Even as a "long" time cakewalk user, DP8 is now on my radar.
As soon as the Windows release is ready,
I will add it to my tool sets.
I will wait and see what happens with Sonar X evolutions
before I spend more.

Don Belisle

  @AT... The hyperbole around here has really been getting to me lately. It shouldn't but it does. I'd like you to know I think you are one of the good ones and I appreciate all the help you've given me and your contributions to this forum in general. Keep up the good work. Cheers. 

AT's post is a good one and I think very accurate and very well received by me.

Beep did you get my PM? 

I did, John. Sorry I haven't replied yet. Just watching some g3 vids right now while my brain is still working. We good, man. ;-)

AT is absolutely right, but I've been through many of these types of situations. They aren't typically decided on by truly strategic people. These decisions are typically based on bean-counting consultant-driven decisions that have little to no knowledge of the company history or true vision. Apple ditched Steve jobs in the late 80's. I'm sure it was a good decision at the time, and yes, this is a poor example, but sometimes you have to look ahead beyond this year. Most corporations don't really do this.

AT

It was, and is, one of the premiere DAWs.  What else is on that list?  ProTools, Cubase and Cakewalk.

ProTools is the only 'Premiere' DAW. Everyone else is fighting for a slice of that pie. I wouldn't put Cubase, Cakewalk, Reaper, or anyone in the same caliber as ProTools. I'm not defending ProTools by any means, but it is what it is.

For the PC, there is only Reaper for a full fledged recording environment, and it has made inroads because it is cheap and fairly no-frills.  The same kind of people as Fruity Loops.  There is Live and Reason, which are niche players.  So, Cakewalk by Roland ain't going anywhere.

It's $225 dollars for a Commercial Use license for Reaper. I wouldn't call that cheap. And it's certainly not a 'no-frills' solution. There's a lot of plug-in's that come with Reaper, it's rock solid, you can run it natively on Mac, and it just works. You can even run it from a Thumb Drive. There's a robust community of users, there's a whole community that does Themes. We have Panup who had to hack Sonar to do what he does. Thanks Panup btw.

So Roland pays good money and the economy tanks.  Less money for everything, including music software.  Then Cake releases X1, which is a new interface for their software.  I liked it, but it was confusing.  Cleaner, but nothing was where it was in earlier versions of SONAR, which slowed work on it until I learned it.  That and a lot of shortcuts.  Then there were whole new methodolgies involved.  Appologies to FBB, but I never got screensets.  I knew in theory what I could do, but I never embraced them and am still only slowly learning to incorporate them.  Usually when I'm working, I want to get a project finished, not practise learning how to use a completely new feature since the old methods still work.

X1 comes out to good press releases, although it is noted X1 has more than its fair share of bugs.  But more importantly, it drives away some long time customers w/ its newfangled methods.

What drove away customers was more the bugs X1 was released with from what I recall, especially with the Pro Channel, which still hasn't been fully resolved.

And new customers, reading the big piles of stinking complaints on the forums and not doing due diligence checking other software forums and not having a lot of cash to spend, don't jump on the X1 bandwagon like Cake hoped w/ their redesign.

This is the kind of statement that starts bad threads rolling. The "big piles of stinking complaints" were legitimate. X1 was released with massive amounts of bugs. Bugs, which I recently discovered, were not in the pre-releases sent to reviewers. It seems that the reviews were actually pretty accurate, which amazes me. Why would Cakewalk release working versions of software to reviewers, but not to their paying customers? That reeks of foul. That reeks of keeping people in the upgrade cycle to me in my opinion.

X2 is well received, but a lot of Cake people leave, and some not on their own.  There have been PR and tech support people leaving, in case you didn't know.  A lot of the old crew.  Welcome to corporate reality.  It sucks.  But as far as I can tell, most of the coders remain.

X2 had fewer problems and I agree there was not as much turmoil as X1's release, but I certainly wouldn't give the impression it was well received. I think it would be more accurate to say it was received better than X1, but X2 certainly has it's share of problems. For example, Take Lanes are extremely buggy, just like the Pro Channel was when it was released.

@

I'm not going to engage in a back and forth and let this snowball out of control. It's my opinion, which I believe to be more 'middle of the road' and accurate.

Thanks,

Bub

Bub

AT

It was, and is, one of the premiere DAWs.  What else is on that list?  ProTools, Cubase and Cakewalk.

ProTools is the only 'Premiere' DAW. Everyone else is fighting for a slice of that pie. I wouldn't put Cubase, Cakewalk, Reaper, or anyone in the same caliber as ProTools. I'm not defending ProTools by any means, but it is what it is.

For the PC, there is only Reaper for a full fledged recording environment, and it has made inroads because it is cheap and fairly no-frills.  The same kind of people as Fruity Loops.  There is Live and Reason, which are niche players.  So, Cakewalk by Roland ain't going anywhere.

It's $225 dollars for a Commercial Use license for Reaper. I wouldn't call that cheap. And it's certainly not a 'no-frills' solution. There's a lot of plug-in's that come with Reaper, it's rock solid, you can run it natively on Mac, and it just works. You can even run it from a Thumb Drive. There's a robust community of users, there's a whole community that does Themes. We have Panup who had to hack Sonar to do what he does. Thanks Panup btw.

So Roland pays good money and the economy tanks.  Less money for everything, including music software.  Then Cake releases X1, which is a new interface for their software.  I liked it, but it was confusing.  Cleaner, but nothing was where it was in earlier versions of SONAR, which slowed work on it until I learned it.  That and a lot of shortcuts.  Then there were whole new methodolgies involved.  Appologies to FBB, but I never got screensets.  I knew in theory what I could do, but I never embraced them and am still only slowly learning to incorporate them.  Usually when I'm working, I want to get a project finished, not practise learning how to use a completely new feature since the old methods still work.

X1 comes out to good press releases, although it is noted X1 has more than its fair share of bugs.  But more importantly, it drives away some long time customers w/ its newfangled methods.

What drove away customers was more the bugs X1 was released with from what I recall, especially with the Pro Channel, which still hasn't been fully resolved.

And new customers, reading the big piles of stinking complaints on the forums and not doing due diligence checking other software forums and not having a lot of cash to spend, don't jump on the X1 bandwagon like Cake hoped w/ their redesign.

This is the kind of statement that starts bad threads rolling. The "big piles of stinking complaints" were legitimate. X1 was released with massive amounts of bugs. Bugs, which I recently discovered, were not in the pre-releases sent to reviewers. It seems that the reviews were actually pretty accurate, which amazes me. Why would Cakewalk release working versions of software to reviewers, but not to their paying customers? That reeks of foul. That reeks of keeping people in the upgrade cycle to me in my opinion.

X2 is well received, but a lot of Cake people leave, and some not on their own.  There have been PR and tech support people leaving, in case you didn't know.  A lot of the old crew.  Welcome to corporate reality.  It sucks.  But as far as I can tell, most of the coders remain.

X2 had fewer problems and I agree there was not as much turmoil as X1's release, but I certainly wouldn't give the impression it was well received. I think it would be more accurate to say it was received better than X1, but X2 certainly has it's share of problems. For example, Take Lanes are extremely buggy, just like the Pro Channel was when it was released.

@

I'm not going to engage in a back and forth and let this snowball out of control. It's my opinion, which I believe to be more 'middle of the road' and accurate.

Thanks,

Bub

? Bub?
 
I don't know what planet you are living on but if it is something that really sucks bigtime and outdate it is Pro Tools!
Is that why all pro ditch pro tools?
  
 
Reaper? Please... allmost second from that list "black list"
 

I'm going to have a good look at the next version of Sonar but it's not going to be a day one purchase this time.

I own Nuendo but hate it so am going to sell that and maybe audition DP and Samplitude and compare them to the new Sonar.

backwoods


I'm going to have a good look at the next version of Sonar but it's not going to be a day one purchase this time.

I own Nuendo but hate it so am going to sell that and maybe audition DP and Samplitude and compare them to the new Sonar.

I have used Samplitude too. Many cool features like revolver tracks etc but be aware DAW controller support is not very good. SSL Nucleus doesn't work for example nor SSL Matrix, Duality etc..

I don't own a quarter million dollar SSL desk fortunately :)