Interesting footnote here.  In the user survey sent to me yesterday, one of the questions concerned how important was control surface support was to me.  For me, it was of the highest importance.  Once again, I have to laud Samplitude's implementation and support of the Mackie MCU.  If the folks at Cakewalk ever needed to steal a few ideas, Samp Pro X would be a good source in that regard.  If there is a menu selection available in just about any menu that I could find, it could be assigned to one of the MCU buttons.  And using the modifier keys, you could assign multiple commands to each button.

Mod Bod
Interesting footnote here.  In the user survey sent to me yesterday, one of the questions concerned how important was control surface support was to me.  For me, it was of the highest importance.  Once again, I have to laud Samplitude's implementation and support of the Mackie MCU.  If the folks at Cakewalk ever needed to steal a few ideas, Samp Pro X would be a good source in that regard.  If there is a menu selection available in just about any menu that I could find, it could be assigned to one of the MCU buttons.  And using the modifier keys, you could assign multiple commands to each button.

Yes the MCU implimentation got plenty of air time from me too. It's my biggest beef with X2 by far. I miss being able to tweak a compressor in the channel strip by pressing the DYN button or the EQ by pressing that button.
Currently it's very useable but it's not far from being really good. Here's hoping for some improvement at some point.
 

Mod Bod

amax55
John, how are you?
I just tried another DAW applications with my MCU PRO. After testing my SONAR X2 (faders are jerky), next MOTU Digital Performer 8 (faders goes smooth up, but jerky down) and finally MAGIX Samplitude Pro - here faders works, say, good in both directions. And what should I do? I planned return the unit (as defective) to the seller, but in actual situation? I do not know... I do not want to work with Samplitude (although it looks enough attractive), beacuse I use SONAR for few years.. Do you think, this mysterious .dll file in a new version could help me with these jerky faders? (and these not working buttons) in MCU PRO?
Best,
Adam

Samplitude Pro X has the best Mackie MCU and XT that I've tried.  You can pretty much program any button to any function.  However, some of the LED implementations are a bit wonky.  That could be because I haven't learned how to set the button up properly.  

Reaper's MCU drivers have been written by users.  One of them has a great feature set but the author doesn't own an XT so full implementation of that is lacking.
 
With the exception of the ProChannel, SONAR's MCU implementation is very useable but I wish it was more like Samplitude.

Hi Dave.
Thank you for your post. I have a question fo you. As a result of your work with Samplitude, do you have some kind of your own overlay of Samplitude for MCU PRO? I try to fit the buttons to their proper functions, but I have to say - it is not easy... If you can to share it with me - I'll be very grateful.
All the Bet,
Adam

amax55

Mod Bod

amax55
John, how are you?
I just tried another DAW applications with my MCU PRO. After testing my SONAR X2 (faders are jerky), next MOTU Digital Performer 8 (faders goes smooth up, but jerky down) and finally MAGIX Samplitude Pro - here faders works, say, good in both directions. And what should I do? I planned return the unit (as defective) to the seller, but in actual situation? I do not know... I do not want to work with Samplitude (although it looks enough attractive), beacuse I use SONAR for few years.. Do you think, this mysterious .dll file in a new version could help me with these jerky faders? (and these not working buttons) in MCU PRO?
Best,
Adam

Samplitude Pro X has the best Mackie MCU and XT that I've tried.  You can pretty much program any button to any function.  However, some of the LED implementations are a bit wonky.  That could be because I haven't learned how to set the button up properly.  

Reaper's MCU drivers have been written by users.  One of them has a great feature set but the author doesn't own an XT so full implementation of that is lacking.
 
With the exception of the ProChannel, SONAR's MCU implementation is very useable but I wish it was more like Samplitude.

Hi Dave.
Thank you for your post. I have a question fo you. As a result of your work with Samplitude, do you have some kind of your own overlay of Samplitude for MCU PRO? I try to fit the buttons to their proper functions, but I have to say - it is not easy... If you can to share it with me - I'll be very grateful.
All the Bet,
Adam

Yeah, I have white masking tape like they make for marking up channel strips on recording consoles with Sharpie written labels.  Haha.  When I go into SONAR, I stick the SONAR overlay on it.

I just tried my MCU PRO with Logic (faders were moving jerky) and with Cubase (faders were moving almost such smooth, like with Samplitude).
The only solution I see, is using the MCU PRO with Samplitude, like Dave does, until Calwalk will release an Sonar update. Hmm...
 

I've just got some info from Cakewalk about our problem. They are aware of this issue, but unable to specify the date of the MackieControl.dll update release. Let's put some more pressure on them - maybe it will speed things up...

I'm in what do you want me to do?

Hopefully they fix other control surface dlls also. They were able to replicate the problems I reported with cm labs Motormix way back when they released Sonar 7 but have done nothing to fix the issues. One of the reasons I stopped upgrading.

Hi John and WDI,
I guess we should email them repeatedly to make them aware of how the users (and potential new ones) feel about the problem. Too bad Cakewalk doesn't care about losing its clients who are forced to switch to other DAVs. I myself (following Dave's example) am thinking of changing to Samplitude - which is probably best suited for MCU Pro.
Adam

OK, I am just installed the new (4.0.3) firmware to my Mackie MCU Pro and now the faders are moving very, very, very, very smooth, like never before! Now, I am waiting for a move from the Cakewalk side - the problem with not properly functioning "EQ", "Compressor" and "Plug-in" buttons in MCU Pro, by using the SONAR X2 - still remains. Hurry up, gentlemen at Cakewalk!!!
Adam