Sonar Professional: Midi clip looping pop noise.

Can you reproduce this with a specific bundled MIDI clip, synth and patch so we can try to diagnose or reproduce it? I can't imagine how snap enable/disable could have a bearing except while setting the loop points.
 
Edit: In general, I would not be surprised to hear a pop when ending a loop right at a note off. Even if the synth patch has an extremely short release, there's no time for the amplitude to decay before the end of the loop chops it off. Also, depending on what audio and video hardware you're running, and how low ASIO buffer is, it could be that the slight CPU spike on returning to the beginning of the loop is causing a buffer to get dropped. It's even possible to get a dropout at that point if the CPU is really heavily loaded
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

As mentioned previously, I can pretty much guarantee there will be at least a small click/pop in any scenario where the loop ends right at a note-off. Fade on start/stop only applies to stopping and starting the transport. You have to give the signal some time to decay according to the release portion of the envelope, either by ending the note earlier or the loop later. Alternatively you can freeze the audio and apply a fade to the clip or use volume automation to attenuate the final few milliseconds before the loop end.
 
That said, the pop shouldn't be that intrusive unless the signal amplitude and monitoring volume are quite high.

When a loop ends at a place other than zero crossing I think there can be a small click. Also, if a loop starts at a non zero crossing.

ChrisX
 I just upgraded from X2 and this was something that caught my attention. My X2 won't click or pop no matter where the midi region is, even when it ends in the middle on a midi note !  Its not a big deal as I can just adjust the notes and eliminate the noise....
Thanks  !

It also depends on the synth patch and the available polyphony. For example there's zero release time, you'll often hear a click as soon as the note ends. This is due to the amp or filter shutting down to zero instantly. I think it's probably just coincidence you didn't have this problem with X2. 

ChrisX
If this would be due to amp and filter than when I play a long row of midi notes each, lets say 1/4 long on each 1/4 bar, than I should hear the same popping noise, but it works fine in this situation.

 
But again, it's synth patch and polyphony. If notes are stealing voices due to lack of polyphony, the shutdown can be instantaneous regardless of what release time you have set. 

I'll try to reproduce based on your post #3 and see if that sheds any light on the situation. I haven't had this happen so I have to figure out a may to make it happen.

Is the tempo the same at begin and end of your loop?

ChrisX
- Popping noise appears after I'm messing around with snap to grid and looping markers.
- The noise starts dim but it becomes more accentuated if I play the loop for longer time.  

Good info. One more question: Does this happen regardless of whether the transport is running when you're making changes? That could be a major factor; it would be less surprising to me if there's a problem with making changes during playback.
 
 

ChrisX
here are some details of what I'm using :
- Windows 8.1 64bit
- cpu:4790k, mobo: MSI-Z97m ; RAM: Corsair 16gb 9-9-9 at 1866Mhz (checked with 1333Mhz and noise didn't stop.), OS and SONAR is installed on a 128GB Samsung 850PRO SSD. Project files and samples are saved on a 2T WD Black HDD.
- audiocard : Focusrite 2i2
- Driver ASIO set at 2ms (I checked from 10ms down to 1ms and I still have popping noise).
- Length of the loop doesn't matter, it does it for any clip length. I changed tempo's and still the same.
- I use Sonar synth's. Also patch doesn't matter. It does it for any sound I loaded into the synth.
- Popping noise appears after I'm messing around with snap to grid and looping markers.
- The noise starts dim but it becomes more accentuated if I play the loop for longer time.  

 
i just called cakewalk. they said another person reported this issue. i also use a focusrite 2i2. could be this be a coincidence? i also have a western digital black hdd 250 gb. i also have 16 gigs of ram, and use an asus  i74770.

Okay, I tested and was able to reproduce if:

• The end of the note ended at the end of the loop (no space)
• The beginning of the note started at the beginning of the loop (no space)
• The synth had a release time, no matter how short

However, I also found out the following:
 
If I ended the last note before the end of the loop and the synth's amplitude envelope release time was less than the time between the end of the note and the end of the loop, it never clicked. For example, if the note ended 100 ms before the end of the loop and the release time was less than 100 ms - no click. If the release time was more than 100 ms - click. The longer the release, the louder the click. This made sense, because the release is being forced to zero at a higher amplitude.
 
But here's some more interesting data. If you "roll out" a groove clip to create more iterations - which is the whole reason for being able to create MIDI groove loops in the first place - the click does NOT occur at the end of each iteration, regardless of the release time. It occurs only when transitioning back to the beginning.
 
I believe what's happening is that when the clip loops back to the beginning, the synth is not allowed to play through its natural release but the release is cut off. Truncating the release causes the click. Generally, that would be what you want; you wouldn't want a long release time to spill over and play at the loop beginning...a note that's supposed to play at the end is not supposed to play at the beginning.
 
So, I'm not sure whether this is a "SONAR problem," an instrument handling problem, some combination of the two, or an inherent issue in looping that depends on the synth patch and note placement. I'll try this in some other DAWs and see what happens.
 
That said, I don't really understand why you'd want a project to loop on a specific MIDI clip unless you were practicing to that part. Maybe someone could enlighten me as to why they want to do this.
 
 
 
 

I can also confirm it doesn't happen in X3 or a couple of the other programs I tried (Cubase and Studio One Pro), so it does indeed seem to be an issue with SONAR Platinum.
 
However, long release times at the end will continue after the loop repeats and play back at the beginning of a loop, even if there are no notes to at the beginning of the loop to make that sound so that's the tradeoff.
 
But I'm still wondering why this matters (which is why I hadn't noticed it, this isn't something I do). If you want something to repeat over and over, you can simply roll out the clip. I'm not sure why you'd want to loop only a section of a song, unless it was to have looping while you were doing an overdub, and the click was distracting.

For whatever reason, though, at least with my computer it doesn't happen with X3, Studio One Pro, or Cubase. So I don't think it's driver-specific...possibly all the work that's been done on looping over the past few versions may have caused this hiccup to appear. Again, though, I'm not quite sure why being able to loop a MIDI instrument for a limited number of measures in a song is important.
 
 

Meanwhile, I have a workaround!
 
Freeze the instrument and if needed, slip-edit the audio track to the length of the loop. I've tried this with several instruments and patches, no click.
 
If you can confirm, I'll add [Workaround] to the title.

Did you try the workaround?

Thank you!
 
Craig--> I haven't used the workaround, but I don't think Freeze would really work for me. I just loop while I set the tempo and compose drums. Once that's done, the looping is off. Unless there's something I missed, I can't add drum hits to a frozen midi file.

dan im impressed as hell. if this was a steinberg issue they would have spent 4 weeks alone trying to figure out what the problem was and after they figured it out, another month to release a fix or solution. i tried your solution, and it worked perfectly. thank you. 
 
maybe ill even upgrade to platinum. you guys seems to know what your doing coding wise. i also love the fact that i can call you from the next state over in ct if i have any issues such as this one. and i really love how you guys handle bugs that is, posting on the cakewalk forums like people and not a company the way steinberg do (your competitor)