I've mentioned before something about having a screenset [M] that sets up Sonar for Mastering, which brings up metering tools, and sort of changes the landscape to be more workflow conducive to a typical Mastering workflow, even one that can consider including external hardware.
What I didn't previously consider is, when you switch to the Mastering screenset, you can choose between Stems and Stereo (or eventually, Surround) to display your Master fader output or all your busses. There you could perhaps "bring-in" or
process/export the audio from the Project in these two ways, so that you can also edit heads and tails, or run some analytical plug-in tools against the audio before
printing or
rendering. When I say, "Bring-In" I mean that, even though you switch to the [M] screenset, Sonar still has to process the audio as it would be played in the project itself. Trying to play back literally every track mixed down in Sonar to this screenset may not always be ideal. It may be best to use this as a separate Mastering tool, where you
Import the audio out of the project and into this screenset, separately to save CPU and other resources while Mastering (especially since Mastering may use some real CPU hogging plug-ins!)
More, In the normal Export dialogue, we could see a check-box for: "Open in [M] Mastering Suite after export".
All of this opens doors to using Sonar for Mastering, and, in some cases strictly for Mastering, if the software workflow is good enough. If the Mastering screenset workflow is different from what Sonar uses natively, then it can be quite different in many ways, however, still included in Sonar and still integrated in ways we haven't considered. Throw in DDP, Master report sheets, CD-R track and sub-track markers, etc. and good metering and we could possibly see the prossible end of a certain other staple in the Home Studio market. To add, being able to "build" a final Master, as you can with Montages in Wavelab, is a very welcome thing for artists who want their music seamless from track to track.