OK I tried Google and I looked on this forum and all info is real old so I don't trust it. My old DAW was only 2 cores and they both always seemed active. That was W7, SO I'm a little insucure about this quad core and optimizing it with W8.1. 
Question, is core parking important and how the heck do you shut it off?  I sure hope it is not that long winded reg edit instructions I found. I'd like a simple button but gave up, thus this thread. 
 

Wow this lasted 10 minutes in the Sonar forum.  I knew it belongs here but figured I'd get a quicker answer there. I miss the old days..
 
 
Anyhow while I was waiting for a reply I opened the Resource monitor and let it run. All 4 cores are running after at least 45 minutes at idle. My office computer parks core 1 and 2 after a minute of idle time. Which I guess is fine seeing how it's an office machine and needs to take coffee breaks. 

http://www.coderbag.com/p...u-core-parking-utility

Core Parking is a registry entry. I "believe" it is the same entry for Win 7 and 8. Here is a post I made a while ago that walks through the process very nicely - http://forum.cakewalk.com/FindPost/3086369