First....thanks to all who've responded and offered tips.
Here's what I've tried.
1. The initial situation was (Win7 64bit):
A. MidiOX showed Midi input from midi devices.
B. Soft synths that can run standalone worked.
C. Vsts within Sonar did not work.
2. First tried many of the suggestions above. Thanks to all(!), however nothing I tried solved things unfortunately.
3. Downloaded a demo of Studio One (seems like it's that time anyways) and it exhibited the same issues as Sonar. No midi making it to the VSTs.
4. Once I saw the above, figured it was something Windows-wide.
5. Took the dive and upgraded to Win10.
6. Once upgraded, uninstalled the drivers for the A-800 and a Edirol UM-880 midi bay. Also uninstalled the driver for my cheapo UA-1G sound card.
7. Plugged the above devices back in and let Windows install the Win 10 drivers.
8. The UM-880 has no Win10 driver, so is currently out of the equation.
9. Reset the APRO back to factory defaults.
10. Checked the communication between the APRO and the APRO editor and all was well.
11. Fired up MidiOX and it showed Midi input.
12. Fired up a standalone soft synth and it worked fine.
13. Fired up Sonar and no midi input to the vst.
14. Fired up Studio One and no midi input to the vst.
So I am back where I started except I can't find stuff in Win10 yet, and something called Cortana just asked if I wanted to tell it a joke. WTF?
I'm a software developer by day and at this point all I can think of is to study up on how a DAW interacts with a VST, write a simple vst host, and write a simple vst that reports on its own state. And I most definitely do not want to have to do that.
If there is anyone with MIDI expertise familiar with how a DAW passes midi info to a VST (if that is indeed what happens) or can point me at any information that could help, please chime in.
Again thanks for the responses, and I'm completely baffled,
Bob