If you have a free moment, please try recreating the following scenario. It's DDS (Drop Dead Simple). An interaction between Sonar and soft synths. To wit, patches in my synths mysteriously get screwed up and sound wrong. I specifically have had this happen with Rapture and Alchemy, but I suspect there are other synths that get messed with (I've heard hints in other posts). 

DDS Steps to recreate:

1. Sonar project.
2. Load a Rapture instrument track.
3. In Rapture, select the CUT1 tab of the first element, so you can see it.
4. Load a patch, any patch, that uses CUT1 (EG status is ON). Under 01-Sequences, for example, Analog Nights is a good one, or Arabian Nights, or Artificial Spiral pad.
5. Play some notes, see how it sounds. Nice, huh? (Or horrendous, depending on your musical sensibilities. All good.)
6. Select Sonar Preferences ("P") and under Project, under MIDI, CHECK "Zero Controllers When Play Stops". Select OK. (Since this is a project only setting, don't worry about it upsetting other projects or Sonar in general.)
7. Press the space bar, or whatever you use, to make Sonar play back. You don't even need a midi track (I think). Sonar starts playback, then immediately stops (if you, indeed, do not have any midi track).
8. Examine the CUT1 EG settings of Element 1. Has/have any of the settings changed? Tickle your virtual ivories and play a few notes. Has the sound of your Rapture patch changed noticeably?
9. Reply to this post with your results, post a comment on your facebook wall ("Guess what I just did?") and we're done.  

That's it. Does your Sonar setup surreptitiously (try saying that 10X fast) mess with Rapture settings, with the above-mentioned Preferences setting checked? That's my question.

Although I (and others) have dealt with synth patches mysteriously dropping out and/or changing sound quality for a couple of versions of Sonar before finally figuring out the cause, Cakewalk support can't recreate the scenario I have just described.  (See this spot on my head? Right here? No, over a bit....yeah, right there! What do you see? That's right, nothing! I pulled it all out over this issue.)  So I'm trying to determine the age-old tech support community question: is it just me?

Coffee or beer is my treat for anyone who tries, next time you're in town. Actually, even if you don't try, I'll still treat any fellow Sonar user who drops by. How cool would that be!

It's usually better to leave "Zero Controllers when Play Stops" OFF.  Instead check the next box, "Patch/Controller Searchback Before Play Starts".  This is will ensure, 1) the default controller values will be reverted to regardless of where playback begins, and 2) any controller values in the sequence will be where Sonar sets those values if playback begins at a later measure in the sequence .  Not all synths respond well to these MIDI commands.  There are sometimes anomolies that are often worked around by adding your controller data close to (a beat or so before) the event you want affected by that controller.

JG
www.jerrygerber.com

I forgot to mention that besides being really simple (DDS) to try and recreate this issue, it only takes about a minute to do--literally! So if you have a minute...thanks. (CW support will thank you too!)

I have had a similar horrible experience trying to figure out why the pitch would get lowered by a whole step after some, but not all, playback of a midi track that had a particular Reaktor 5 sound loaded up.

It ended up being that I had to remove the check from the zero controllers box, and as soon as I did that, the problem went away.

I never did figure out what got changed in the settings, although I did look, when this issue was occurring, I just left it alone after removing that check box and it started working again.

I have seen other posts where people have commented that they too have removed that check box to get things working properly again, for various synths.

I hope that helps, 

Bob Bone

Thanks for your comments robert_e_bones. Besides my own issues dealing with this, I have, like you, seen other mentions of this anomaly. That's a big part of the reason I'm trying to encourage some forum users to try to replicate my (Drop Dead Simple to do) test case scenario (see above "DDS" instructions), so that CW support can see/acknowledge/face/whatever the problem and put it on their to-do list--so that this bug/design flaw/feature/whatever can be eradicated.

I'm hoping somebody will find a minute--literally--to try this scenario, to help isolate this long-standing Sonar issue.

PS. Best wishes on you DC gig. I feel a rather tenuous kindred spirit with your adventure. A few years ago I had email discussions with a tech person stationed in the basement of the White House regarding some software that I had written that ended up being used by WH personnel.

czyky


Thanks for your comments robert_e_bones. Besides my own issues dealing with this, I have, like you, seen other mentions of this anomaly. That's a big part of the reason I'm trying to encourage some forum users to try to replicate my (Drop Dead Simple to do) test case scenario (see above "DDS" instructions), so that CW support can see/acknowledge/face/whatever the problem and put it on their to-do list--so that this bug/design flaw/feature/whatever can be eradicated.

I'm hoping somebody will find a minute--literally--to try this scenario, to help isolate this long-standing Sonar issue.

PS. Best wishes on you DC gig. I feel a rather tenuous kindred spirit with your adventure. A few years ago I had email discussions with a tech person stationed in the basement of the White House regarding some software that I had written that ended up being used by WH personnel.

We got to know the Secret Service folks REAL good one day.  I was the senior systems programmer for the DC Y2K effort, and one day one of the network guys did a 'ping' test of all connected devices to see which were still active, and apparently there had once been a terminal connected in the bunker I was in to the FBI system at the headquarters building across the street and above ground.


I will never forget him wandering in to tell me he wasn't sure the physical location of one of the terminals, when all of a sudden the power to the entire bunker was CUT, and a FLOOD of dark-suited FBI's and Secret Service folks came in - they thought that someone was attempting to hack into the FBI systems.  DOH! ")


They were there in like 10 minutes from when the ping went out.  Amazing!


Bob Bone

So....has anybody tried this? I'm trying to help support pinpoint a long-standing bug that has flummoxed a bunch of users over the years. So if, er, when you take a minute to try the above-outlined test case, please make sure to note your results in this thread, so I can pass the results along to CW support (or not pass them along if nobody except me can recreate this result). See the original post for details.

I just tried it. The problem with your recreation steps is that I wasn't aware that I was supposed to be taking note of the settings in CUT1 before I hit the space bar. So I don't know if any of them changed afterwards. Also, you say that Sonar immediately stops playback after starting. It doesn't on my system. The NOW time just keeps going forward in silence until I stop it. I was also confused by the fact that you'd instructed me to create an INSTRUMENT track for Rapture, and then you talk about whether or not I had a MIDI track. If I have an instrument track, then a MIDI track is going to be part of that isn't it? 

But anyway, I did everything I could to order, and I didn't notice any change in the sound of the patch after I'd started playback and then stopped. Apart from that, I was confused by the instructions 

No changes here. Sharke, there's a setting under the TV Options menu to "Stop at Project End." I actually always leave that unchecked because some soft synths have sequencer patches (e.g., Reakor) that require playback with no midi data in the track (which is one of the reasons CW added that option a while ago).

czyky

I'm trying to help support pinpoint a long-standing bug that has flummoxed a bunch of users over the years. 

You imply that the problem may be evident on earlier versions of Sonar, so I tried your test with version 7.  Sorry, nothing to report, i.e. no Rapture settings were changed.

I've got Rapture v1.22 with Sonar v7.0.2 32-bit running on Windows 7 SP1 64-bit.