In my trials, it's "usable" under Parallels or VMWare, but can't be used for any serious recording. However, this isn't a limitation of Sonar, but rather Parallels and VMWare, which have gotten SO thick and heavy over the last several versions, despite company efforts to advertise them as being faster and faster. The first two versions of Parallels allowed Windows XP to boot (on my Duo-Core laptop) in 9 seconds! Every iteration made it slower and slower. The hand-off through the software induces high latency and low throughput, but on a MacPro it may be somewhat acceptable. I can only use it to edit or perform a lot of the offline automation I need.
 
With that said, if you've seen the latest announced Mac Pro's, it seems Apple doesn't seem to be focused on the Production market as much. Perhaps it's their way of telling the DAW brewers to adapt, but to me, I'm quite happy with how far Microsoft has come since Vista. Windows 7 is pretty darn solid. And hardware is cheap in comparison.
 

AT
I think a few of the long time users are amused that people are worried about cakewalk and the fact they aren't holding worried customer's hands.  That Cakewalk won't tell them and their competitors what Cake's next step is.  Because we've seen this all before.  In the golden days of yore Brandon etc. used to be on the forums all the time telling everyone exactly what was in the next update or version, kernal-like. 
 
It never happened.  Cake has never gotten specific about timelines other than soon.  They have never revealed what X2b/3 was like, or what was in SONAR 5.  Never will.  brandon and Seth were great and did spend time on the forum at TIMEs.  Most of the time they didn't, having a day job.  And we never found out what was coming until it got here, all wrapped up like a Christmas tree.  I suppose they have a timeline for releases, and I suppose these change w/ the Beta testing.  That is why they don't release timelines or prospecti, because they don't know.
 
For the record, I would like an update of X2.  It is glitchy, esp. w/ some of my 32 bit effects.  But then, iLok just released a complete redo and it is screwing up my softube bundle.  Much worse than most of Cake's sins.  X2 is a little glitchy, but nothing that stops me from working.  I just have to come up w/ clever work arounds and make sure to Save.
 
But I ain't worried about them and some secret plan to drain your bank accounts w/ faulty products.  They just spent money w/ Overloud to bring out a new PC effect rack.  Doesn't sound like Roland (who has been around longer than many on this forum) plans to dump Cakewalk
 
So chill dudes.  Make your views known here on the forum - just realize Cake doesn't use this forum for market research or tech support.  They do stop by in their free time to see what us users are saying, but it is usually as users themselves.
 
@

The golden times were before Seth and Brandon... Roland does come on here for damage control. The developers and beta testers all watch this forum btw.

Bob,
   You're quite right in all of this. Cheap, Fast, Reliable, Feature-Rich. Pick Two. It's the way of things, for sure. I'm personally OK with Sonar X2a, although I'm not using Take Lanes, and minimizing the editing I do, opting to automate instead to get around the issues I have. I'm also not doing as much mixing this month as I am Mastering, so I haven't been using Sonar as much lately.
 
Tell you guys what I'd like to see is if Cakewalk either feels or doesn't feel Take Lanes could use some improvement. But more, importantly, I'd like to see a list of known bugs in X2a that need to be fixed. It would shut a lot of us up, including me.

I'd also like to add, that X2a recently in the last three months has been solid. No crashes. I haven't changed anything to fix my machine, haven't installed or uninstalled any new drivers/software or anything, but suddenly is seems more solid. I have to be patient while it loads projects and plug-ins, as it's not as fast as X2 was, but it's humming along without a hitch. I'm finally in a state of "OK".

I think some sort of compilation list, probably maintained by Cakewalk, of bugs that are reported, (no information needed on which ones are or or not being addressed is fine), would be a helpful set of information for folks.
 
I think it best to have them post that, because it would remove all of the noise that would go along with that just being a user-posted thread.
 
 A simple list - no delivery dates or statuses, just to have awareness of things that are out there that one could run into.  I think such a thing would help folks plan how to do things, as well as lower overall frustrations from having put a bunch of effort into some way of doing something, only to find out the hard way some "you can't get there from here" kind of situation and such.
 
What do you Cakewalk folks think about doing something like that, as a sticky thread that you guys periodically update, if any new ones came along?
 
If it were to help you guys in any fashion, I would be happy to try to sweep through threads to come up with such a list, then I could email it to someone in Bakersville, for you guys to evaluate and decide whether or not to proceed with posting that kind of thing.
 
Bob Bone
 

karma1959
"WE DO WHAT WE WANT, SAY WHAT WE WANT, AND YOU JUST SIT AND WAIT LIKE A GOOD LITTLE
CUSTOMER..."


I think that's a really unfair representation of Cakewalk's response in this thread just because you didn't get the answer or level of detail you wanted.  Some vendors don't attend their forums at all - it's not as if CW hasn't provided any communication in years.  It's obvious you (and some others here) would like more frequent communication, but some comments in this thread come off as adolescent angst more than customer feedback requesting a company to alter their communication approach.

I'm responding to the OP in this thread....and it has NOT only been in THIS thread that Cake have stated that...

I'm responding to the Business Mentality also, as I've dealt with Cake for years....

A Business RELATIONSHIP is like ANY other relationship...without communication the RELATIONSHIP breaks down....

No one said that it was FAIR..just that it IS what it IS...I've also stated previously...
 
IF YOU DON'T LIKE WHAT CAKE IS DOING....go elsewhere...but we ALL have the right to express our "perceptions"

My comments aren't ANGST at all...I can get by with what I use....without issue...if Cake went under tomorrow...

THE SHOW MUST GO ON...

But their "Business Practices" are not conducive to a good "Business Relationship"
It's like me telling one of MY Customers "You'll get your Product when I'M READY TO GIVE IT TO YOU...SO SHUT UP"
or, after I've delivered the product, the Customer finds a problem and I say..."well Mr. Customer, I'll deal with that 
when I'm good and ready...and not before...so go away for now" ...get my point...

I don't think that would go over very well....that's my only point...

robert_e_bone
I think some sort of compilation list, probably maintained by Cakewalk, of bugs that are reported, (no information needed on which ones are or or not being addressed is fine), would be a helpful set of information for folks.
 
I think it best to have them post that, because it would remove all of the noise that would go along with that just being a user-posted thread.
 
 A simple list - no delivery dates or statuses, just to have awareness of things that are out there that one could run into.  I think such a thing would help folks plan how to do things, as well as lower overall frustrations from having put a bunch of effort into some way of doing something, only to find out the hard way some "you can't get there from here" kind of situation and such.
 
What do you Cakewalk folks think about doing something like that, as a sticky thread that you guys periodically update, if any new ones came along?
 
If it were to help you guys in any fashion, I would be happy to try to sweep through threads to come up with such a list, then I could email it to someone in Bakersville, for you guys to evaluate and decide whether or not to proceed with posting that kind of thing.
 
Bob Bone
 

Hi Bob,
 
Check out my post here: http://forum.cakewalk.com/FindPost/2853144 . If people want to identify bugs, they should seriously contact us so we can do it the proper way. That system (the problem report system) has resulted in thousands of resolved bugs over the years. Let's continue to use it and encourage people to use it. If we decide to go a different route in the future it will be driven and managed by us.
 
 
To everyone, 
 
I think it's time to retire this thread. Andrew and myself answered questions as best as we could, and people have all expressed themselves quite clearly. We're at the point where we're repeating ourselves and the actual responses are being lost.
 
Sorry guys, let's move on to other topics. As we stated, we'll let everyone in on the loop when we have news.