During the boot up process when I first start Sonar X2a it hangs up during the scan process. This only became a problem after adding Melodyne Assistant. I'm using a Sweetwater Creation Station (Windows 7) which has a backup program called Acronis True Image. The scan process stops at:
 
 
c:Program Files (86)Acronis\TrueImageHome\tishell32.dll
 
 
My first thought was that this program was conflicting with Melodyne, so I contacted Sweetwater support with a description of the problem. Their response was:
 
 
"This is probably being caused by an improper scan path that was added in Sonar. If you are able to get into Sonar, click Utilities -> Cakewalk Plugin Manager -> Options -> and make sure you don't have a scan path that is just C:Program Files."
 
 
I did this and found that all the items in the list under Options are directed to "c:\program files". The final one on the list is:
 
c:\program files\common files\vst2\celemony\melodyne
 
 
So now, seeing that they are directed to c;\program files, I have no idea where they should be directed. Since this seems like more of a Sonar issue rather than one caused by the Sweetwater software, I'm directing my question to this forum. I'm a bit vague in my understanding of Plugin Management, so I guess my question is: how & where should these plugins be directed?
 
 
Any insight and instruction for solving this problem? From reading the various posts on this forum I can see that some of you are vastly more knowledgeable than I am.
 
 
My PC specs are:
 
Operating system: Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit
CPU: Intel Ive Bridge Core i7 Quad 3.4GHz
Motherboard: Intel H67 Express Chipset
Memory: 8GB DDR3/1600
2 Hard Drives: 500GB (program) & 1TB (audio)
 
Audio interface is:
 
Focusrite Saffire Pro 40 (firewire)
 
Thanks in advance for any help.
 
Katnip a.k.a. Charlie

I am guessing your are running 64bit SONAR. If so, you need to make sure that your registry entry "HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Cakewalk Music Software\SONAR Producer\Cakewalk VST X64\Paths" does not contain "C:\Program Files (x86)" which would cause the Plugin manager to scan the entire "C:\Program Files (x86)" directory tree. As with any recommendation WRT registry edits be careful, make backups.

did you add any new entry's to your plug in manager by any chance?
any new paths ?
 
pretty much what scott is saying, but in a nutshell,
only add the path where the plug in is. not every file and there brother's too :)

Yes, I'm running 64 bit Sonar. I haven't added anything to the plugin manager myself. The only changes would be what the programs I've loaded have added/changed; I just follow the prompts and let the software configure itself. 
 
I think that the plugin manager is scanning the entire "C:\Program Files (x86)" directory tree. It seems to take a very long time for Sonar to boot up to the point where it stops. I'll have to pay more attention to the boot process to be sure that what I'm talking about is just the plugin scan. My knowledge in this area is sketchy.
 
At this point it's not a serious enough problem to prevent me from using Sonar. When the "not responding" prompt pops up, it offers a few choices (I'm not at the music computer so I can't be specific). If I close the prompt without choosing an option it bypasses the remainder of the boot process and allows me to open a Sonar project.
 
I just recently upgraded to X2 from Sonar 8.0 on a machine running Windows XP, so I'm still learning my way around on X2. I have a lot of catching up to do.   
 
Thanks for the responses so far.

From inside SONAR you can configure which directories the Plugin Manager will scan from two places. First from Edit > Preferences > File > VST Settings. Second from Utilities > Plugin Manager the Options button in VST Configuration will bring up a "Cakewalk VST Scan Paths" dialog. Either way, you should remove "C:\Program Files (x86)". If you have plugin dlls installed in "C:\Program Files (x86), you have a couple of options. The easiest would be to move them to directory under "C:\Program Files (x86)" like "C:\Program Files (x86)\Vstplugins" and add the directory path to the Plugin Manager. Or if you can determine what plugins the dlls belong to, uninstall the plugins and reinstall paying attention to the VST plugin path.

Thanks the detail, scook. That's what I need. I've printed out your instructions and will see if that solves the problem. I think it probably will.

pretty sure the default folder for 32bit plugins is C:\Program Files (x86)\Cakewalk\Vstplugins -AND- 64bit plugins go to C:\Program Files\Cakewalk\Vstplugins So add these to your plugin scan folder list. There might be some other folder locations where third party plugs created their own folders for dlls. You can do a windows search and pull up appropriate folder locations and then just add to that list within the plug manager scan path. It might be a Melodyne issue too. They have horrible track record with Sonar. Anyway, make sure to have latest update of their software. Pretty sure one of those plugs you need to add as exception in UAC since it pings celemony on startup.

Thanks, gerberbaby. This is all good information I'm getting in this thread. I need to bring myself up to speed on this and a host of other aspects involving software recording. I won't be able to dig into this for a few days so I won't know if these suggestions solve the issue, but I certainly appreciate the help.
 
I've wondered if this might be a Melodyne issue rather than a Sonar issue since all was well until I added the Melodyne software.  I've found a few of the bugs in X2 that have been discussed on this board, but have managed to find work-arounds for them. This issue gets into areas that I'm fairly ignorant about, but it's not preventing me from getting work done, so I've been putting up with it for a few weeks. DAW software has gotten complex through the years. Sure is a lot to learn & remember.
 
Thanks again for the help.
 
 

just be aware if your running x2 on windows xp you may have some issues that can not be supported, because XP is not supported for x2.
on a side note, the x2 a patch can not be installed using windows xp, only 7 +8

just be aware if your running x2 on windows xp you may have some issues that can not be supported, because XP is not supported for x2.
on a side note, the x2 a patch can not be installed using windows xp, only 7 +8

Pssst. Charlie:

My PC specs are:
 
Operating system: Windows 7 Home Premium 64-bit

Just sayin.......................