but since you already know midi  basics it shouldn't be that difficult to learn.

Starise
Is Cubase the only other deep midi daw out there? 
 
Were Sonar and Cubase the only two?

I would add Logic, but that is now Mac only.  It also started out as a MIDI sequencer, so it has heritage as well...