Andrew Rossa [Cakewalk]

Guitarmech111

Andrew Rossa [Cakewalk]
It's not realistic to expect us to communicate about product plans, road maps, or business plans. I understand the frustration but don't take the silence as a sign of something bad. FWIW, this kind of speculation has been happening for over a decade. It's nothing new. We are all hard at work and when we have something we can discuss, we'll definitely communicate that to our customers via our website, emails, and forums. 
 
I do want to stress that anyone having serious issues should always contact Cakewalk support directly. We are happy to help out and often times a quick call can resolve an issue. 
 
 

Andrew, Many already have reported issues and there is STILL NO X2b update mentioned or available for download. Come out with a statement about that and I can be swayed.

With that said, I know a lot of the older users who I have communicated with for many years are now switching to Cubase and Studio one. Since I do not use X2, I am seriously thinking about trying the other guys out. I still have 8.5 which works flawlessly though, so I am not in  hurry to crossgrade. I would like to use what I paid for as a loyal Cakewalk supporter and user, but I don't know how long that will last.

Just to be clear, there are many more customers who love SONAR X2. Our survey results expressed that very fact. I understand people have issues and problems come up. But basing an opinion on a product from reading a help forum is not the best idea. It's like going to a mechanic shop and asking the customers there how they feel about their car at that moment. 
 
It would be much better to try out the demo yourself and make the judgement. 
 
And again for people having issues, please contact us directly. We are here to help.

Man, like pulling teeth...

Okay, so if I'm reading between the lines correctly it does indeed sound like there may be plans for a patch but they can't just come right out and say it. Perhaps that's being optimistic but the wording suggests with a wink and a nudge that that may be what's going on and it is appreciated. I know the bigwig muckymucks must have your hands tied and I'm sure it is infuriating to be put in this position. It would be nice if they let you guys do your jobs as you see fit. You know us. We know you. They know jack.
 
I was quite literally about to download Reaper and start learning how to use it. I will hold off for now because of the statements here and how I am interpreting them. I am relatively new customer and love X2 and you will continue getting my dollars if we get this patch instead of an upgrade. This is what the corporate guys need to understand is that they have let it get to mission critical. It's not just the usual bashers doing their thing... the general community is getting antsy and starting to bail. You may have already lost some customers. I've seen quite a few dudes who've said they've already jumped to Cubase7 recently and before that we had a small exodus going over to S1.
 
X2 is AWESOME. It is everything I want and need from a program... when it works. The selection issue is a huge pain. The graphics issues are disorienting. Audiosnap is hard to use because of it's odd general behavior and for some reason if you save in the middle of a session you can't go back to where you left off because the project become unstable. Those are my problems and they waste a lot of time. They seem to be effecting a large amount of users so I know it's not just me being a dumb ass. I truly think that a patch will clean up some of the jitteriness in those areas. Then I will be a happy Beep.
 
If I have to pay for it though and/or any fixes come via an upgrade that has a whole new set of features to gum up the works again it is doubtful I will upgrade.
 
I'm generally one of the more positive dudes on here and I ain't slamming Cake. That's just where my head is at. The bigwigs want to play "business is business"... well then as a consumer I guess I gotta take the same mentality.
 
I really do wish you guys had shown up in the more positive thread we had earlier this week though instead of waiting for things to boil over like they have here. Could have saved some of the angst.
 
Good luck and let us know what's up as soon as you can. Cheers.

I think of X2 as the paid bugs patch to X1.
 
X2 didn't fix enough for me and it introduced new problems.
 
As an owner of X1 I have vested interest in my bug fixes. I realize that I will have to pay for X2 or X3 to get the bugs fixed and this leaves me with the opinion that my opinion of how satisfied I am with X2 and it's ability to satisfy the needs introduced by X1/X1 Expanded is indeed pertinent. Cakewalk either cares about a guy who sent them a couple thousand dollars or it doesn't... really, does it? :-)
 
I think the surveys and an interest in surveys is remarkably short sighted and the use of them is hardly an effective substitute for managing a commitment to fix bugs regardless of their popularity and notoriety.
 
I mean, just think... wouldn't it be nice if Fit To Improvisation worked the way it was advertised to?
 
Wouldn't it be awesome if I didn't have to hand locate every transient in Audio Snap so they are actually on the transient? I wouldn't mind so much... but I've seen some other-brand stuff that actually works.
 
Wouldn't it be great if Cakewalk stuff just worked so well that you didn't have any competition?
 
I'm ready to buy X3... maybe I'll get a survey. ;-)
 
all the best,
mike
 
 
 
 
 

Andrew Rossa [Cakewalk]

mike_mccue
"Just to be clear, there are many more customers who love SONAR X2. Our survey results expressed that very fact."
 
Is that the survey that was limited to a survey set of people who loved X2 before it asked them how they liked it?
 
What happens to the hopes and aspirations of the long time customers whom have spent a couple thousand dollars with Cakewalk but didn't buy X2? What happens to the opinions of people that didn't like X2 enough to pay for it?
 
Trash can?
 
 
best regards,
mike
 
 

A survey that sets out to answer the questions of how satisfied you are with SONAR X2 would only be limited to SONAR X2 customers. We have surveyed other groups asking how they liked X1 and why they haven't upgraded. 

I seriously am glad Cakewalk/Roland employees are doing their jobs instead of addressing every whiney thread that pops up.  If anything I know about dealing with constant complainers is that no answer other than exactly what they want to hear will do.  Every answer leads to a stream of more questions and complaints.  We get plenty of response on this forum and customer support.  Cakewalk does send us surveys and has appropriate means of sending feedback and suggestions..  Just because they don't implement  every simple wild hair someone has up their ___ does not mean they are being cold and silent. 
 
I have found over the years the cakewalk staff to be very helpful on these forums when there is a specific question with narrow enough pare meters to have a definitive answer. There is just no way they can keep up with the whine level even if they tried.  The guys that practically live on this board 24/7 and want to be helpful don't have time to respond to every one of these threads, let alone breakdown every strawman and red herring argument presented.  Does the OP have even a rough guess as to how many longtime Cakewalk users are "jumping ship" to Cubase?  I'm sure there are Cubase users who jump ship to Sonar.  I know at least one and i am sure there are more.
 
Before I get dismissed as some "fan boy", I can break down flaws and frustrations of X2 with the best of them.  It has its shortcomings, like EVERY product in existence.  It has it's pluses too and for most of us hre, those clearly outweigh the negatives.
 
As far as the patch or lack of patch.  I seriously would rather they put their resources in the next version if it's already in the pipeline than spend too much time trying gto pacify every little complaint in a perpetually uphill battle.  We all know that at some point Cakewalk will provide the newer version dirt cheap anyway.
 
 

Beepster
Okay, so if I'm reading between the lines correctly it does indeed sound like there may be plans for a patch but they can't just come right out and say it. Perhaps that's being optimistic but the wording suggests with a wink and a nudge that that may be what's going on and it is appreciated. I know the bigwig muckymucks must have your hands tied and I'm sure it is infuriating to be put in this position. It would be nice if they let you guys do your jobs as you see fit. You know us. We know you. They know jack.
 
I was quite literally about to download Reaper and start learning how to use it. I will hold off for now because of the statements here and how I am interpreting them. I am relatively new customer and love X2 and you will continue getting my dollars if we get this patch instead of an upgrade. This is what the corporate guys need to understand is that they have let it get to mission critical. It's not just the usual bashers doing their thing... the general community is getting antsy and starting to bail. You may have already lost some customers. I've seen quite a few dudes who've said they've already jumped to Cubase7 recently and before that we had a small exodus going over to S1.
 
X2 is AWESOME. It is everything I want and need from a program... when it works. The selection issue is a huge pain. The graphics issues are disorienting. Audiosnap is hard to use because of it's odd general behavior and for some reason if you save in the middle of a session you can't go back to where you left off because the project become unstable. Those are my problems and they waste a lot of time. They seem to be effecting a large amount of users so I know it's not just me being a dumb ass. I truly think that a patch will clean up some of the jitteriness in those areas. Then I will be a happy Beep.
 
If I have to pay for it though and/or any fixes come via an upgrade that has a whole new set of features to gum up the works again it is doubtful I will upgrade.
 
I'm generally one of the more positive dudes on here and I ain't slamming Cake. That's just where my head is at. The bigwigs want to play "business is business"... well then as a consumer I guess I gotta take the same mentality.
 
I really do wish you guys had shown up in the more positive thread we had earlier this week though instead of waiting for things to boil over like they have here. Could have saved some of the angst.
 
Good luck and let us know what's up as soon as you can. Cheers.

Thanks for being so positive. There is no wink wink or nudge here. We don't have a comment on the future of SONAR other than we believe it to be very bright and we are listening to all our customers. Please don't take our communication here to mean anything else or read between the lines. That wasn't the intention at all.

mike_mccue
I think of X2 as the paid bugs patch to X1.
 
X2 didn't fix enough for me and it introduced new problems.
 
As an owner of X1 I have vested interest in my bug fixes. I realize that I will have to pay for X2 or X3 to get the bugs fixed and this leaves me with the opinion that my opinion of how satisfied I am with X2 and it's ability to satisfy the needs introduced by X1/X1 Expanded is indeed pertinent. Cakewalk either cares about a guy who sent them a couple thousand dollars or it doesn't... really, does it? :-)
 
I think the surveys and an interest in surveys is remarkably short sighted and the use of them is hardly an effective substitute for managing a commitment to fix bugs regardless of their popularity and notoriety.
 
I mean, just think... wouldn't it be nice if Fit To Improvisation worked the way it was advertised to?
 
Wouldn't it be awesome if I didn't have to hand locate every transient in Audio Snap so they are actually on the transient? I wouldn't mind so much... but I've seen some other-brand stuff that actually works.
 
Wouldn't it be great if Cakewalk stuff just worked so well that you didn't have any competition?
 
I'm ready to buy X3... maybe I'll get a survey. ;-)
 
all the best,
mike

Mike, you didn't use "classic" anywhere in this response.   What's up with that?  
 
 
FWIW, I think of X2 as a more refined and improved version of X1.   So if you didn't like X1 in the first place, then I'd imagine that refinements and improvements are probably not enough to do it for you.    Bring on X3!        
PS....  I've heard rumors that X3 will come with a new survey in Pro Channel format.   
 

Nice to see the bakers replying, even if they are somewhat generic responses with no actual insight as to if issues that have been raised on this forum and via reports are ACTUALLY being dealt with.

What would be nice would be a simple pinned thread at the top which could be modded heavily and used as a means of telling people that such and such a bug is currently being worked out....at least giving some sort of indication that it's not going to be another age before people get updates that are overdue. A lack of communication and feedback between the company and those users who experienced issues just stokes the fire and does put many off.

I've used Sonar since v4, love the program but on times it has it's quirks and i've had to avoid upgrading on times just because of bad experiences.
I only recently downloaded the update to v2, in all honesty, scared to install or make use of it until i've completed what I am doing in x1 (which I had to avoid until x1d >.<) I still go back to 8.5 on times, the interface was much better and definitely didn't have the bugs and learning curve of X1 onwards.

I suppose I just could have said "COMMUNICATION" and left it at that really, it's the biggest thing lacking with this company and really does put the dampener on what should be a top of the line product.

mike_mccue
I think of X2 as the paid bugs patch to X1.
 

Sorry to pick on you yet again, Mike but I don't agree with that at all. X2 is a very different beast than X1 was. There were some very significant changes in workflow (which IMO were major improvements). Take lanes, time ruler zoom, auto track zoom, new effects and included modules. A lot of things changed and for the better. X1 was alright I guess but X2 blows it away. It is also much more stable in the sense the major crashes I used to get in X1 were gone and it doesn't freeze up nearly as much or as badly and I'm assuming that's because of the new/improved audio engine (which would be an actual improvement... not a bug fix). In X2 it is all sorts of minor glitches and annoyances and they were not there in X1. It is ALMOST there. Just one good patch and I'm good.
 
BTW... have you bought it and used it yet or are you basing your assumption on what you see posted here and the marketing vids? Because really... it is quite different.

mike_mccue
I think of X2 as the paid bugs patch to X1.
 
X2 didn't fix enough for me and it introduced new problems.
 
As an owner of X1 I have vested interest in my bug fixes. I realize that I will have to pay for X2 or X3 to get the bugs fixed and this leaves me with the opinion that my opinion of how satisfied I am with X2 and it's ability to satisfy the needs introduced by X1/X1 Expanded is indeed pertinent. Cakewalk either cares about a guy who sent them a couple thousand dollars or it doesn't... really, does it? :-)
 
I think the surveys and an interest in surveys is remarkably short sighted and the use of them is hardly an effective substitute for managing a commitment to fix bugs regardless of their popularity and notoriety.
 
I mean, just think... wouldn't it be nice if Fit To Improvisation worked the way it was advertised to?
 
Wouldn't it be awesome if I didn't have to hand locate every transient in Audio Snap so they are actually on the transient? I wouldn't mind so much... but I've seen some other-brand stuff that actually works.
 
Wouldn't it be great if Cakewalk stuff just worked so well that you didn't have any competition?
 
I'm ready to buy X3... maybe I'll get a survey. ;-)
 
all the best,
mike
 
 
 
 
 

Andrew Rossa [Cakewalk]

mike_mccue
"Just to be clear, there are many more customers who love SONAR X2. Our survey results expressed that very fact."
 
Is that the survey that was limited to a survey set of people who loved X2 before it asked them how they liked it?
 
What happens to the hopes and aspirations of the long time customers whom have spent a couple thousand dollars with Cakewalk but didn't buy X2? What happens to the opinions of people that didn't like X2 enough to pay for it?
 
Trash can?
 
 
best regards,
mike
 
 

A survey that sets out to answer the questions of how satisfied you are with SONAR X2 would only be limited to SONAR X2 customers. We have surveyed other groups asking how they liked X1 and why they haven't upgraded. 

 A survey is not a way to prioritize or manage bugs and issues. We have other vehicles for that. I don't think it's such an awful thing to ask people who own the product what they think of it and collect some data. It's definitely a good vehicle to collect feedback about the experience. I'm sorry you don't agree. 
 
Also, we stated that we would keep results private so we aren't going to share the data other than to say it was positive. I'm sure you'll interpret that in your own way but again this not the kind of information we would just publicly post and let competitors see. 

thebiglongy


I suppose I just could have said "COMMUNICATION" and left it at that really, it's the biggest thing lacking with this company and really does put the dampener on what should be a top of the line product.

 
The fact that two employees are engaging you right now shows they are committed to communication.  Just because a person is not saying what you want to hear does not mean they are not communicating. My company is a fraction of the size of Cakewalk and I find myself struggling at times to give even one needy client the exact answer they want.  They never say it in these terms, but no matter how much you ben over backwards, some are better satisfied without some magical holy grail of an answer.  If they are working on an X2b patch it is either not tweaked enough to make an announcement or they are working on X3.  In either scenario, they are not likely to tip their hand until they have something useful to announce.