Upgrade from X1

X3 already - ! I still have X1, since I could not manage to upgrade my computer yet to install X2 - so now money wise do I get penalized as far as upgrading to X3 - assuming I invest in a new computer soon. ??? 

Depends on your computer specs. Check out the system requirements on the SONAR page.
http://www.cakewalk.com/products/SONAR/X3-Producer/
 
Scott

--
Scott R. Garrigus - http://garrigus.com - SONAR X2 Power! - http://garrigus.com/?SonarX2Power
* 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
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To get X1 on a new machine, install it and apply the updates. Projects can be copied by whatever means is at your disposal; could be across a local network connection, external drive or a flash drive. Some use their external backup to restore the project directories.

Sure, it is no different then when you built out your old machine, just in a more compressed time frame. Plug-ins depend on the vendor as to how many times they can be installed and on how many machines. I keep all plug-in installers and zips (or however they come) so that when I need to build out a new machine, I reinstall the plug-ins just like the DAW software. Some plug-ins may be simple copies, some may make registry entries and folders for presets.... That is why I prefer to install them. The tricky bit is migrating presets. Sometimes they are files which can be copied. Sometime they are in the registry. To get presets out of the registry, in the case of Cakewalk plug-ins for example, there is an export/import process in the plug-in manager. How presets are handled is up to the plug-in vendor.
 
The other bit of work is hunting down any customization you may have performed on the DAW itself. Things like project and track templates, drum maps, etc. I usually grab all those directories and copy them to a safe place on the new machine and integrate the pieces as I need them.
 
Unless you are going to lose access to the old machine. You can always go back and pick up the odd file that you missed during the migration.