Anderton
i understand that what you want is a single button to freeze an entire mix, but remember that implementing any feature means that some other feature is not being implemented. What I don't know is whether substituting one click for ctrl-A+two clicks would be seen as such a significant benefit by the majority of the user base that it would be worth taking the time to implement, test, and debug something that essentially saves a shortcut and a click.
 
Furthermore, if you have any external inserts or use external DSP boxes (e.g., Universal Audio or Duende), you couldn't do a global freeze. So you'd have to do a real-time bounce anyway to include those tracks.
 
Another issue is that computers keep getting faster and latencies keep getting lower. A lot of people don't even feel the need to use track freeze any more; since the whole reason you want a global freeze is to overdub with the lowest possible latency, I think this feature might become irrelevant sooner rather than later anyway.

Anderton

brconflict
 
Computers do get faster, but the software gets fatter. As I mentioned earlier in this thread, if MOTU would have allowed plug-in use for their own low-latency CueMix, I wouldn't even be asking this

 
The problem is as soon as you allow the use of plug-ins, then you're back to the latency issues that IIRC CueMix is designed to defeat by hooking directly into your interface and bypassing the computer.
 

Using the Echo function in Sonar is very inconsistent for me (sometimes merely stopping and restarting the Playback drastically changes the echo delay), and regardless of how low you can get the latency, there's still a serious battle between delay and audio-drops. We're not there yet, IMO.

 
Are you using plug-ins with lookahead? Understanding when/how to use the PDC (Path Delay Compensation) function in Sonar can be very helpful. For example limiters, compressors, "maximizers," and even some noise gates can have lookaheads of one to dozens of milliseconds; having a Waves Maximizer inserted in the master bus during tracking causes the latency to skyrocket to the point of being unusable. This is because Sonar is using PDC to delay all the other tracks to match the delay of the maximizer so they all sync up. When tracking, I simply disable plug-ins with lookahead and can then run at the lowest possible latency. When mixing, a couple dozen milliseconds of extra latency doesn't really matter except for fader moves requiring extreme precision.
 
I record consistently at 96 samples without dropouts, and these are projects with lots of tracks...in some cases over 80 tracks. With lots of virtual instruments, I need to bump up to 128 samples because I usually don't freeze them...128 samples is acceptable to me.
 

True that some features which we ask for could be asking to reduce the resources to work on other aspects of Sonar features, but lately, what CW has put into Sonar hasn't been too useful for me. There are some cool features, to be sure, but nothing lately that has saved me any significant time in tracking and mixing beyond X1.

Speed Comping, Quick Grouping, audio-to-MIDI conversion, and the Bi-Directional Browser and other browser enhancements (e.g., keyboard shortcut support) have saved me a lot of time. Also colorization makes it easier to parse tracks quickly, and using Melodyne means I don't lose time from V-Vocal crashing  However development also means things like VST3 support and ARA integration, which may or may not speed up tracking and mixing but support newer generations of tools like Melodyne, Padshop, etc. that some people consider important. Also ARA can be useful in more contexts than just pitch correction, and I expect will be exploited for other applications in the years ahead. But from a programming standpoint, from what I understand it was a bear to add and QC ARA and VST3 integration.

Sanderxpander
Sonar has latency compensation built in. There is no need for such an extra plugin.