After owning Sonar X1 studio for over a year, it is only recently that I started using it to record myself during practices. So, please bear with me with this question. I'm having great difficulty in matching the audio record volume I hear in my headphones while playing to the final recorded audio volume during playback (using same headphones). The playback is much, much louder. As far as I determine, all volume controls are exactly the same in Sonar. For the sake of completeness, I'm recording using an M-Audio Fast Track Ultra USB audio interface. Again, as far as I can determine, all its volumes are at the same level (max).I've tweaked output volume knobs without a lot of success.
 
While this problem is largely a nuisance, I'm asking this question largely to learn what on earth I'm doing wrong. Reading through Garrigus' book (while helpful) didn't seem to help me, hence this posting.
 
If you have a second, I'd appreciate some advice or a reference to a webpage or two that might help me.
 
Bob aka the jazzwombat
 
 

Check your gain setting levels (not volume) on all tracks and busses.

Just to clarify, the reason Rocker suggested checking Gain is that the Gain widget on a track will raise the playback level, but not the live input level (or the direct-monitoring level if your not using input monitoring). It should be thought of as Clip Gain rather than Input Gain as you might expect.
 
Dave

Your advice is greatly appreciated. I'll confirm gain levels. Thanks.