Teksonik

Bristol_Jonesey
By specs I mean your computer specs - what CPU, how much RAM, how many & size of hard drives, SOUNDCARD/INTERFACE etc.

There goes that odd fixation with System Specs again on this board.........Ram ? How many hard drives ? Really ?

Do you realize how ridiculous that sounds?  Without knowing the system specs, you can't accurately diagnose the problem. If you call or write any technical support group, the first thing they will ask for are your specs. In this case I don't think the # of drives would help, but certainly knowing what soundcard he is using is essential. 
 
 

Teksonik

wizard71

Teksonik

Bristol_JoneseyBy specs I mean your computer specs - what CPU, how much RAM, how many & size of hard drives, SOUNDCARD/INTERFACE etc.

There goes that odd fixation with System Specs again on this board.........Ram ? How many hard drives ? Really ?

Looking forward to hearing how an expert like yourself would help remedy a problem such as the one in question in this thread?

Bibs

Simple see above.  I'm pretty sure I can help without knowing how many hard drives he has.........it appears to be an issue with the ASIO4ALL driver from what I've read in his posts........"Stopped Working" is always a key.........

Really?
 
So if he revealed he had 64Gb of RAM & an RME interface with a single 120Gb HDD running Win 7/Sonar/EWQLSO/BFD2 - what would your diagnosis be?
 
 

Teksonik

Bristol_Jonesey
By specs I mean your computer specs - what CPU, how much RAM, how many & size of hard drives, SOUNDCARD/INTERFACE etc.

There goes that odd fixation with System Specs again on this board.........Ram ? How many hard drives ? Really ?

May not be specific to this issue but it's good general advice to give a new user for when they report problems. Your odd fixation with the requests is far odder than the requests themselves.
 
Don't be a weirdo.

Teksonik

wizard71

Teksonik

Bristol_JoneseyBy specs I mean your computer specs - what CPU, how much RAM, how many & size of hard drives, SOUNDCARD/INTERFACE etc.

There goes that odd fixation with System Specs again on this board.........Ram ? How many hard drives ? Really ?

Looking forward to hearing how an expert like yourself would help remedy a problem such as the one in question in this thread?

Bibs

Simple see above.  I'm pretty sure I can help without knowing how many hard drives he has.........it appears to be an issue with the ASIO4ALL driver from what I've read in his posts........"Stopped Working" is always a key.........

Excellent. Then why not just post that answer to begin with instead of repeatedly popping up in threads telling us all how stupid it is to ask what people's specs are. I think we are all intelligent enough to realise that they alone don't always provide an answer but you would have to be pretty stupid to think you can solve every problem without ever knowing them.

Bibs

Teksonic seems to have a fixation on people posting or requesting system specs - I think his opinion is that if you do post your specs it is some kind of ego thing. IIRC in another thread he stated that on other forums he visits people don't include their specs.
 
My experience is that in the Cubase forum many users post specs, the Ableton forum not so many and this forum about the same as Cubase.
 
Personally I post my specs because if I have an issue I don't want to have to dig up the information that may assist others in giving me assistance. If it doesn't help I don't see the harm.
 
Regards,

John
Welcome to the forum Savio.
 
ASIO 4 All is a driver wrapper. It says nothing about what your sound card is. For example I have a Edirol M16DX digital mixer. You may be using your built in sound chip on your motherboard.
 
Although you say all was well up until a few days ago with what you have I think you would be far better off with a good solid audio interface meant for multi track audio.  

Thanks.  I just read up on audio interfaces--essentially, they're external, high-functioning sound cards?  As far as I can determine, you're correct about the motherboard sound chip.  Now, would an audio interface bypass the setup in my computer (thus eliminating the ASIO 4 All sound issue)?  
 
I'm using both Sonar X2 and a MAGIX sound editing program (can't get to my PC at the moment for the exact name), and I trust that with an audio interface, I wouldn't have the issue of one or the other (MAGIX or Sonar) wanting to "own" the interface?  (-:  Sorry for the question overload, and thanks again.
 
 

Hi, everyone.  Many thanks for the replies.  If I weren't so spec-clueless (is that a word?), I would have given all that data gladly.  As it stands, my set-up isn't much of one--no audio interface, apparently no sound card (which *does* explain why I can't locate it in my system!), and my sound source a Casio WK-3800 synth, which I'm using for audio, MIDI input, and multi-channel MIDI playback (though the Casio's "Mixer" is quirky, to put it mildly).  My best results, to date, have been with recording Casio parts/tones and mixing them--as opposed to so-so results using MIDI in and out.  I suspect Casio's sound mixing is inadequate.  (Is that the definition of a given?)
 
Hopefully, I haven't broken a forum rule by mentioning Casio!  (-:  The WK-3800 has some great patches/tones, as in, far better than the brand name suggests.  However, given its terrible tone mixing/layering, I wonder if MIDI playback will be a problem even if/when I buy an audio interface (essentially an external sound card?).
At first chance, I'll reference the unhelpful Help page.  
 

If people would slow down and read the original post in it's entirety, they would realize that the OP wants to know why Sonar's help pages do not reference the menus/dialogue boxes in the same manner as they are presented to him by his O/S - Windows 7. So why not start there? What O/S did Cakewalk use as a reference when building their current help files?
 
System specs. Sheesh.
 
KEv

Teksonik

Problem: suddenly, for no evident reason, my Sonar X2 has stopped accepting input from my sound card (the one I downloaded to correct the latency problem--ASOL something).

 
It appears to be an ASIO4ALL driver issue.  "Stopped accepting" implies that your sound card did at one time accept input.  I'm running late for work right now but check the ASIO4ALL panel and see if your sound card is selected. I'll check back after work and see how things are going......
 
I haven't had a chance to check this video but it might be of help:
 
Getting ASIO4ALL working on Windows 7
 

Thanks!  This video may contain the answer.  Just previewed it, and it mentions the exact issue I'm experiencing.  I'll have to watch it on my own PC, which I'll do at first opportunity.  As I suspected, it's a MIDI/audio issue.  To clarify, for months my ASI04ALL driver (not card, I now realize!) has been giving audio to Sonar X2 without complaint.  No, no audio from ASIO4ALL to Sonar.
 
Once I'm back at my own PC, I can quote exact error messages, etc.  Thanks again.

If there is no physical "card" on your system then you are likely using the "onboard" sound on the motherboard. If you want to find this in Win7 go to Start > Control Panel > Hardware and Sound > Sound. A dialog will pop up and you will see what your computer is currently using. For example my Acer laptop which has no other audio devices on or attached to it and uses the motherboard's onboard sound is telling that it is using Conexant High Definition Audio. That is acting as my soundcard/sound driver. I could use Asio4all if I wanted to use that driver and have in the past but it is very unreliable. I believe in Sonar the other driver settings (there are options other than Asio) can handle onboard sound like this but I am unsure.
 
That said go to the Sound section of the control panel as I described and see what the computer is using as it's sound device/driver. Then in Sonar go to Preferences > Audio > Devices and you should see it in the list. If not I think you can run the Wave Profiler or whatever it is called and Sonar will scan for a device and it should appear. Asio4all may actually appear instead. Either way you just need to put a checkmark beside whatever device the computer is using. You may want to try uninstalling and reinstalling Asio4all to see if that shakes something loose.
 
If your Casio keyboard can be used as a USB MIDI controller (meaning you hook it up to the computer VIA a USB cable) then be sure to find the most current drivers for it and read the installation directions to get it running as a USB MIDI device. After that is done go into Sonar and go to Edit > Preferences > MIDI > Devices and there you should see the Casio as an option. Put a checkmark beside the appropriate entries. Now you can input notes and record within Sonar from the Casio. There is however a lot to learn about actually setting up softsynths and MIDI tracks to accept input from the controller. That is covered in the X2 manual. I suggest you work through all the tutorials at the start of the manual. They will give you a better idea about everything I've already described and much more.
 
Basically what I've tried to describe here is how to get it so you can input MIDI data into Sonar and get Sonar to play out through the sound section of your motherboard so you can hear the results. It is very basic and you really should get a proper interface at some point but hopefully if your system is powerful enough simple MIDI editing and playback should be possible.
 
I may have made a few errors in this as I'm still kind of new to the whole Sonar thing but hopefully the other guys will correct any mistakes I made.
 
Good luck.