Yeah, I'm still on 8.5.3 (64bit). I tried the demo version of the latest version (a year ago) and just didn't get along with it. Mainly the lack of phase and interleave buttons on individual tracks. It messes with my workflow so I'm not ready to make the jump yet.
 
Over to my problem:
 
I have multiple issues with the freeze function in 8.5. I have the exact same issues in my studio and on my home setup so it's definitely not computer or Windows related.
 
1) When using freeze with EastWest Symphonic Orchestra (Play engine) Sonar crashes when I unfreeze the tracks. With some instruments more often than others. There's a violin that ALWAYS crashes, I have NEVER been able to unfreeze it. Others can be 50-50 (at best). I usually need to attempt unfreezing at least 7-8 times before succeding.
 
2) When unfreezing audio tracks I sometimes loose all automation.
 
3) I also sometimes experience differences in volume when unfeeezing. And I mean AUDIBLE differences, not that the waveforms looks different (as they should). It does not seem to be plugin dependent, totally random. I have a feeling that freeze/unfreeze messes with the "offset" volume control but I haven't been able to confirm this as it happens so rarely and I tend to keep tracks frozen until final mixdown so I forget about any offset adjustments I've made before.
 
I'm usually working on pretty large projects (close to 100 tracks, multiple plugins on almost every track) that require a lot of processing power. Recently I've been forced to do a lot of work from home (sharing the studio part of the week to be able to cope financially) but my home computer can't handle these large projects without dropouts so I keep a lot of tracks frozen until final mixdown in my studio. When I did all my work in the studio this wasn't an issue so I never noticed it before. It has turned out to be a huge problem now. Buying a new computer for my home setup would be the obvious solution but it would be very expensive considering the processing power I need and also a HUGE hassle setting up a new computer for this (I've finally gotten both studio and home computer 100% stable with Sonar after years of repeated and unexplainable crashes, this is also a reason for me to not upgrade yet, never know what's gonna happen...).
 
Are any of these problems known issues with 8.5 or is it just me? If there IS a problem, is it fixed in later versions? Or is there a known solution for 8.5? Perhaps some setting I've missed? I've tried everything I can think of...
 
Any help will be much appreciated! :)
 

All three of those symptoms are due to bugs in 8.5 (that have since been fixed in later versions). Even though they'll never be fixed, there are workarounds. This is how I used to address them in 8.5...
 
What I would do for large instruments with lots of automation is freeze before automating. Then I'd create a new track, drag the frozen audio into it and do my automation on the new track. The frozen audio track, having been merely an intermediate step, could be deleted. If I needed to go back and work on the MIDI, there'd be no un-freezing required, just a re-freeze and re-copy the new version to the "real" audio track. 
 
This process also led me to adopt a practice of doing most of the volume automation in the MIDI track. That way I could get a rough mix for the part before freezing, and the MIDI automation would not affected by freezing/bouncing. 
 
There was a bug in 8.0 and 8.5 wherein mono tracks would experience a 3 dB gain after bouncing/freezing. I'd just anticipate that and use the Trim slider to compensate after bouncing.
 

Thanks, much appreciated!:)
 
It probably won't solve my problem entirely as I will need to freeze and unfreeze when taking projects back and forth between studio and home but at least this lets me know what to be aware of and work around it whenever I can.
 
Perhaps it's time to upgrade but the missing phase/interleave buttons really puts me off. Especially the interleave button, I really depend on that one. They are still missing right? Last time I checked was a year ago... I really wish these buttons could at least be customized to appear on individual tracks. I would upgrade TODAY if they were.