Hello,
 
I have been using Sonar for a very long time and have mostly been very happy with it. However, recently Sonar Platinum started taking forever to load everything as each thing happens. I click to open a plugin, then wait at least 10 seconds for it to open. I play a song, wait 5-10 seconds for it to start playing and inevitably drop out partway through. Loading a project with any content could take anywhere from 20 seconds to 10 minutes or so. I set Sonar to autosave every 5 minutes, which isn't normally a problem, but now it takes at least 1-2 minutes to autosave. I could turn that off, but I run the risk of losing my work in the event of a crash. Even loading Sonar without opening a project takes about 3 minutes and 43 seconds to load completely (I timed this).
 
How can I solve this problem?
 
My specs:
 
Sonar Platinum x64 (2017.06)
Windows 7 Home Premium SP1 x64
RAM: 8GB
CPU: Intel Core i5 3.2 GHz
Sound Card: Presonus Firestudio Project (Buffer Size is set to 2048, Safe Mode set to Safe Mode 2)
 

If you use your machine for other things, do they also take a while to do, or are there delays there as well.

Have you run a chkdisk on your drives?  Also, check the system event logs for disk errors.

How long takes the start of windows?
If it takes also a long time then you have probably a broken harddrive - (or your disc is full).
I would first make a check for the speed of the harddisc. If the speed is very low, then your hd is just broken. There are free tools in the internet for measuring your hd.
 

Thank you for your quick replies.

promidi
If you use your machine for other things, do they also take a while to do, or are there delays there as well.

Have you run a chkdisk on your drives?  Also, check the system event logs for disk errors.

I have not yet run a chkdisk on my drives (yet). The software is getting slower, as most programs do with time (I've had the computer for around let's say 3 years or so). However, none from what I can tell have become as excruciatingly slow as Sonar, with the slight exception of ACID Pro 7.0, a DAW I no longer use in part because it automatically scans for plugins, of which I have a large enough an amount that it takes several minutes to start up (I've set Sonar's scanning feature to be manual, so it shouldn't have that problem). However, ACID runs fine once I start it, unlike Sonar in its current state on my computer.

THambrecht
How long takes the start of windows?
If it takes also a long time then you have probably a broken harddrive - (or your disc is full).
I would first make a check for the speed of the harddisc. If the speed is very low, then your hd is just broken. There are free tools in the internet for measuring your hd.
 

While that's good advice I probably should've mentioned I have a raid system set up on the hard drives I keep Sonar and my projects on, so there is little danger of data loss from drive failure. In addition, Windows boots up at the normal speed, so no problems there.

In terms of disc space, I recently cleared 24 GB on my C: drive and 33 GB on my D: drive, though the C: Drive is filled to about 87%.

Could that be at least part of the problem? It has run faster without that extra space, but I think it may have helped a little when I cleared that space, just not enough.

What size is that C drive ?
It could also potentially be a plug in or synth loading samples at an amazingly slow rate.
Have you tried opening a new project with no plug ins and do you notice the same thing ?

Your c drive is way too full. I never let a boot drive get above 50 percent. That's the problem. Windows has no room to function… 

The guideline I have used for thirty-some years is to keep at least 15% free space on a hard drive.  Either way, 15% or 50%, you are starting to have a situation that causes thrashing.
 
I would also look for other programs running in the background (crapware).
 

Audman71
While that's good advice I probably should've mentioned I have a raid system set up on the hard drives I keep Sonar and my projects on, so there is little danger of data loss from drive failure. In addition, Windows boots up at the normal speed, so no problems there.

 
Looks like the C drive is fine, but the RAID health looks suspicious to me.
 
While you may be protected from data loss, you're still susceptible to drive slowdowns if something is failing. It could even be the RAID controller. 

Defrag?
 
Does your AV software hit the top of the list for CPU/disk in task manager during the load?  When Rap Pro came out with its huge samples, I ended up excluding my Samples drive from AV checks, which sped things up considerably.

I've noticed that Windows updates take a while beyond the time the computer says it's updating. Sometimes, even before opening SONAR there will be a ton of hard disk activity. If I try to open SONAR, or for that matter Studio One or any other DAW, the load time is excessive. Once Windows has finished doing its thing, programs load normally.
 
I now take advantage of this - when I boot the computer, that's a great time to clean up, change strings, document projects, etc. By the time I'm finished, so has the Windows bootup.