I know the 32bit days are almost over, but I still need to bring up this question of how to handle the still good sounding legacy tools.
 
I hadn't used a 32bit FX or synth in a while, but when I needed one just recently I opened up a can of worms, getting almost random crashes after weeks of nice stability until I narrowed it down to 32bit VST synth most likely causing it (I'm still working on it).
 
Sonars bit bridge dates back to Nov 2009 and with 32bit going out of style it'll never be updated.
jBridge is still under maintenance with most recent upgrades in spring 2012.
 
Which one are you guys using? For which FX  / VST?
 
 
 

I use jBridge more than Bitbridge. Mainly I use it for Drumagog and the Korg Legacy collection. In particular the Legacy Cell was very problematic for me under Bitbridge. Drumagog was a little finicky as well, but jBridge fixed that. The other reason I use it more is that I was always getting "Telesport Server" errors with Bitbridge, either in SONAR itself, or when trying to close it down. jBridge is very inexpensive, works nicely and seems more stable to me.

I personally recommend a dual-boot Windows 7 machine (one instance of 32-bit and one instance of 64-bit) vs. bit-bridging. I don't have much luck with the bit-bridging, and it causes me a lot of grief. It seems to make performance worse than just using 32-bit Windows, and doesn't work for some plugins. 

Sonar installed on each boot version of Windows works well with sessions from the other bit version of Windows. However, licensing should be flexible to doing this. I wouldn't be surprised if that overlooked, but Cakewalk/Roland shouldn't be balking at the idea. If you need to boot up Windows 32-bit and use Sonar there, any retribution required for doing this would be unreasonable, IMHO.

No need to use dual boot. Simply install both the 32 and 4 bit versions in their respective folders (32 bit in the program files (x86))

You can then simply switch between them at will...

I did this for a while but I've abandoned most 32 bit devices by now. Actually, I use PC modules for almost everything. 

Keni

That's a good point, Keni. Unfortunately, though, in my case, I found at least one plug-in that simply wouldn't work in 64-Bit Windows. I also found that I saved my own butt from a Waves plug-in disaster, thanks to Sonar for holding Waves Shell versions too tightly. By having the Waves shell version 9.0 updated to version 9.2, Sonar was still "looking" for 9.0. After a reste, all of the plug-in settings were gone. Having the Waveshell 9.0 still installed under W7 32-bit, I booted there, opened the sessions in that version and saved all the Waves plug-in settings before Resetting All Plug-Ins in 64-Bit. 

It was a mess, and time-consuming, and although I blame Sonar for holding specific versions of plug-ins hostage, I praise them for the ability to seamlessly open the same session in the 32-bit version of Sonar. 

I personally prefer jbridge. The interface is a little easier to use and it doesn't insist on staying on top all the while.

Interesting posts.

Seems like I should give jBridge a try.

BTW, does x-ray work with jBridge?

Good question, never used X-Ray, it never played nice with my Waves stuff so I gave up on it way back in 2007. jBridge does have an issue with the GIUs of certain plug-ins when minimized but they provide a check box to over ride that issue.

Yes. In my experience 32-bit plugins using jbridge do work with X-Ray even though they didn't work under bitbridge.

For the record and later forum searches:

jBridge installation fixed my problems with crashes due to 32 bit soft synths. 15€ cure for serious headache!

I use it now for all of the IK soft synths, but failed to apply in general i.e. to all of my remaining 32 bit tools.

The following synth / FX had to stay with BitBridge (but all now set to load into different bitbridge servers which seems to help):
VC64 does not work with jBridge (error message).
Fantom and ARX module behave strange and get stuck when jBridged.
Cakewalk Sound Centre gives error at shut-down.
Amped SVX didn't output any sound when jBridged.

x-ray works with jBridge although you need to tick the force refresh GUI option for some plug-in otherwise GUI gets empty ...