Buss routing - Strange question.

Anyone,
 
I'm have a Universal Audios Laptop Solo.
 
There are a minimum number of pluggins that Universal Audio's Laptop Solo module can load at once.
 
In Sonar, I have a situation where I have to load 10 songs at once. 
 
Problem:  There is a compressor in Universal Audios Laptop Solo that I want to use in each song.  I don't want to load 10 instances of this same compressor - taking up resourses.
 
Is there some kind of software VST player out there where I can load 1 instance of this compressor to use in all 10 songs. - where Sonar can utilize its sends and returns?
 
Anyone ever done something like this?
 
 

John


Why not put it on a buss?

I have 10 songs. Each with separate buses - which would require me to load 10 of the same compressor. 
 
What I want is to somehow have 1 instance of the compressor loaded that all 10 songs can access.

John


I am not understanding you. Are thses songs in the same project? Are they routed to your hardware out? Is not the out a version of a buss? In other words you have a single buss you are routing all your songs to. Am I right on this?  If you have a lot of buses then make one more and route them all to that one. Put your compressor on it.

 
Sorry for being confusing:
 
1. The songs are in the same project.
2. Nothing is routed from Sonar anywhere right now.   
3. I have a lot of busses, but they are in different songs.
 
 
 
You said something interesting:
 
"In other words you have a single buss you are routing all your songs to."  - This is exactly what I want to do. But I don't know how to do it.
I suppose my question should have been - can I route a bus of one song to the bus of another song?
 

John


Now you have confused me.

How are your songs laied out? Are they linear or horizontal? That is one after another or stacked on top of one another? If stacked then muting will be needed If not no muting will be needed. First create a new buss and call it master. Select all your buses and route them to that master buss you just made. It just caught me. Do you have any buses in Sonar? Or are these hardware outs that you are using? If you are using hardware outs as your buses then select all your tracks and output them to that master buss. 

Explain what you mean by buses please.

 
I have 10 songs.
 
I open each song and all of them sit in Sonar opened up - at the same time. Each song is opened up in it's own window.
 
Each song has a master bus out (in the bus section of sonar) below all of my midi tracks. This master bus in each song sends it's audio signal to my audio interface.
Right now I have a software compressor opened up in the Master bus out of each song.  I don't want to do that.
 
I want to have each song route it's audio output (bus) to some kind of vst program that contains a single compressor.  Or if I can somehow create an 11th song in Sonar that my first 10 songs can route it's output (bus) to that would be even better. The 11th song would have my compressor loaded in it. That way I would only have to load up a single compressor in the 11th song.  

They are not in the same project right? Thats what I asked you first off. The simple way is bring them all into one project. This will let you have a single master buss. There is no way to do this outside of Sonar as far as I know. But think about even if you could only one song could play at a time. With a single project you have far more control over when and where a song plays back.

What does this mean "1. The songs are in the same project."

A project is what is displayed in the track view not what Sonar can open. One project per one track view. Opening up a lot of projects is not the same thing.

ChristopherM


If you have ten separate projects (i.e. a project per song) open simultaneously, only one is active at any given moment, so I presume that in terms of CPU and disk usage, only the active project is consuming any resources.  Each project must use memory, but surely nine extra instances of a compressor is not likely to have that much impact on memory. Have you tried it?

Otherwise, I don't think that there is any way within Sonar to do what you want to do, and I have not come across any product that provides the sort of "virtual audio out" that Sonar would accept as a valid output, which is presumably what is required to implement what I think you are proposing.

That really helps.
 
The reason I was thinking that there might be something out there that would work is because my audio interface "TC Electronics Konnekt 24D"  has a section in its software that has some gates and limiters  and stuff that I use. Because my audio interface is the default output for anything that I do in Sonar, I only have to load 1 instance of a gate/limiter in my computer for all of my songs / projects in Sonar.
 
I was hoping that there could be something that could exist between Sonar and my Audio interface that I could load my VST effects in.  

Chris thanks for coming by here I was getting a little frustrated. Your calm words help me to calm down. 

I do think I gave the OP the best solution.

because the compressor resides in the UAD hardware

ChristopherM

  However, it presumably means that my comment about RAM in the DAW is redundant, because the compressor resides in the UAD hardware. 
 
 

I may have mis-spoken - my compressor does not reside downstream in the UAD hardware. My compressor currently resides as a VST in each Master Bus of each Sonar song.
What I want is for the compressor to reside downstream in a "VST player" or some hardware uint where I can take the duplicated compressors out of each SONAR song and just load one instance in somekind the  VST player.   

I will then send the output of each Sonar song to the VST player and then the output of the VST player to my audio interface.

I suppose I'm going to read up on what a project actually is.

In Sonar, a project is what you create with File - New and what you subsequently save with File - Save.  It is a single file with a .cwp extension (albeit with potentially many subsidiary audio clips).  Most commonly, this will represent a single song, but because you can mute and solo individual tracks there is no reason why a project cannot contain more than one distinct song.

Sonar allows you to have multiple projects (i.e. .cwp files) open simultaneously, but this is for convenience only, as there are no audio connections between the separate projects and only one is active at any moment.  Having multiple projects open simultaneously does allow you to cut, copy or paste clips between projects, however.

Still, that doesn't solve your problem, does it?

Because my audio interface is the default output for anything that I do in Sonar, I only have to load 1 instance of a gate/limiter in my computer for all of my songs / projects in Sonar.

Yes - that's also the way my E-MU works.  I don't think that the UAD works that way, however.

John


I believe the OP has stated that he can only run just so many instances of that compressor because the UAD has a limit on how many it will load. It shouldn't matter if the project is in focus or not. The UAD still has to load it up. I hope I have this right.

You are exactlly right. Thats my delima.  Thanks for all of your suggestions.
 
At least I know that I'm not missing some advanced option in Sonar or some other software platform that could help me. 
 
Thanks again guys. You both were great.

I'm wondering why you want to have all ten songs open at once? You can only listen to, and work on, one at a time.

If you don't open all ten songs at the same time you will be able to run many more instances of your UAD plugins on each individual song (up to the limit of the UAD card).

Once you've got all your individual songs completed you can mix them down and import them all in to a new 'Sonar Project' (ie a new song file) and put all the mixes in there, you will then be able to deal with all ten songs on one arrangement page and apply the same effects (should you desire) to all of them. You can also do this without mixing them down and have ALL of the original tracks in one 'Sonar Project' but this may well become pretty unwieldy pretty quickly. (does anyone actually work like this?)

As has been observed it appears that GtGartner was thinking of a project in terms of 'this album project I'm working on' whereas John mean 'Sonar Project' IE a single arrange page with all of the songs laid out it it.

So to answer the OT, it's not a problem for you to have the same effect on the output buss of every song, but you can't (because of the limitations of the UAD) have all the songs opened at the same time (unless you copy them all in to the same 'Sonar Project' as described above.)

Good luck!
Child

Rothchild


I'm wondering why you want to have all ten songs open at once? You can only listen to, and work on, one at a time.

If you don't open all ten songs at the same time you will be able to run many more instances of your UAD plugins on each individual song (up to the limit of the UAD card).

Once you've got all your individual songs completed you can mix them down and import them all in to a new 'Sonar Project' (ie a new song file) and put all the mixes in there, you will then be able to deal with all ten songs on one arrangement page and apply the same effects (should you desire) to all of them. You can also do this without mixing them down and have ALL of the original tracks in one 'Sonar Project' but this may well become pretty unwieldy pretty quickly. (does anyone actually work like this?)

As has been observed it appears that GtGartner was thinking of a project in terms of 'this album project I'm working on' whereas John mean 'Sonar Project' IE a single arrange page with all of the songs laid out it it.

So to answer the OT, it's not a problem for you to have the same effect on the output buss of every song, but you can't (because of the limitations of the UAD) have all the songs opened at the same time (unless you copy them all in to the same 'Sonar Project' as described above.)

Good luck!
Child

I use Sonar Live every Sunday. It's a Theatrical Performance that I work with.
 
There is absolutely no time for me to open songs on stage during a performance. The only time I have during the performances is to switch between windows and play songs.  I need the Metronome and Measure couters during the playback. Sonar is triggering my lights and everything through DasLight.  Each song has a DasLight track to control my moving head and flush lights and everything.
 
Everything has been working great for years. I just wanted to start adding in some effects. 
 
If I was simply using Sonar in a studio.....this would be a no-brainer.

John


Then use a single project with all your songs in it. Use markers to help navigate.

Yup, out-succincted me there John ;-)

Child

Edit: although needing different tempos, time signatures or wanting all your songs to count off from 0.0.0 might cause you some additional work. If they're all in the same time sig you could put each song in a folder track (so they can all start at the top of the 'project'),  mute / unmute the whole folder, and just change the tempo as you move between the songs?