Treefight
 
Is it more than ACT?  Does it work intuitively with channel strips (or at all)?

yes, it works quite intuitively. i'm a happy camper.
 
I had some issue with it not retaining my ACT mappings, but John T pointed me to the fix. Ever since it's really smooth i.e. direct access to PC modules & sends for the selected strip & ACT for active plug-in & quickly jumping between plugs for the vs-700. You can even remap the PC knobs (as a few of them are not set to what you personally might favor) ... there isn't a lot of mouse involved in mixing (editing is a different story, but I don't think that there's anything faster than the mouse when it comes to edits)
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

The channel strip control section maps to ProChannel modules. You step through the modules of the selected channel by pressing the EQ button on the console. I use this constantly. It's very nicely implemented.

It's related to my greatest irritation, mind you. You can set up the console so it only shows channel strips shown in the on-screen console view. So you get rid of redundant midi track strips for mixing, and your physical console layout is nice and neat.
 
However, this got broken in X1 or X2, and never fixed, and if you use it that way now, it gets hopelessly confused about which ProChannel strip it's controlling. Since I use MIDI + Synth track rather than simple instrument tracks, this means I've got an extra completely redundant strip mapped to the console.

These are the kind of irritations I'm expecting more and more of as Sonar gets updated. Like I say, they're not working on it, or even testing on it as far as I can tell.
 
Again, I'm not trying to put anyone off, but it's quirky, and grows more quirky with each Sonar release. There will be a point when it's simply too painful to use.

John T
The channel strip control section maps to ProChannel modules. You step through the modules of the selected channel by pressing the EQ button on the console. I use this constantly. It's very nicely implemented.

It's related to my greatest irritation, mind you. You can set up the console so it only shows channel strips shown in the on-screen console view. So you get rid of redundant midi track strips for mixing, and your physical console layout is nice and neat.
 
However, this got broken in X1 or X2, and never fixed, and if you use it that way now, it gets hopelessly confused about which ProChannel strip it's controlling. Since I use MIDI + Synth track rather than simple instrument tracks, this means I've got an extra completely redundant strip mapped to the console.

very true. and unfortunately not a among the few fixes we've seen lately
 
i usually work around this by moving all MIDI tracks to folders at the lower end of TV (right-hand side of console view) when tracking is done, synths are frozen and mixing gets serious. this way MIDI tracks are on the far right (usually separated by a dummy track labeled "-----" to indicate where audio strips end and MIDI/archive land begins) ...

Yeah, there are workarounds. I wouldn't want to overstate the case. But without rancour, I will say this: Cakewalk's ongoing effort to keep the console functional from X1 onwards has been extremely thin, bordering on careless, and that was when it was a live product. I realise that's not exactly the nicest thing in the world to say, but I can't imagine anyone from Cakewalk exactly denying it either. They have patched up the odd thing here and there too, but often anything up to six months after it got needlessly broken.

On a more positive note: The I/O really is excellent, and doesn't really have any of these kinds of issues. It's essentially the same as Rolands Octa Capture, and remains fully supported by them as part of that series. That'll keep on trucking long after the console is a doorstop.

I definitely agree ... and keep my fingers crossed that we see an occasional fix ...
 
But as I said I'm currently more attached to the vs than future x series upgrades (as I don't see any affordable CS solutions that would work any better). The new comping and VST3 made me go for X3, but if they had broken the vs-700 like they did in X1a-X1c I would have stayed with X2a, which I'm still quite happy with ...

John T
On a more positive note: The I/O really is excellent, and doesn't really have any of these kinds of issues. It's essentially the same as Rolands Octa Capture, and remains fully supported by them as part of that series. That'll keep on trucking long after the console is a doorstop.

and chaining the vs-700r with octa-capture makes a brilliant multi I/O system with zero latency monitoring for up to 4 different headphone mixes (which is a feature that the vs-700r is actually lacking ... yet, you can again work around with a beefy DAW that can run heavy load on really small ASIO buffers)

Ah, you can do unique headphone mixes with an Octa? I didn't know that. Might have to get one.

John T
Ah, you can do unique headphone mixes with an Octa? I didn't know that. Might have to get one.

 
Yes, you can and it's quite flexible actually. The OC provides 8 analogue INs and 2 digital ones, which you can route fully flexbile in the OC DSP direct mixer to 4 separate headphone mixes, plus you can send e.g. another 8 mono channels (or 4 stereo channels) from the DAW, which I usually use to send mix stems and feed them to each headphone mix at different levels.
 
I actually take it a bit further and also feed the digital OUT of the vs-700 into the digital IN of the OC, which allows me to also get all vs-700 INs and ADAT INs (which are connected to the vs-700) into the OC headphone mixes (vs-700 and ADAT arrive at the OC as one single mix controlled by the vs-700 direct monitoring mixer). This way you can have a multi-mic drum set coming in via the vs-700 and ADAT channels, the drum mix routed to the OC, plus you have another 8 INs from the OC to track whatever you feel like with each muso getting his own mix.
 
Mind you, with all these options the routing sometimes gets a bit overwhelming, so it's good to have some templates saved and a few things documented ...