+1 on the Control Room Pro
 
I upgraded from GR4LE to GR5 Pro and that jump was pretty big (many more components). I cannot speak directly to the differences between GR4 Pro and GR5 Pro, but the NI website was pretty detailed as I recall. I would check the NI web site if you want a good breakdown of what is new with GR5 Pro.
 
Michael

Konrad,
 
From your signature, you already have enough invested in NI stuff to just buy Komplete. I think you would be glad you did.
 
Regards,
Dan
 

I'm a keyboard guy, but hope you don't mind me asking what kind of latency you guys are getting with the guitar plugs.  I have some guitar playing buddies who drop by and I have Amplitube and the stuff we got with Sonar.  None of my buddies are DAW people,,, they use their amps, maybe some pedals.  I'd like to at least know what's worth showing them, and hopefully get them to lay down some tracks on some projects. 
 
In my old system, I ended up using a J Station in the studio, because the latency made working with Amplitube impractical.  I have a 64 bit system now though.  I'm hoping my results will be better now. 
 
 

harmony gardens
I'm a keyboard guy, but hope you don't mind me asking what kind of latency you guys are getting with the guitar plugs.  I have some guitar playing buddies who drop by and I have Amplitube and the stuff we got with Sonar.  None of my buddies are DAW people,,, they use their amps, maybe some pedals.  I'd like to at least know what's worth showing them, and hopefully get them to lay down some tracks on some projects. 
 
In my old system, I ended up using a J Station in the studio, because the latency made working with Amplitube impractical.  I have a 64 bit system now though.  I'm hoping my results will be better now. 
 
 

GR is pretty resource intensive, especially if you use the higher internal sample setting which is recommended to get the best results (but you can simply track at the low setting then turn it up for mixing). TH2 is supposed to have a much lower footprint in comparison but I've never really done any tests. It does seem to not freeze or go all screwy which GR would on occasion. I don't know about any other sims as I haven't really used much beyond those two.
 
However if you meet recommended system specs for Sonar you should be able to run it but you may have to do a few resource saving procedures if you a) have a synth/effect/track heavy project and/or b) want to get your latency down for tracking without dropouts or other issues. You may know this stuff but just in case...
 
Use the "freeze" function on all tracks that are using synths or effects.
 
Archive any unneeded tracks. If the guitar player only needs the bass and drums to do his thing archive everything else so Sonar doesn't have to work to process/playback those tracks.
 
If it's still giving you are hard time you can make a temporary backing track for the guitarist to record along with. Get his headphone mix to how he/she wants then do a mixdown to another new track. Then archive everything else. Now Sonar only has to deal with one track for playback, one track to record with and the amp sim. Any system within recommended (or even minimum specs) should be able to handle this. Remember to use the Low CPU setting in GR for tracking and then change it to Hi for mixing after you've turned your buffers back up. Once you've got the take just delete or archive the backing track and pull the rest of the tracks out of the archive section.
 
You could also check to see if your interface has a Zero Latency Input option. This however means you won't be able to hear the sim while tracking so the guitarist would be tracking dry.
 
Cheers.

thanks beepster.
 
I hope you guys keep talking guitar shop here, I'm interested in what you guys are saying.

harmony gardens
thanks beepster.
 
I hope you guys keep talking guitar shop here, I'm interested in what you guys are saying.

I'll be doing a lot more tracking and mixing now that I'm set back up and most of what I do is guitar oriented. I try to post stuff as I figure things out.
 
One cool thing I just learned today as I was reviewing the Crag Anderton X1 Advanced vids is using the Sonitus or VC 64 Multi Band Compressors and cloning to separate the frequencies of a single guitar track to widen the stereo field while giving access to specific frequencies for EQ and compression (as well as other effects) manipulation.
 
Record your guitar track and set up your sim how you like. This will be the foundation of your guitar sound and you want to get it right because your will be cloning it. Having to change settings of an effect across tracks is a pain... so yeah, get it sounding as good as possible.
 
Insert your multi band EQ to the track and set it so there is NO compression or any other effect noticeable. Totally dry. Just the guitar track and the sim.
 
Clone the guitar track 4 or 5 times (depending on how many compressor bands you want to use but he uses 4).
 
Then use the compressor's solo buttons to isolate a specific frequency range for each track (low, low mid, hi mid, hi) and rename the tracks to reflect which frequency you've isolated.
 
Already you can now use the individual track's pan knobs to widen the mono track across the stereo field (low to 8-9 o'clock, mid-low to 10-11 oclock, etc) which makes things sound much nicer.
 
He does some specific compressor and EQ stuff but to me it was very minimal. To me I would use each track's EQ, sim settings, compressor and whatever else to bring out the best of each frequency's sound.
 
I'm actually really stoked about this trick.
 
You could also do the same thing but instead of using cloned tracks you'd use a single track and employ 4 sends and busses then put your sim and compressor in the bus effects bin.
 
Cool stuff. I'm going to even try mixing and matching compressors and EQ's because I can never get enough parameters to polish my guit sound. It's an obsession with me.
 
Cheers.

dcumpian
Konrad,
 
From your signature, you already have enough invested in NI stuff to just buy Komplete. I think you would be glad you did.
 
Regards,
Dan
 

+1
 
It's absolutely worth considering. When i had two of NI's apps I decided it was pointless to resist Komplete.
Possibly wait for some special deal (that NI usually has once in a while) if there's no hurry.
 

Oh and I mentioned the SOS article about dealing with amp sims. Here it is...
 
http://www.soundonsound.com/sos/jul11/articles/sonar-tech-0711.htm
 
He shows this procedure in the X1 Advanced vids as well (the bulk of it in the first vid and then the Desser part in the Next Level vid).
 
To me the best part about the Gibson takeover is having Craig's input into the program. He is a passionate and knowledgeable Sonar user and if they let him do his thing I'm sure Cakewalk will become a force to reckon with.