8 works better for me. faster. same machine, same me, same musicians.

After all, it's not like cake makes any money from us switching to windows 8

hmm...


Maybe no one pays CW directly to stay on top of the latest MS release, but like other developers, the decision is motivated by a judgement that doing so will be more profitable at some point than refining the product they designed for the last Windows version. Undoubtedly they could have fixed more...ahem... "features" that were troublesome in X1 or even a Win7 dedicated X2 if they had not turned their attention to accessing and optimizing new integration with Windows 8. The decades long circle jerk between Microsoft, Intel & their customers, and the software developers has not  only moved computing technology ahead, but provided a very profitable way to leave old customers stuck with obsolete or unsupported products. Like the evil sorcerer tricking Aladdin's wife with the offer of "new lamps for old," the software industrial complex has been able to secure valuable new customers, and transform satisfied old customers into born again buyers, without in every case offering anything of any more real value.

slartabartfast

After all, it's not like cake makes any money from us switching to windows 8

hmm...


Maybe no one pays CW directly to stay on top of the latest MS release, but like other developers, the decision is motivated by a judgement that doing so will be more profitable at some point than refining the product they designed for the last Windows version. Undoubtedly they could have fixed more...ahem... "features" that were troublesome in X1 or even a Win7 dedicated X2 if they had not turned their attention to accessing and optimizing new integration with Windows 8. The decades long circle jerk between Microsoft, Intel & their customers, and the software developers has not  only moved computing technology ahead, but provided a very profitable way to leave old customers stuck with obsolete or unsupported products. Like the evil sorcerer tricking Aladdin's wife with the offer of "new lamps for old," the software industrial complex has been able to secure valuable new customers, and transform satisfied old customers into born again buyers, without in every case offering anything of any more real value.

I am convinced you are in "reds under the beds" territory... I suggest you look at this a different way....imagine cakewalk did nothing to test or validate operation of x1 (available at the time) or x2 (in development) and their performance with win8..
 
now imagine the firestorm of anger protest and redicule at cakewalk if there had been issues.......
 
The prior poster is of course 100% correct... cakewalk gains nothing financially by win8 and its release and you can argue every new win os is a major $$ and time pain in test, development and validation...but its their responsibility to ensure it works.

gswitz


8 works better for me. faster. same machine, same me, same musicians.

Problem is, that's a subjective opinion, and even if it weren't, there are other factors at play.  If you format an XP PC and reinstall the OS, it will be much faster.  Your Windows 8 experience is on a newly installed OS.

Also, some of the things that make Windows 8 seem faster, such as boot time due to the hibernated kernel, don't translate to other things.

There's a guy on the Motunation forums that has found Windows 8 slower across the board for DAW work, based on DAWBench results.

Problem is, Windows 8 has been hyped, but the real-world DAW results just don't bear it out.

The problem with Cakewalk article is - no graphs - and from what I understand it's a release candidate of Win8 (maybe someone can correct me). The problem with the Gearsluts article is that the tests are not exactly extensive.

My own opinion is that Win8 probably balances the CPU load between cores better, with power management switched on and off, and maybe it's a little more efficient with memory. If you don't get performance issues with Win7 you will see no real benefit to upgrading to Win8. The situation is not much different from using a custom PC with all the parts from loads of sources, and a PC off the shelf. If a PC is more powerful are you going to use that power? Or is it better perhaps to buy a PC with a full warranty, where an engineer can come around the next day and supply parts, where you know manufacturers won't be blaming each other when things go wrong (e.g. hey it's not our motheroboard that's freezing it's your graphics card that's doing it! zzzzzz, seen it, been it, done it). If you want the latest right now go ahead and use Win8, expect a little more pain... just like a custom PC may have.
 
If you are running an OS earlier than Win7 the real benefit is you can run X2.
If you are running Win7 don't rush into a Win8 upgrade... you will upgrade one day but you don't have to do it today.... unless you class shiney new OS's as a bit of fun to play with like I do.

Silicon Audio

gswitz


8 works better for me. faster. same machine, same me, same musicians.

Problem is, that's a subjective opinion, and even if it weren't, there are other factors at play.  If you format an XP PC and reinstall the OS, it will be much faster.  Your Windows 8 experience is on a newly installed OS.

Also, some of the things that make Windows 8 seem faster, such as boot time due to the hibernated kernel, don't translate to other things.

There's a guy on the Motunation forums that has found Windows 8 slower across the board for DAW work, based on DAWBench results.

Problem is, Windows 8 has been hyped, but the real-world DAW results just don't bear it out.

Another subjective statement :)
 
In the scope of all the subjective assessment I would rather trust (one of several who have made the same comment) a member here with Sonar than against some *random guy* (no offense intended, but if i dont know him from adam its a random guy) from other forums.. I have seen quotes related to "worse results with DPC" when DPC doesnt even work correctly on win8, also seen worse results with DAW on win8 using motu ultralite, when other posters clearly say there are driver issues with win8 on said interface.. so simply believe what you will.
 
From an engineering perspective, unless the test methodology is clearly stated, deemed applicable and viable, and all results are documented, including driver versioning and hardware, then any commentary is ALL of questionable merit and even if that criteria is passed then there is still a large slice of subjectivity to be applied relative to the applicability of the test methodology to an individuals workflow.
 
 

Mystic38

Silicon Audio

gswitz


8 works better for me. faster. same machine, same me, same musicians.

Problem is, that's a subjective opinion, and even if it weren't, there are other factors at play.  If you format an XP PC and reinstall the OS, it will be much faster.  Your Windows 8 experience is on a newly installed OS.

Also, some of the things that make Windows 8 seem faster, such as boot time due to the hibernated kernel, don't translate to other things.

There's a guy on the Motunation forums that has found Windows 8 slower across the board for DAW work, based on DAWBench results.

Problem is, Windows 8 has been hyped, but the real-world DAW results just don't bear it out.

Another subjective statement :)
 
In the scope of all the subjective assessment I would rather trust (one of several who have made the same comment) a member here with Sonar than against some *random guy* (no offense intended, but if i dont know him from adam its a random guy) from other forums.. I have seen quotes related to "worse results with DPC" when DPC doesnt even work correctly on win8, also seen worse results with DAW on win8 using motu ultralite, when other posters clearly say there are driver issues with win8 on said interface.. so simply believe what you will.
 
From an engineering perspective, unless the test methodology is clearly stated, deemed applicable and viable, and all results are documented, including driver versioning and hardware, then any commentary is ALL of questionable merit and even if that criteria is passed then there is still a large slice of subjectivity to be applied relative to the applicability of the test methodology to an individuals workflow.
 
 

Even if we take that last paragraph into account, based on the CW blog, the difference between Win 7 and Win 8 should be night and day - clearly in real-word tests it is not.  Keep in mind that the author of the benchmark is a well respected professional DAW system builder.

Don't be so quick to assume that our benchmarks mean nothing in the real world. The tests are based on measurable metrics that directly have an impact on how SONAR functions with real world projects at low latency, like kernel performance. We have worked with Intel on reducing SONAR's footprint in the very same areas and have got proven gains. Also there is nothing abstract or subjective about the same project loading more plugins without glitching under identical configured settings. 

The test was done several months ago by one of our QA engineers and it was done on the release candidate of Win8. We'll redo it sometime soon on the latest version of X2 and Win 8 and post updated results.

Nowhere did the analysis mention that the difference would be night and day. Here is the summary of the test:

All the tests above were done running the current shipping version of SONAR X1 with no special Win8 tweaks. The tests ran very smoothly with no problems noted under Win8 using SONAR X1. In fact you could push the system harder under Win8 without getting glitches in audio as compared to Win7. The tests show that despite the controversial changes to Windows, there are some significant benefits even for standard Windows desktop apps running Windows 8. This is great news for existing Windows 7 users who are considering an upgrade to Windows 8.

@Noel Thanks. That was a great post.

Release to Manufacturing (RTM) version of Windows 8 is the full version of Windows 8. It will be patched and upgraded along the normal path like all other versions of Windows. This differs from Alpha and Beta versions that could require re-installations rather than patching.

While I don't isolate things to a single variable, I think my personal experience relevant. A bit like a social science or a political pole, it could be misleading or misinterpreted, but it isn't entirely meaningless.

I'm a pretty talented computer user. I'm a long way from a star, but I make a living at it. I do live on a budget, but I have been an early OS adopter since XP. I installed Beta of Vista and 7 before installing RTM versions before they were released to the public. I get this for free because of my day job.

There have been OSes which I struggled with more. Windows 8 isn't one of them.

@Silicon_Audio I don't love the fast boot feature personally. It has taken some getting used to. Where I used to be able to shutdown with my M-Audio Fasttrack Ultra plugged in and on, I now have to be sure to turn it off first. That said, I don't really shutdown anymore - just hibernate or sleep. It's hard for me to remember to turn off the audio device because I'm usually tired and racing to get to bed as I bounce down a last track, export, use Lame to make an MP3 and post it so my friends can hear. powering down my usb powered interface doesn't always come to mind.
 
Also, I have been using Cakewalk since XP, so for all those Beta, RTM and early installs, I've been installing Cakewalk and testing.

gswitz


@Noel Thanks. That was a great post.

Release to Manufacturing (RTM) version of Windows 8 is the full version of Windows 8. It will be patched and upgraded along the normal path like all other versions of Windows. This differs from Alpha and Beta versions that could require re-installations rather than patching.

While I don't isolate things to a single variable, I think my personal experience relevant. A bit like a social science or a political pole, it could be misleading or misinterpreted, but it isn't entirely meaningless.

I'm a pretty talented computer user. I'm a long way from a star, but I make a living at it. I do live on a budget, but I have been an early OS adopter since XP. I installed Beta of Vista and 7 before installing RTM versions before they were released to the public. I get this for free because of my day job.

There have been OSes which I struggled with more. Windows 8 isn't one of them.

@Silicon_Audio I don't love the fast boot feature personally. It has taken some getting used to. Where I used to be able to shutdown with my M-Audio Fasttrack Ultra plugged in and on, I now have to be sure to turn it off first. That said, I don't really shutdown anymore - just hibernate or sleep. It's hard for me to remember to turn off the audio device because I'm usually tired and racing to get to bed as I bounce down a last track, export, use Lame to make an MP3 and post it so my friends can hear. powering down my usb powered interface doesn't always come to mind.
 
Also, I have been using Cakewalk since XP, so for all those Beta, RTM and early installs, I've been installing Cakewalk and testing.

All good and usefull information,for one like myself,who although a longtime musician,I'm a virtual newb,with anything digital,and especially computers,so it's power users like yourself,that I try to look to for knowledge,Thanks.
Cheers
Bob