I have seen a lot of guys who were at the end of their rope saying this is a great release and they are glad they upgraded. To me that speaks volumes.
 
As to my personal "fanboiism"... well I just gotta laugh at that. Somebody obviously hasn't seen some of my tirades over the past few months. lol
 
I truly hope you enjoy your purchase and after you give it a once over maybe edit your OP if you deem it worthy.
 
Peace.

mettelus
+1 to all the responses. IMO, X3 was a quantum leap above X2. The value in that alone was worth the upgrade to me. As far as "bait and switch" with Melodyne...   1) Melodyne Essential will suit many user's needs without the upgrade to Editor.   2) The upgrade to Editor was a bargain as well ($150 versus $300).   3) Melodyne released a patch to improve the ARA functionality (with X3) so this partnership is a great one. X3 coming out of the chute with ARA on board and it being as nice as it is is rather impressive to me. People love to find bugs, but so much of it WORKS (very well actually).

I bought x3 and I really havnt dug myself into it because I been away. I tried to buy the upgrade to melodyne and the deal was gone in like 1 week of buying x3 . The whole contact them and ask them to extend the deal .is just not something I wanna do . So feel cheated in reference to that.
Try to buy it from there site and there was no upgrade:(
.
AD pack I keep getting offers for.

I just bought the upgrade to Melodyne for $149 I think last week. I'll look ad get back. Or was it cheaper than that?

Sounds right to me Grem. $150 USD to go from Essential to Editor. There is a studio version another level up that concurrently reviews multiple tracks at a time.
 
This is interesting to me thinking about how you could build a really great Console Emulator that actually had cross track bleed, for example. It could take some sound from your bass track and run it through the delay on your guitar track or ... right?
 
If this plugin design can take the whole mix into account it could 'auto resolve' phase issues with mics.
 
All kinds of useful possibilities here.

So the Melodyne offer has expired?.... crap.

Yes, I said you sounded greedy and i meant it be ause that is how you came across. No way can i actually know that. No, I'm not particularly into bass drops. My name stems from a fondness for old 70's dubs and not dubstep. Sonar has its pros and cons but value is one if its strong points. How much of a value it is depends on what you already own, but other than offer plug-in vouchers in lieau of bundling, noway to avoid such scenarios. Anyway, hope you found what you were seeking.

Beepster
Somebody obviously hasn't seen some of my tirades over the past few months. lol

LOL, Beepster... I was actually going to throw that comment in before and say this sort of negates some of your rants
 
But in all seriousness, CW over the years has done a LOT to make the "Producer" package be very functional out of the box. There is a lot of behind the scenes thought/action that goes into this. The bakers bust their butts and are involved in so many things.
 
Imagine a truly new user... if they entered the scene with X3 Studio or Producer, they would be like a kid in a candy store (we have all had this experience), and have the essentials to enable recording... Unfortunately, as time passes we tend to get jaded and loose touch with this.
 
The folks who cannot flee when people start to throw rocks are the bakers... and those who have been CW users for years cannot deny the positive involvement the bakers have taken in their product. It heartens me a lot to see users who stopped upgrading prior to the X series come back with X3 and their first response was "Wow..."
 
In the big picture, I own software that costs a lot more to upgrade and use far less than SONAR. And those programs' "support" is often a sick joke. As far as "bang for the buck," SONAR has always been way up there... just invest in things you spend the most time on, and it is money well spent.

I think the direction is nice. I'd rather see higher versions that are more extras, rather than cut features. In the past CW did what most companies do: Crippled lower versions. If you wanted 64-bit mixing, or unlimited tracks or whatever you had to buy a more expensive version. That is still how most DAWs work. Cubase is badly crippled in their lower end versions, Studio One doesn't even support VST plugins in their base ($100) version.
 
Well with Sonar now it is pretty well uncrippled. Everything you get in regular X3 is unlimited. No track limits, sample rate/depth limits (outside of the software's inherent limits in all versions), etc. Means if you are coming from another DAW and have all the effects and instruments you like (or you are buying them separate), $100 does the trick. The only features it is lacking are pro channel, surround mixing, and MTC. So if you need those, then Studio does the trick, and also gets you a bunch more extras. Producer is basically just if you want extras. You don't need it unless you want the stuff it comes with.
 
It is nice. Cheaper for users.

SimpleM
So I have been a Cakewalk user since PA8 and a "producer" level buyer/upgrader/user since Producer 6.  It seems like in the old days part of the bonus to buying producer was that you got plugs/instruments that no other version got and they were full versions, none of these "demo" feeling or limited plugs and instruments.  With X2 I suddenly felt like I was paying a ton of money extra for "limited" software versions designed to part me with another $100+ in order to actually utilize the useful features. (Overloud stuff, prochannel add ons etc.)  How is X3 in this regard?  It looks like it is getting worse.  It looks like AD is the real deal but how about the AAS stuff, Melodyne?  (Melodyne seems to be the worst for the ole bait and switch from how it reads).  It almost feels like Sonar has become a free to play video game that sets it up to get you money on the back end if you actually want to play the game.  I have spent many $1000s of dollars riding the Cakewalk upgrade train and now as I try to consider going to X3 this just feels like something is trying to violate me.

With all due respect, I think if you were upgrading SONAR each year for only the included plug-ins (which are merely bonuses thrown into a package) then you may have been upgrading for the wrong reasons.  SONAR itself has proven to be a very extensive and capable platform for audio and MIDI recording and editing albeit, like all others, has it's short coming(s). 
 
X3 (Pro) may be the most appealing package to date with the inclusion of Melodyne Essential, VST3 compatibility, new comping feature, tape emulation and the full version of Addictive Drums, not to mention the Nomad stuff to boot.
 
Kind regards,
 
Living Room Rocker

lawp
i would rather they bundled less & lowered the price

Sounds to me like you want X3 Studio Edition. It's basically Producer, but bundles less and lowers the price. Here's a comparison chart.