brconflict
However, if you look at the alternative $24.99 price/mo. for a full year (perpetual license) vs. $24.99 comparison for PT indefinitely (non-perpetual license (subscription only)), the deal looks a bit better.

For a small project studio to just rent PT 2-3 months and do that project - no strings attached - it's an alternative.
Not for all year usage, I think.
 
Maybe campaigns is way to go, I don't know. Just keeping back to my own thinking why I never went for Producer back in the day - the annual penalty in price of updates. That a lower threshold would encourage an upgrade.
 
Artist=$49 annually.
Pro=$75 annually.
Plat=$99 annually.
 
seems more like lowering threshold to go for it and be in the same realm as competition.
 
$245 for Platinum, and maybe campaigns at $149 or $129 is still high.
It's not that much happening in a year.
If you are already set in plugins and instruments - what is there?
 

Platinum is also limited only by your hardware. PT is limited by hardware and license. Sonar Platinum certainly is more feature-rich than PT. You can't mix Surround in standard PT, and limited to 64 tracks at 96Khz, for example.

Avid policy to strip down versions to sell hardware - and then keep adding penalty to those that did - is no better.
And userbase had their say - share went from $18 to $8 until management  corrected some in policy. Now share is about $5 still.
 
But nobody can deny that PT is kind of reference for serious studios. But probably changing as I write and loosing territory all the time.
 
Plenty good thinking in Sonar to compete too. And Cakewalk is maybe together with Cockos Reaper team the most dedicated to improve in the business, I think.
 
But lacking what PT, Cubase, StudioOne do, and to some extent Reaper and Samplitude - VCA's would give headroom to do anything smoothly as a project grows. Reaper and Samp can't do true nested - so lack a bit.
 
I did not do notation as I tested PT, so can't say how it measures up. But Cubase is really, really good in this field.
 

Keep an eye on your email Inbox for Sonar renewal deals, and watch the forums. You might be surprised at how valuable Sonar pricing is.

I am checking out Cakewalk every spring a bit to see what happends. I ran Sonar Studio 4 and 8.5, X3 and Artist 2015(actually Cakewalk Pro 3.0 in the 80's and first windows 3 version 1.0 and 1.25) - and will probably get Sonar Pro at some point if it gets closer to Cubase Pro. If to have Sonar as backup it's good to be as close alternative as possible.
 
Notation and nested VCAs is on the top of my list of needed features. Other really nice things in Cubase is handling of relative automation ghost curves to get visuals while doing that and then can freeze into automation when you feel you are done. Works for VCAs too. Multiple marker tracks are really useful too, make one with timebase time to be used for video scenes, one with bars+beats timebase for recording postiions and one for normal playback and mixing. One marker track is active at a time. And same with multiple ruler bars and can select grid as time or bars+beats.
 
Cubase new video engine is imminent and on next maintenance update - so might be something there too to look at for competition. I ran video in Sonar but when I set markers for scenes it was off a bit the next time I opened project - so not really usable.
 
Testing Reaper 5.4 just now one simple thing struck me as excellent thinking - when changes in tempo track, you get a marker with new tempo printed right there, no need to to look at obscure tempo track and hover mouse or something. Little things like that makes a big difference the more hours a day you sit and work with mixes. And doing video I found that I do a lot more of tempochanges to fit different scenes.
 
Region in Reaper is also excellent, it taking everything including tempo track with you if moving it. Creating inserting nodes as needed.
 
Is new ripple editing in Sonar doing this?
Allow to move full section of project?
Can you lock a track, like video - and have that untouched?