So after my epic failure yesterday I realized I should figure out when and where to have the interleave buttons activated. Here's what I'm assuming is the way to go about it but if anyone has some suggestions or can let me know if I'm wrong I'd appreciate it. I'm gonna keep all my stereo busses with interleave on. All mono tracks (like guitar, vox, etc) I'll turn it off. Stereo tracks like my stereo BFD import or other stereo imports like samples or projects to be mastered I'll turn it on... and that's all I got. I don't know much about stereo effects but I've seen it said that you usually want interleave on for that stuff too. So yeah... nothing urgent but just want make sure I've got this straight in my head. Cheers, guys. Hope you are all having a good weekend.

I personally think you are on the right track.  Mono sources = mono interleave.  My exceptions come sometimes when I have mono sources that I am treating like a unit in a stereo field like toms in a drum kit.  Sometimes I will bring them into SONAR as a stereo track if I don't think I will be needing to process each piece individually.

I just leave them on all the time. Some plugs like it stereo and what's the difference really? I don't think it's an issue at all although there will be dissenting about it.

@mod bod... Cool, and thanks for the tip. I'm assuming that would be for Pink Floyd style stuff where different sounds are jumping out at you from various directions.

A mono source should have a mono track. 

Buses should be stereo including aux. But nothing is written in stone.

@guitarpima... but I guess don't do what I did and turn it off on all busses (including the Master). I wasted a lot of time learning that lesson. lol

Right on, John. Looks like I've got this somewhat under control now. One of those simple but oh so important concepts. ;-)

To be honest, this isn't something to stress about, in my opinion.  In general, you should choose stereo, because you could have a mono guitar track with a ping pong delay, for example.  If your track is set to mono, the panning delay will sum to the center.   So, unless you have a specific reason to sum a stereo signal to mono and then pan, I'd go with stereo all the time.

Good to know, Bill. I wasn't sure if it would result in a deceiving mix or some other wackiness but if it's a set it and forget type scenario I'll just go with that until I learn more. Thanks again for your help yesterday. That really saved the project from getting scrapped. Might actually get the bugger done today. :-)

  the biggest question for you x2 guys is does the interleave work now? Back when I was using X1 (or even 8.5) on the x64 machine it wouldn't save properly (would always open in mono, would always render in mono)