For those of you who recall my ****ing about wanting to stay with XP 32 bit until hell froze over, well here's your shot at "We told you so!".  So I am going to move all the way up to Win7-64 bit and buy X3 Producer, not feeling safe going to Win8.1 after googling all the posts from gamers who are formatting their Win8.1 drives to go back to Win7.  That is scary and bodes poorly for Microshaft indeed!
 
Anyway, what really cool stuff that I have now in X1 am I going to sorely miss when I install X3?  How can I prepare for the mess I assume I will run into?  For example, if I have existing projects that relied on Session Drummer 3, will I need some way to reinstall SD3?  Why do I feel like I am stepping through the doorway into hell?  Isn't there some place on the Cakewalk site where you can compare versions?  (I couldn't find it.) 
 
How about if I copy my entire c:\program files\cakewalk\vstplugins directory over to an external drive, install X3, and copy it all back?  Will that work?
 
I keep all my projects/audio in C:\...\MyDocuments\CakewalkProjects\MySongs.  If I copy this folder back to MyDocs in Win7, will X3 be able to open them?
 
Should I just buy a new harddrive and keep the old one as a safety net?  Or am I simply paranoid?  Oh OH!  Someone's knocking at the door.  It's probably the Police!  Hide the donuts...

You could just install X1 first, or do an advanced install, to install all the plugs that are not in X3. The actual X1 program takes very little space and all the other content is shared. On the X3 comparison page you can see which plugs are included. Pretty sure Session Drummer is still there but e.g. V-Vocal is not. Also the comping behavior/take lanes changed but I would call it an improvement.

Yes, if you want to keep some of the plug-ins and V-Vocal, install X1 first and then X3 and keep them both installed.
 
Scott

--
Scott R. Garrigus - http://garrigus.com - SONAR X3 Power! - http://garrigus.com/?SonarX3Power
* Author of the Cakewalk Sonar and Sony Sound Forge Power book series: http://garrigus.com/?PowerBooks
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Timeking
Should I just buy a new harddrive and keep the old one as a safety net?  Or am I simply paranoid?  Oh OH!  Someone's knocking at the door.  It's probably the Police!  Hide the donuts...

You should miss nothing. I would strongly recommend backing up your old drive however with Acronis True Image or something, if you don't have something like an external USB hard drive (very cheap nowadays) for backups then you should consider getting one or find an alternative backup solution. Really this sort of thing is essential.
 
Any plugins missing from X1 you can install later after X3 if this is to be a clean install (I would recommend wiping your hard drive and starting again if you are installing a new OS).

BTW if your hardware supports it I would strongly recommend going straight to 8.1, otherwise you may find yourself having to do another upgrade a lot sooner. 8.1 is a great OS providing your drivers are supported. Do the math I suggest, you may find it a better idea to buy a new machine BTW as Windows is bundled with them, if your machine is old a cheap Win8 machine may be far more powerful.

If you are moving from 32bit SONAR to 64bit, most of the older DX plug-ins were not ported to 64bit and will not load in 64bit SONAR. The 32bit only DX plug-ins are no longer included with X3. Beatscape, VC-64 and V-Vocal have been dropped too. It may be easier to perform a full install of 32bit X1, then a full install of X3 32 and 64bit, then an advanced install of X1 64bit to add the missing 64bit plug-ins. V-Vocal is the only plug-in that is not separately installable, the X1 SONAR program itself must be installed to pick up V-Vocal. Having both 32bit and 64bit versions may help with transitioning to 64bit SONAR.
 
Copying the VST directory may not be completely successful. Plug-ins that use a Windows installer usually update the registry and have files located in directories other than the VST path. Best to re-install them using their installers. The same is true for copy protected plug-ins.
 
SD3 is part of X3 still see here for the full list of items included in X3 http://www.cakewalk.com/D...mp;Req=Comparison.html
 
Copying projects will be OK.
 

I would like to add something about working with projects.
 
I have always had the philosophy that I would finish projects in the same Sonar release I created them in, and only create new projects in the new Sonar release.  Some folks share this approach, and some  folks open projects created in prior Sonar releases and don't worry about it.
 
In any case, if you keep X1, and then install X3, you have the choice to either continue to work with the X1 projects in X1, or you can open them in X3.  Newer projects could be created in either, but I would think the obvious choice would be to create the new ones in X3.
 
As was pointed out, keep the plugins that were dropped, like V-Vocal.  Beatscape was dropped, but I think its sounds were rolled up into something else (cannot recall what, because I didn't use it).
 
At one point, I had Sonar 8.5.3, X1, and X2 all living happily alongside each other.  I now have X1 and X3 and that's it.
 
Hope that helps - you will LOVE X3, by the way.  It has great new features, and is very stable, and FUN.
 
Bob Bone
 

robert_e_bone
 
 Beatscape was dropped, but I think its sounds were rolled up into something else (cannot recall what, because I didn't use it).
 
 

They were incorporated in Loops_And_One_Shots

One thing I would do before upgrading is to freeze (or bounce) all synth tracks, just for backup.   You can always unfreeze if the same plugins are available in Win7, but if not, the project will at least sound the same.
 

I think that you will mostly miss the bugs (that were in X1) that the versions up through X3 fixed...
Then again you may not ever think about, nor miss them.

I share your feelings about staying away from Win 8.1.  Once you get Win 7 64 installed and squared away, I would suggest simply re-installing X1 and your existing projects, and then adding X3.  That way you have a fall back solution if for some reason an old project won't work in X3.  
 
I have had 98% great results with X3 Producer and Win7 64 (the remaining 2% is in the hands of a laughing demon somewhere).  I no longer have to worry about them - I just use them!