It looks to me like you're using the onboard soundcard of your laptop with an ASIO4ALL driver.  I am not an experienced Sonar user myself so you have to take my advice with a pinch of salt, however my understanding is that you need a proper audio interface (soundcard) because the one built into your laptop will have severe limitations.  The one I use is the UA25-EX, it's an external box linked by USB that Roland do, but there are lots of others on the market.

I wasn't sure whether your MPD32 would also serve as the audio interface, is there any way you can select it under the Edit | Preferences | Devices?  Where is your sound coming out of?  Are you plugging headphones directly into the laptop or are you getting the sound off the MPD32?

no the pd 32 doesn't have any sound from it at all. just a straight controller.  I hear sound from the speakers of the laptop, but I use the momiter headphones I got with everything. 

Invest in a decent sound card/audio interface. Even a $99 interface is better than the onboard chip set. Onboard cards are not really meant for use with professional recording software like Sonar.

After you get one, install its drivers and let sonar run the wave profiler. Then try ASIO and WDM driver mode to see what works best for you

CJ

My recommendations were based on an actual audio interface being present.

ASIO4ALL is freeware that essentially wraps around WDM drivers to simulate ASIO, but it can be problematic depending on memory and horsepower of your system.

A dedicated audio interface has circuitry that performs the fairly processing-intensive task of analog/digital conversion (in addition to providing inputs and outputs and usually mic pre-amps and such).  By moving the task of all of that conversion, it frees up your CPU for other things.  Using a dedicated audio interface can make a WORLD of difference with improved audio quality - less dropouts, etc.

Using ASIO4ALL means that your CPU is still responsible for doing all of that conversion - it's just presented to your system using ASIO.  This can lead to distorted sound and dropouts, which sounds like what you are experiencing.

I am no expert on getting things to sound decent when using ASIO4ALL - there are others that use it successfully for that, and there are those for which it just does not do the trick on their systems.  There are some folks in the forum who can hopefully assist in getting ASIO4ALL to sound OK for you.

My recommendation is that you consider buying at least a basic dedicated audio interface for use with Sonar.  ASIO4ALL is potentially not going to give you good results.  Since you are using Windows 8, you MUST do some homework when you are shopping for an audio interface, as not all of them have drivers that work in Windows 8.  Generally, cost for an audio interface goes up quite a bit, depending on the number and quality of inputs/outputs, pre-amps and converters (digital/analog).  If you do not need many inputs and outputs, you can look for one of the more basic (and less expensive) interfaces.

Bob Bone

32 or 64-bit Windows 8? 32 or 64 bit Sonar X2?

Get a USB audio interface and get rid of the USB microphone. They are trouble.

hmmm... A bunch of us already pointed out that you need an audio interface in another thread you started. We offered quite a few suggestions as well.

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/accessories/nady-smps-1x-phantom-power-supply
 would this be sufficient?  and the mic isn't a usb, I was mistaken.  It uses xlr connections.  I picked up a xlr to usb cable when I purchased everything.  if this would work, ill need to get an xlr cable for it and then I should be able to ust the xlr to usb cable to plug into correct?

Bob Bone and CJ have confirmed my suspicions and they're much more experienced than me; I also strongly recommend that you get yourself an audio interface.  Sonar is placing too much demand on your laptop when you are using the onboard soundcard.  An external audio interface will free up your machine from the audio conversion burden and then it will fly.

I had a look at the link you provided - that's not an audio interface, although I think there's something similar that does combine an audio interface as well.  I'd be more inclined to go with a Roland for piece of mind:-

http://www.musiciansfrien...re-usb-audio-interface

All the best ...

No. You NEED an interface to get the signal into the computer.

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/pro-audio/nady-smps-usb-phantom-power-supply-and-usb-audio-interface more like this?  you said earlier I needed phantom power for the mic earlier.  so if that's needed something like this maybe?